[2][6] He studied law at Lyme, Connecticut, under his uncle, Judge Matthew Griswold, and was admitted to the bar in 1814.

[2] The General Assembly elected Lane to a seat on the Ohio Supreme Court on December 18, 1830, for a seven-year term.

He was elected to two more terms, but tendered his resignation to Governor Thomas W. Bartley on December 20, 1844, with an effective date of February 16, 1845.

After retiring from the court, he partnered with his son, William G. Lane and Walter F. Stone in that place in a law practice.

[12] In November 1855, Lane was elected Counsel and Resident Director of the Illinois Central Railroad, and removed to Chicago, staying in that office until March 16, 1859.

[13] On March 23, 1859, Lane embarked at Boston, Massachusetts, on the steamer Arabia, bound for Liverpool, England.

[14] Lane devoted his remaining years at Sandusky to studies in his personal library of 4000 books, in the English, French and German languages.

He had penetrating sagacity and rare intellectual powers, was profoundly versed in the law, and was an omnivorous reader of literature.

On the bench he shunned display of learning, and was for the most part content with stating the facts and principles of law which controlled the case; and his opinions, concise, direct, and cogent are conspicuous in the reports for their simplicity and strength.He came to the Bar when the jurisprudence of Ohio was yet not settled, and brought to its cultivation great general ability, patient research, both in civil and common law and logical power and acumen.