Selling Suits

Lawyers can advertise on TV

An earnest-looking man in a conservative suit comes on the television screen. No, he is not the fellow from H & R Block offering you another way to save tax dollars or even a used-car salesman trying to appear sincere. He is a lawyer, offering you a good price for a divorce, a will or a suit of almost any kind.

The idea of peddling legal services over the tube between deodorant and beer ads is enough to make many lawyers wince. Advertising was banned by bar associations as "unprofessional" until last year, when the Supreme Court struck down that prohibition as unconstitutional. The American Bar Association immediately went along as far as newspaper, magazine and radio ads were concerned but held off on TV. Last week, as some 10,000 lawyers met in New York City for the association's annual convention, that obstacle fell away too. By a vote of 141 to 69, the A.B.A.'s House of Delegates agreed to approve TV advertising, as long as it is "presented in a dignified manner." The decision will probably prod the 43 state bar associations that do not already allow TV advertising to do likewise.

The debate at the A.B.A. Convention, however, was heated. Quoting from Thomas Jefferson's diary reference to "soliciting pettifoggers," Joe Stamper of Antlers, Okla., urged his fellow lawyers not to "equate legal services with soap and breakfast foods." But Roger Brosnahan, chairman of the A.B.A.'s Commission on Advertising, argued that "television advertising is not abused where it is permitted. The purpose of legal advertising is not to enhance the incomes of lawyers but to inform the public."

Well, it probably will wind up doing both. Long accustomed to serving the small percentage of the population that can afford high legal fees, the profession --glutted with new lawyers--is slowly entering an age of providing mass legal services and charging less for them. Advertising on TV and elsewhere will no doubt speed up that process.

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