"It’s not obvious that he changed at all," Feldman said. "The world changed around him—and conservatism changed around him."

Before joining the Supreme Court, Souter served on the New Hampshire Supreme Court and as an Associate Attorney General in the state. He was briefly on the U.S. Court of Appeals before being appointed to the nation’s highest court.

According to media reports when he stepped down, Souter never felt completely comfortable in Washington. He had always preferred his farm in New Hampshire, and his retirement came as a welcome relief from a city from which he had largely grown distant.

Souter—who was replaced on the court by Sonia M. Sotomayor—said at a Constitution Day event last September that he planned to undertake a variety of part-time jobs, such as returning to the First Circuit in Boston, where he spent just one day hearing cases before starting his tenure at the Supreme Court.

Souter follows in a long line of distinguished commencement day speakers that most recently have included Secretary of Energy Steven Chu, author J.K. Rowling, and Microsoft founder Bill Gates.

—Staff writer Elias J. Groll can be reached at egroll@fas.harvard.edu.

—Staff writer William N. White can be reached at wwhite@fas.harvard.edu.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

CORRECTION: February 25, 2010

Due to an editing error, an original version of the Feb. 9 news article "David H. Souter To Deliver Address at Harvard's 2010 Commencement" stated that former U.S. Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter ’61 retired to his family farmhouse in Weare, N.H. after stepping down from the high court in June. In fact, though Souter was known to frequently return to Weare during his tenure on the court, upon retirement he bought a house in nearby Hopkinton, where he now lives, according to the New York Times.