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Check out this from www.philly.com. I had to subscribe to get this. I think that it's too early to for so called journalists to say there won't be any changes. I think this writer consulted left wing, eutha-nazis to write this piece. Louisiana is moving in the right direction. It's summertime. I think we are going to make progress even though the pro-death lobby did get a decent head start in the killing business.

Posted on Thu, Jul. 21, 2005

Terri Schiavo case yields little legislative action

By Larry Fish

Inquirer Staff Writer

The drama of the Terri Schiavo case brought unprecedented attention to end-of-life issues from activists and lawmakers, but there has been relatively little legislative reaction in the 16 weeks since she died.

A handful of state laws, mostly dealing with peripheral matters, have resulted from the globally watched case and the passions it evoked. No federal legislation has resulted.

Any impact in the voting booth is still unknown.

The Schiavo effect "may be a very transitory one. It's hard to tell right now," said Charles Sabatino, director of the American Bar Association's committee on law and aging.

Polls taken in the spring showed that a majority of voters did not approve of political intervention into the case, giving lawmakers little incentive to revisit it.

For much of the 15 years that Terri Schiavo was in a vegetative state, her husband and legal guardian, Michael Schiavo, fought with her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, over her care.

Despite a last-minute bill passed by Congress before her death March 31, courts upheld Michael Schiavo's decision to withdraw his wife's feeding tube. An autopsy found that the original damage to her brain had been irreversible.

Her parents and their allies had contended that Terri Schiavo might respond to therapy, and that even without improvement her life should be sustained. Michael Schiavo said that his wife had no meaningful life, and that she had expressed a wish never to be kept alive in such circumstances.

The National Right to Life Committee, which backed the Schindlers, responded with proposed legislation that states could adopt in an effort to avoid the dispute that engulfed Schiavo.

The legislation would require doctors and hospital administrators to presume that all patients unable to speak for themselves would want to continue to receive fluid and nutrition, unless the patients had clear living wills stating otherwise.

That would be a major change from the law in most states, Sabatino said. "In virtually every state right now, there's a presumption of neutrality, if the person has not done an advanced directive," Sabatino said.

Doctors now take each case individually, he said, and make judgments based on the patient's condition and outlook and discussions with family members.

So far, he said, the National Right to Life Committee's proposal has made little headway.

"There are 10 or 11 states where it has been introduced, but it has not been adopted anywhere," Sabatino said. "There doesn't seem to be a tide toward approving it."

Dick Bennett, head of independent polling organization American Research Group Inc., based in Manchester, N.H., said legislators took note that a majority of voters disapproved of political intervention in the Schiavo case, and showed little appetite for changing existing law.

"I think probably most state legislators believe the laws that they have are sufficient," Bennett said. "Legislators don't want to touch it."

In June, the American Medical Association passed a resolution opposing the Right to Life proposal or any act that would "presume to prescribe the patient's preferences."

Sabatino said the bar association took no position on the proposal, but said that he was troubled by aspects of it.

The law would dictate care, he said, unless a patient had the foresight to have a written directive to do otherwise, and the medical situation would have to closely reflect what was in the directive.

"We don't have crystal balls, so we don't know how explicit you can be" in writing an advanced directive, Sabatino said.

The Right to Life Committee, based in Washington, did not respond to several requests for comment.

Apart from the committee's proposal, a few other pieces of state legislation have been inspired by the Schiavo case.

In Delaware, both houses passed legislation sponsored by Republican State Sen. Cathy Cloutier, who said she was moved to introduce it not only by the Schiavo case but also by her husband's death in 1998. The measure was signed into law earlier this month.

The law allows for a space on driver's licenses to note whether the holder has an advanced-care directive or living will, so emergency-room workers would be alerted.

Louisiana is home to one of the few other legislative acts traceable to the Schiavo case.

One argument made by the Schindlers' allies was that Michael Schiavo should not be allowed to act as legal guardian because he had begun a family with another woman.

The Louisiana bill would originally have prevented adulterous spouses from making critical life decisions in those circumstances. As passed, the Louisiana law bars a violent husband from making end-of-life decisions if he is responsible for his wife's medical condition.

If the legislative record is sparse, the electoral impact is still unclear.

Polls at the time of Terri Schiavo's death showed most voters disapproved of Congress' efforts to intervene.

Earlier this month, Democratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean said that would be a weapon used against Republicans next year, especially against House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas and Senate Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee.

The issue might also reverberate in a handful of state-level elections. Randall Terry, the former head of the antiabortion group Operation Rescue and a highly visible Schindler spokesman, has said he plans to run in a Republican primary against a Florida state senator who did not support Terry's views.

FV SAYS: Did you notice that none of these journalists EVER ASK THE DISABLED COMMUNITY what they think about the Schiavo "effect"? It seems to me that this is about them. To see that there's even a term called the "Schiavo effect" shows me that Terri will not ever be forgotten. I dare a journalist to contact Diane Coleman, J.D. of www.notdeadyet.org. She is in touch with approx. 25 disabled orgs in the U.S. and around the world. They won't interview her but they should.