Lewis says The Crimson honed his journalism skills. "You're certainly the product of your experiences [and] it was The Crimson that shaped me," he says.

"In my day, there were many fewer editors and we worked very hard," he says. "I was a typical Crimson editor: I was there four days a week and did very little classwork."

Nevertheless, he graduated with honors in English in 1948.

Lewis remembers a prank he and his fellow editors played during the 1947 Harvard football game: a parody of The Dartmouth distributed in Hanover the day of the game.

"The banner headline was 'Seven Indian Starters Poisoned on Eve of Game," he says. "I remember the subhead because I loved it so much: 'Candy ration proves toxic.'"

Although nostalgic for his college years, Lewis says Harvard has changed for the better in many ways in the last few decades.

"Now of course, it's racially, ethnically, geographically and economically mixed in a wonderful way. I think that's an immense thing," he says. "I also think the move toward gender desegregation...is a tremendous thing."

Lewis has worked for various newspapers besides the Times and written three books on law and society: Gideon's Trumpet, about the landmark Supreme Court case; Portrait of a Decade, about changes in American race relations; and Make No Law: The Sullivan Case and the First Amendment.

The columnist lives in Boston. "I decided I couldn't live in D.C. because I couldn't be tough enough if I were chummy with the Congressmen. I suppose it was my sense of the Law School that led me to live here," he says, but adds that recently, "there's been another reason."

Lewis is married to Margaret H. Marshall, former Harvard vice-president and general counsel. Marshall is now Associate Justice of the Massachusetts State Supreme Court.

After more than 50 years of journalism, Lewis concedes that he might eventually slow down. "Nothing goes on forever," he says, but adds there is little reason for him to retire, since his wife's career would keep the couple in the public eye.

From the comfort of his Martha's Vineyard retreat this past Memorial Day's weekend, Lewis said he plans to keep writing.

"It would be hard to hide away in a Mediterranean villa because of what my wife does," he says.