Templating has a very long history in law: law firms were strongholds of WordPerfect against MS Word due to WP's non-WYSIWYG, macro/batch-friendly nature, and i

Templating has a very long history in law: law firms were strongholds of WordPerfect against MS Word due to WP's non-WYSIWYG, macro/batch-friendly nature, and insurance companies used and still use SGML (SCRIPT/VS, DCF, GML on z/OS) for printing customized contracts and account statements. Early full-text databases for cases and annotations etc. also evolved in law. SGML in particular allows full markdown and custom notational conventions for referencing legal code/precedents without resorting to ad-hoc template "engines"; it was even designed by a lawyer.