I can't imagine not having your own legal staff. I've always had my own legal staff. I've always been a lawyer. It did not make sense to me not to have my own legal staff.
There are day-to-day legal questions you have to answer or deal with that have nothing to do with inquiries. Even for that purpose, one needs a legal staff, especially when we have moved from a code to an act. That entered it squarely into the legal domain.