ABSTRACT
It is impossible to deny (at least with any conviction) the fact that law has come to play an increasingly obvious and important role in our society (c/. Taylor 1986). Lawrence Friedman summed it up this way:
One of the most striking aspects of American society, to natives and foreigners alike, is the way law and the legal system seem to dominate public life—and, apparently, much private life as well. There [is] … an extraordinary number of lawyers in this country; and they seem to be multiplying like rabbits. In general, law appears to be growing at an alarming pace. If an outside observer took the daily newspaper as a rough guide to events and situations that worry or excite Americans, he would conclude that sports and law are the two main topics of interest in the country. And law has even been creeping into the sports pages, with stories about contracts for basketball players, court struggles over team franchises, and so on. Any reader can make the test for herself, picking up at random any copy of any newspaper, any day. Almost every domestic story has a legal angle. Almost every story mentions a judge, a court, a rule, the police, the state legislature, Congress, some administrative agency, somebody suing somebody—some aspect of law, some rule or regulation. (Friedman 1985b, 3)
