A top conservative justice on the Supreme Court on Thursday challenged critics who have claimed the court is abusing the so-called shadow docket process. The process unfolds when the court is petitioned to make a quick decision by litigants who believe their cases have been wrongly decided by a lower court. The decisions are issued without oral arguments or other briefings. They’re meant to be temporary while an appeal is made. The court recently made three such decisions. Justices ruled against halting the pro-life Texas law, reinstated the previous administration’s “Remain in Mexico” program, and rejected a Biden administration rule that was blocking evictions in most of the country. “Our decisions in these three emergency matters have been criticized by those who think we should have decided them the other way, and I have no trouble with fair criticism of the substance of those decisions,” Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito, a …