NOTEWORTHY DEATH

Correction: Anthony Lewis, a former New York Times reporter and columnist, began writing a column for the paper in 1969. It moved to the op-ed page when the op-ed page was created in 1970. His New York Times obituary incorrectly stated the first year that the column appeared on the op-ed page.

Pulitzer Prize-winning chronicler of law

Anthony Lewis, a former New York Times reporter and columnist whose work won two Pulitzer Prizes and transformed American legal journalism, died on Monday at his home in Cambridge, Mass. He was 85.

The cause was complications of renal and heart failure, said his wife, Margaret Marshall, a retired chief justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court.

Lewis brought passionate engagement to his two great themes: justice and the role of the press in a democracy. His column, called “At Home Abroad” or “Abroad at Home” depending on where he was writing from, appeared on the op-ed page of The Times from 1969 to 2001.

“He brought context to the law,” said Ronald K.L. Collins, a scholar at the University of Washington who compiled a bibliography of Lewis’ work. “He had an incredible talent in making the law not only intelligible but also in making it compelling.”

Lewis wrote several books, two of them classic accounts of landmark decisions of the Warren court, which he revered. Chief Justice Earl Warren led the Supreme Court from 1953 to 1969.

One of those books, Gideon’s Trumpet, concerned Gideon v. Wainwright, the 1963 decision that guaranteed lawyers to poor defendants charged with serious crimes. It has never been out of print since it was published in 1964. In 1991, Lewis published Make No Law, an account of New York Times v. Sullivan, the 1964 Supreme Court decision that revolutionized U.S. libel law.

Joseph Anthony Lewis was born in New York City on March 27, 1927. Lewis’ first marriage, to Linda J. Rannells, ended in divorce. The couple had three children, Eliza, David and Mia, who survive him, along with seven grandchildren.

Lewis married Marshall in 1984. Marshall, who wrote the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court’s landmark 2003 decision recognizing a right to same-sex marriage, stepped down in 2010 to care for her husband.

Northwest Arkansas, Pages 8 on 03/26/2013

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