[dinoparty]

But if the lawyer had not prevented you from using the prods, then the agency could have been sued or prosecuted. Therefore, by informing you of the law, the lawyers were protecting the agency.

(leaving out the sovereign immunity aspect, of course)

[muawiyah]

Still, the question was quite complex. To start with the agency had "sovereign immunity" so no one could have sued us over the use of "cattle prods" to herd customers toward open windows.

Lawyers, in effect, called upon precedent and hoary principles of ancient laws to guide us to the correct answer ~ which given our druthers, we'd have rejected as not having "real teeth" in it!