New York Times Supreme Court correspondent Adam Liptak on the conservative nature of John Roberts’ Court: “The Burger court and the Rehnquist court, which sat for about 35 years, fairly consistently were ruling in a conservative direction about 55 percent of the time. That was a very, very sharp turn to the right from the Warren court, the famously liberal court that preceded it, which was at 34 percent [conservative]. And the Roberts court, which has now finished five years, now moves an additional increment to the right. It’s now at 58 percent — I stress, not a huge move, but a discernable move in a period where there was nothing like this. And the term that ended last year, the court is at 65 percent conservative. So you do see by these measurements, the court is noticeably more conservative than even the conservative courts that preceded it.”

Tomorrow: We talk about the Roberts court with New York Times Supreme Court correspondent Adam Liptak. He’s recently written about how the Roberts court has become the most conservative one in living memory, and that several of the court’s written decisions have been unusually long, but lacking in clarity.