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Eight lawyers practiced in Willmar when attorney George Hulstrand, Sr., first opened his office. All worked solo, all offered a range of services and all knew each other.

Today, Hulstrand estimates that more than 35 attorneys practice in the city, including those in the growing area of public service. Partnerships of two or more lawyers are the norm, specialization is increasing, and professional familiarity is absent.

These are a few results of what attorneys interviewed in southwest Minnesota view as drastic and often negative transformations in the practice of law witnessed by them in the last quarter century. A tightening squeeze on rural practices in turn is altering service to clients, they said.

"I think most lawyers tend to be associated with firms just because of the expense of being in solo practice. I think there's going to be more and more specialization, and I think that's bad because people don't live specialized lives. Law needs not only depth, it also needs breadth," Hulstrand said. "If it goes on like this, you're going to have not lawyers, but technicians."

The lifting in the mid seventies of a prohibition on legal advertising is acknowledged among rural attorneys as one of the greatest detriments to them and to clients. Personal injury lawyers led the solicitations, followed by a host of others, said Daniel Giles, a partner with the Marshall law firm of Christianson, Stoneberg, Giles & Stroup, P.A.

"Competition among big firms, which possess money and manpower, is driving them into rural areas to drum up business through advertising and cold calls, and by attending conferences to make business connections," said Paul Stoneberg, another partner with the Marshall firm. "They're acting a lot like car salesmen and selling themselves as the end-all, be-all on complex projects. Most anybody could do these, but they've done a good job of selling it."

As a result, much of Marshall's corporate legal work, particularly banking, now goes to New Ulm, or to the Twin Cities, where some clients perceive attorneys' abilities are greater, Stoneberg said.

"We're in this dogfight with bigger firms out of the cities who have more money, who are taking the bigger business, the cream of the business, and we're in this downward spiral," Stoneberg said. "Local attorneys are cut out of a lot of the local business they historically did, so, now they're scrambling to fill other avenues. You're having a shakeout in the practice in terms of quantity and quality of work."

Additionally, some services previously handled by attorneys now are performed elsewhere. For instance, title companies typically handle loan closings, Giles said.

"On the family [law] side, everyone is in a frenzy doing that work because there's lots of volume, which is a symptom of the breakdown of society," Stoneberg said.

Historically, lawyers took positions on moral issues and acted as a social conscience for their clients, Giles said. They served as state legislators, performed community service and represented their share of indigent clients. Public defenders now represent the latter, and attorneys lack the time to do the former.

"Attorneys used to make decent money with less hours. We now have attorneys grinding out huge hours to make, in comparison, less money than they did in the fifties and sixties," Stoneberg said. "They can't devote the correct time to clients sometimes, and they can't break off to do community work. It's more for less, it's more with less, and it's greater complexity, greater speed and greater expectation."

Technology is partly to blame for the current frantic pace, Stoneberg said.

"When I started in Clarkfield in 1986, there were no computers, no fax machines, and no e-mail or voicemail. All this technology has done is speed up the system, and I'm not so sure in the legal system speeding up really helps a thing," Stoneberg said.

Some attorneys refuse complex cases that pose risks, or that are likely to involve long hours, Giles said. This puts an increasing burden on a shrinking number of lawyers willing to do this work. Meanwhile, new attorneys often bypass rural areas when looking for jobs.

"This reflects a problem with the education of attorneys," Giles said. "There's a huge impression left with students that the only way to be a lawyer is to be in a firm. It means that the smalltown practice is no longer attractive because it's no longer respected by law schools, or by law school students."

Daniel Gislason, a partner with the New Ulm firm of Gislason & Hunter, LLP, said that even though the firm attracts young lawyers, it can't always keep them. Some Minneapolis firms recruit nationwide, offering starting pay of $105,000. Unable to compete on this basis, the firm emphasizes quality of life and small firm practice, he said. However, the remote location and finding work for spouses present problems.

"Because we have become specialized, we are training people in specialized areas," Gislason said. "These people have now become attractive to Twin City practices to raid. There's no honor anymore."

Some blame rests on law office management "gurus" who counseled law firms to run their offices as a business, rather than as a profession, Gislason said.

"As soon as you do that, professional courtesies are gone," Gislason said. "The tobacco cases are a good example of the dog-eat-dog, win-at-any-cost philosophy that is now part of the American culture. I think rural Minnesota has done very well deterring that, but it hasn't done it completely.

"We try very hard to get along and have professionalism and camaraderie. But this is changing in rural areas because we don't see each other enough, we're not in court enough anymore. Everything is settled through mediation, or magistrates."

The firm has grown from seven, to about 30 attorneys since Gislason joined in 1972. It also maintains offices in Minneapolis, Mankato and Maple Grove. While some corporate and financial legal work goes to the Twin Cities, the firm attracts its share of this work in part because of its Minneapolis presence and its 20-year history of holding banking seminars on agriculture lending, Gislason said.

"We do this for two reasons: We learn more, and we have contact with the market," Gislason said.

Patrick Costello of Muir, Costello & Carlson in Lakefield knows of rural attorneys who want to sell their practices and retire but are unable to find buyers. Hiring new attorneys is equally difficult.

"We strike out time and time again in recruiting and find that urban opportunities are what's attractive to law students," Costello said. "What's really disgusting is a very talented lawyer with 20, 25 years of experience out here in the rural area knowing that [he could earn] not twice as much in Minneapolis, but three times as much, and you say, do I owe it to my wife and kids, and their college education to just relocate?"

The firm, established in the 1890s, once claimed eight partners. Most of them left in the 1980s, when no-fault insurance and advertising by Twin City lawyers took a big bite out of trial work, Costello said.

"I think I'm the last guy who's ever going to practice law in Lakefield, Minn. That means that western Jackson County, when I retire, or drop dead, will probably be driving to Windom, Worthington and Jackson because they can't get their work done locally anymore. It's like our whole culture on the Great Plains," Costello said. "When I first got here, there was a great

deal of collegiality. You could call up competitors and take off in the afternoon and have lunch. This is unheard of today."

While technology is partly to blame for a lack of contact and a pace that limits lawyers' time to reflect on their work, it also enhances research and other aspects of the job, Costello said. And the ability to stay current with new computer software is one advantage small rural practices hold over large firms because of their lower overhead.

Computers have revolutionized the practice at the Worthington firm of Hedeen, Hughes & Wetering, founded in 1923, said William Hedeen.

"It's made the processing of documents faster, it reduces the cost to the client and you produce a much better product," Hedeen said.

Criminal cases predominate in local courts, but public defenders and prosecutors, rather than private attorneys handle many of these, Hedeen said. Civil litigation cases dropped off 10, or 15 years ago, primarily the result of no-fault automobile insurance.

"I think you'll be seeing even less litigation [in the future]. And I think you're going to see a drop in the whole area of estate planning and the rest because we're looking at abolishing estate tax as of 2010, unless congress changes it," Hedeen said. "Years ago, a solo practitioner would

litigate, do real estate work, do estate work, and even sometimes defend criminals. But that's a thing of the past, certainly within the last 25 years. The need to specialize has become a fact of life."

While advertising by big firms lures some business away, other cases, such as medical malpractice, sometimes are referred away, Hedeen said. "An awful lot of that goes to certain firms in the Twin Cities, one of the reasons being the local lawyer doesn't want to sue the local doctor who may happen to be his golf partner, or his bridge partner," Hedeen said.

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