Having maligned the legal profession last week, I hope to return to grace with some high praise for one branch of the species.

It may be hyperbolic to refer to the legal counsels of publishing companies as “grey eminences,” a term one usually assigns to the shadowy power brokers who manipulate the controls of vast corporate or political networks. But it would be no exaggeration to state that tremendous influence resides in the hands of the attorneys who counsel publishing executives on the legal aspects of their companies’ operations. Few significant corporate decisions are made without clearance by a publisher’s lawyers, and no book is published that has not somehow been affected by procedures originating in the firm’s legal department. To the degree that the men and women of those departments are seldom colorful, their eminence may indeed be depicted as grey. But it must never be underestimated, because the power they wield over the fate of your book is both total and final. However headstrong the chief operating officer of a publishing company may be, he or she will override a house counsel’s advice at the utmost peril.

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