The Supreme Court ended its term with the conservative justices bending the law sharply rightward in a series of momentous decisions on abortion, gun rights, environmental regulations and religious rights that will reverberate for decades. The decisions represent triumphs for a conservative legal movement that has sought for decades to remake American law and found its moment in a high court with a bolstered 6-3 conservative tilt that took on issues long linked to Republican policies. The term that ended Thursday showed that majority “really flexing its muscle” in the cases it selected and the decisions it issued, said Josh Blackman, a professor at South Texas College of Law Houston. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who has expressed a desire to maintain the court’s reputation as nonpartisan, highlighted that shift when he criticized his fellow conservatives for an abortion case decision that is a “serious jolt to the legal system.”But five justices, including three Donald Trump appointees, voted to undo the 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade and wipe out the constitutional right to abortion, an outcome the conservative legal movement had sought for decades.
