Since then, Opperman has stayed within the Democratic party -- but his politics have served his self-interest as well as the public good. He worked for years as a successful corporate and trial lawyer, earning a reputation as of the "most influential lawyers in America," before getting involved in the family business. West Publishing, run by his father Dwight, was the nation's largest publisher of law materials and legal research tools.

Over the years, Opperman has also made generous campaign contributions the Democrats. In 1993, Bill Clinton appointed him to a presidential advisory committee investigating copyright and patent law -- an issue of critical important to Opperman's company. The administration later decided to extend copyrights protection to the Internet, where much of West's legal information was accessed.

The following year, Opperman met with White House officials to express concern over government plans to establish an online legal research system that would compete with West. The Justice Department later dropped the plans.

In 1995 and 1996, Opperman and his wife Darin gave the Democrats at least $353,000 to help re-elect President Clinton. In 1996, Opperman sold West Publishing to the Toronto-based Thompson Corp. for $3.4 billion in cash. The Justice Department imposed only limited restrictions on the sale, even though it merged the two largest legal publishers. Senate Republicans investigated the decision, suspecting that Opperman had received a "quid pro quo" in return for his contributions, but the inquiry never proved any wrongdoing, and Opperman never strayed from his declarations of innocence. "I have never been involved in anything illegal or improper in any way," he told reporters.

In 1999, Opperman toyed with a run for the Senate. He was on a first-name basis with Al Gore and Bill Clinton, and his own checks already bankrolled much of the Democratic Party in Minnesota. In the end, however, he decided he wasn't ready to move his family to Washington, D.C.

But Opperman need not worry about being on the losing side of the last election. His father, who is worth an estimated $1 billion, tends to support the GOP -- a schism that creates little friction with his son. "We differ on a lot of political issues, but they are not unfriendly differences," Dwight once explained. "I have political friends, he has political friends, and so even if [the government] changes, we have someone in control."