LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

The U.S. Supreme Court justices ruled on a number of significant cases on Monday, the last day of the term. They will begin to hear cases again Oct. 2. Among the developments:

There had been speculation that Justice Anthony Kennedy could reveal his retirement, but the court recessed without any announcement from Kennedy. Kennedy turns 81 next month and has been on the court for nearly 30 years. His retirement would give President Donald Trump his second high court pick.

The justices sent back to a lower court a case involving the shooting of a Mexican teenager by a U.S. Border Patrol agent. The question the court was asked to resolve was whether the parents of the teen could sue in U.S. courts. The justices told a federal appeals court to take account of a Supreme Court ruling last week that limits damages claims against high-ranking U.S. officials.

The Supreme Court has rejected a major 2nd Amendment challenge to California’s strict limits on carrying concealed guns in public. The justices turned away an appeal from gun rights advocates who contended most law-abiding gun owners in San Diego, Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay area are being wrongly denied permits to carry a weapon when they leave home.

To many religious communities, the question of whether two same-sex people can or should be the parents of a child is a question of faith. But to the Supreme Court, as of Monday, it’s a question of rights. The court ruled that the rights of marriage, which it guaranteed equally to straight and gay couples in 2015’s landmark Obergefell v. Hodges, include the right to have both partners in the marriage listed on the child’s birth certificate. The court struck down an Arkansas law.

The Supreme Court has ruled against a Texas death row inmate who said his lawyers failed to challenge a faulty jury instruction at his trial and on appeal. The justices ruled 5-4 on Monday that Erick Davila could not bring a claim that his appeals lawyer was ineffective for failing to challenge the work of his trial lawyer. Davila was convicted in 2009 of the shooting deaths of a 5-year-old girl and her grandmother at a children’s birthday party in Fort Worth.