The battle revolves around the dealings of Senator Wayne R. Bryant, 59, a Democrat from Camden who has been a legislator for a quarter century. For months, state and federal investigators have been looking into whether Mr. Bryant improperly steered millions of dollars in state grants to the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey in exchange for a $38,000-a-year position there in which a federal monitor recently said Mr. Bryant did ''little to no work.''

Then, on Sunday, The Star-Ledger of Newark reported that Christopher J. Christie, the United States attorney for New Jersey, had issued a broad subpoena to the state's Office of Legislative Services, which functions as the Legislature's counsel and administrative arm, seeking records related to millions of dollars in state grants. The article said the subpoena requested documents ''pertaining to conflicts of interest for lawmakers and staffers.''

It also reported that the Legislature had hired an outside lawyer, Edward J. Dauber, a former federal prosecutor and executive assistant attorney general in New Jersey, and that the two sides were due to appear before a federal judge in Trenton, in a secret session, on Wednesday.

Mr. Dauber did not return a call to his private law office in Newark on Monday. Albert Porroni, executive director of the Office of Legislative Services, did not respond to a telephone message at his home or an e-mail request for an interview. A spokesman for Mr. Christie, who is based in Newark, declined to comment. A spokesman for Senate President Richard J. Codey, a Democrat, said Mr. Codey was unavailable.

A lawyer involved in the investigation said it might include a handful of legislators with connections to Mr. Bryant, and some of the state grants Mr. Bryant requested for his district.

Gov. Jon S. Corzine, a Democrat, said at a news conference here in Newark on domestic security that, assuming there was sufficient separation of powers between the judicial and legislative branches, he supported Mr. Christie's right to obtain any relevant documents.

''I think we need to do as much as we can to clean up the challenges we have to the ethical environment we have in this state,'' Governor Corzine said. ''I think that's what the U.S. attorney is trying to do, and I support it.''

Still, on a day in which state government was closed for Lincoln's Birthday, there was no shortage of response from legislators on both sides of the aisle. In general, many Republicans expressed indignation that anyone would challenge the subpoenas, while many Democrats said they believed that Mr. Bryant was the sole target of Mr. Christie's inquiry.

''I don't know about the legalities of this, but it would seem to me that if the U.S. attorney is interested in anything specific, he should start there,'' said Senator Loretta Weinberg, a Democrat from Bergen County. ''This sounds so broad.''

Senator Ellen Karcher, a Democrat from Monmouth County who has been one of the Legislature's chief advocates of changes in ethics rules, said: ''As a student of the institution of the Legislature, I kind of get where they're coming from, in defending the protocols we have. But my experience with the U.S. attorney's office is that when they are looking into something, there's a there there.''

The Star-Ledger article described legal records in which the Office of Legislative Services argued that the requested documents were protected under lawyer-client privilege. But Assemblyman Bill Baroni, a Republican from Mercer County who is also a law professor at Seton Hall University, dismissed that notion. ''To make up an argument over lawyer-client privilege smells like a cover-up,'' he said. ''Chris Christie has a track record of bipartisan prosecution of corrupt officials.''

It is hardly unusual for prosecutors to tangle with defense lawyers over whether certain documents or communications should be protected by lawyer-client privilege. The issue was on display during the investigation of President Bill Clinton by Kenneth W. Starr, the independent counsel, and during a federal prosecutor's investigation of former Gov. George Ryan of Illinois, who was convicted of corruption last year.

It would be unusual for Mr. Christie to seek a blanket inquiry into all legislators rather than a targeted one, according to Ricardo Solano Jr., a former federal prosecutor in Mr. Christie's office who is now in private practice.

As for Mr. Bryant, who could not be reached on Monday, several Democratic officials said he is not planning to run for re-election.

Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company

David W. Chen reported from Newark and Ronald Smothers from Trenton. David Kocieniewski contributed reporting.