Interesting points.
Artificial nutrition and hydration ought to be legally classified as ordinary care and not as extraordinary medical procedures. I think such a referendum (or a campaign directed at the FL legislature) is essential in EVERY state to prevent a recurrence of the fate suffered by Terri Schiavo.
I don't know Randall Terry's strategic or tactical take on this point. Maybe he thought there wasn't enough time to do this and --- conscious that the clock was ticking --- he decided that a dramatic intervention via the governor was the best ope to save Mrs. Schiavo's life?
But certainly I think that a push for this revision of the Florida statutes should be undertaken now.
Do you agree or disagree with this?
And does anybody know if this is being done --- either as a referendum or as a campaign directed toward the legislature?
Floridians also passed a Constitutional right to privacy amendmendment in the 80's. Any attempt to change the wording of medical directives will have to take that law into account.
It might be easier to get legislation declaring the choice to discontinue medical treatment to be the same as committing suicide...which is already governed by Fl. Law.
I don't think that option is politically viable though. The point is that there were better, more effective ways to affect the outcome then the Schindler advisors utilized.
Justice Scalia, concurring.
The various opinions in this case portray quite clearly the difficult, indeed agonizing, questions that are presented by the constantly increasing power of science to keep the human body alive for longer than any reasonable person would want to inhabit it. The States have begun to grapple with these problems through legislation. I am concerned, from the tenor of today’s opinions, that we are poised to confuse that enterprise as successfully as we have confused the enterprise of legislating concerning abortion---requiring it to be conducted against a background of federal constitutional imperatives that are unknown because they are being newly crafted from Term to Term. That would be a great misfortune.
While I agree with the Court’s analysis today, and therefore join in its opinion, I would have preferred that we announce, clearly and promptly, that the federal courts have no business in this field; that American law has always accorded the State the power to prevent, by force if necessary, suicide---including suicide by refusing to take appropriate measures necessary to preserve one’s life; that the point at which life becomes "worthless," and the point at which the means necessary to preserve it become "extraordinary" or "inappropriate," are neither set forth in the Constitution nor known to the nine Justices of this Court any better than they are known to nine people picked at random from the Kansas City telephone directory; and hence, that even when it is demonstrated by clear and convincing evidence that a patient no longer wishes certain measures to be taken to preserve her life, it is up to the citizens of Missouri to decide, through their elected representatives, whether that wish will be honored. It is quite impossible (because the Constitution says nothing about the matter) that those citizens will decide upon a line less lawful than the one we would choose; and it is unlikely (because we know no more about "life-and-death" than they do) that they will decide upon a line less reasonable. ...
Cruzan v. Director, Missouri Health Department
497 U.S. 261; 110 S.Ct. 2841; 111 L. Ed.2d 224 (1990)