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DISCOVERY. Designed to eliminate the surprise element (trial by ambush) in civil suits, discovery has been greatly expanded since the 1940s. It allows a party to delay endlessly by demanding often absurdly peripheral information "relating to" the lawsuit. The wear-'em-down philosophy was articulated by Cravath, Swaine & Moore Senior Partner Bruce Bromley in a speech before an appreciative audience of Stanford law students 20 years ago: "I was born, I think, to be a protractor ... I could take the simplest antitrust case and protract it for the defense almost to infinity ... [One case] lasted 14 years ... Despite 50,000 pages of testimony, there really wasn't any dispute about the facts ... We won that case, and, as you know, my firm's meter was running all the time—every month for 14 years."

AMBULANCE CHASING. Most modern practitioners are too sophisticated to run after personal-injury victims themselves; instead, they hire private investigators, insurance adjusters and friendly policemen to do so. But some lawyers have been known to "solicit"—scout for plaintiffs —in class actions.

LAWYER SUITS. After a Government agency brands a particular action as illegal—an increasingly familiar story in regulation-happy Washington —a hungry group of lawyers may quickly file a lawsuit on behalf of a class of aggrieved people. Hastily preparing their case (sometimes by simply copying the Government's complaint), they settle as soon as they can justify a large legal fee, regardless of whether all the injured members of the class have been adequately compensated.

CONTINGENCY FEE. Most personal-injury cases are taken by lawyers for a percentage of the gross award, often one-third if the matter is settled before trial, perhaps 40% if a costly, risky, laborious trial is actually necessary. This creates a potential divergence of interest between lawyer and client. Since the potential additional reward for trial work may not be worthwhile, many attorneys encourage their clients to accept even an unreasonably low offer from an insurer.

TAX PRACTICE. According to Sidney Roberts, a New York tax lawyer, there is a "Gresham's law of tax practice" in which daring practitioners drive out the more conservative ones. The reason is obvious: clients want to pay as little as possible to the tax collector without actually breaking the law. Although most lawyers deny it, some firms charge clients a percentage of taxes saved. Boston's Hale and Dorr, having saved a client $4.5 million in taxes, submitted a bill for $760,000 for 2,000 hours' work —a cool $380 an hour. A court upheld the bill.

DIVORCE. The days when an attorney could charge $400 to $1,000 for an uncontested marital split, where the major work was less than an hour's typing by a secretary, is gradually ending with the advent of advertising, legal clinics and do-it-yourself divorces. But plenty of opportunity for abuse remains. In major cities especially, matrimonial "bombers" so vigorously represent their clients' interests that once friendly marriage partners become bitter enemies fighting a protracted court battle. The fee is suitably high.