Posted on 10/05/2005 9:49:39 AM PDT by Brilliant
WASHINGTON - Newly installed Chief Justice John Roberts on Wednesday sharply questioned a lawyer arguing for preservation of Oregon's physician-assisted suicide law, noting the federal government's tough regulation of addictive drugs.
The 50-year-old Roberts, hearing his first major oral argument since succeeding William H. Rehnquist at the helm of the court, seemed skeptical of the Oregon law, and the outcome of this case was as unclear after the argument as before.
At the outset, Roberts laid a barrage of questions on Oregon Senior Assistant Attorney General Robert Atkinson before he could finish his first sentence.
"It's a tough case," noted Justice Anthony Kennedy, a moderate, who with Roberts and others got immersed in one of the most vexing cases of the court's term. Justices pondered whether the federal government has the power to block doctors from helping terminally ill patients end their lives.
As they did so, demonstrators — some carrying signs saying "My Life, My Death, My Decision" — carried their pleas to the courthouse steps.
Inside, retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor seemed ready to back the law allowing dying patients to obtain lethal doses of medication from their doctors.
Although O'Connor could provide the fifth vote in Oregon's favor, she likely will be off the court before the case is decided. A 4-4 tie would be decided by a new justice.
Voters in Oregon have twice endorsed doctor-assisted suicide, but the Bush administration has aggressively challenged the state law, the only one of its kind in the nation.
O'Connor immediately challenged Solicitor General Paul Clement, asking if federal drug laws also prevented doctors from participating in the execution of murderers.
Kennedy said he found it "odd" that the U.S. attorney general determined physician-assisted suicide to be an abuse of drug laws, when the state of Oregon strictly limited how the drugs could be administered and in what cases.
"I don't think it's odd," Clement replied, noting that federal laws regulating drug use have been in place for more than 90 years.
The case was heard by justices touched personally by illness. Three justices — O'Connor, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and John Paul Stevens — have had cancer, and a fourth — Stephen Breyer — has a spouse who counsels young cancer patients who are dying.
Their longtime colleague, Rehnquist, who once wrote about the "earnest and profound debate" over doctor-assisted suicide, died a month ago after battling untreatable cancer for nearly a year.
In 1997 the court found that the terminally ill have no constitutional right to doctor-assisted suicide. O'Connor provided a key fifth vote in that decision, which left room for state-by-state experimentation.
The appeal is a turf battle of sorts, not a constitutional showdown. Former Attorney General John Ashcroft, a favorite among the president's base of religious conservatives, decided in 2001 to pursue doctors who help people die.
Hastening someone's death is an improper use of medication and violates federal drug laws, Ashcroft reasoned, an opposite conclusion than the one reached by Janet Reno, the Clinton administration attorney general.
Oregon filed a lawsuit to defend its law, which took effect in 1997 and has been used by 208 people.
The Supreme Court will decide whether the federal government can trump the state.
"It could be close," said Neil Siegel, a law professor at Duke University and former Supreme Court clerk. "It is a wrenching issue. It's one of the most difficult decisions any family needs to make. There's a lot of discomfort with having the government at any level get involved."
Under Rehnquist's leadership the court had sought to embolden states to set their own rules.
The administration lost at the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, which said that Ashcroft's "unilateral attempt to regulate general medical practices historically entrusted to state lawmakers interferes with the democratic debate about physician-assisted suicide."
In Oregon, the first assisted-suicide law won narrow approval, just a 51 percent majority, in 1994. An effort to repeal it in 1997 was rejected by 60 percent of voters.
"There is a real human need" for control over one's life, said cancer patient Charlene Andrews of Salem, Ore. "We are terminal and we know when we have a few weeks left. We know when we're unconscious. We know when we're at the end."
The case before the Supreme Court is Gonzales v. Oregon, 04-623.
Like I said. Either people have the right to kill themselves, or to have people kill them, or they don't. Suffering? Unbearable? The world is full of suffering of all kinds. What about someone whose family dies? Isn't that worse then mere physical pain? It doesn't mean you authorize "doctors" to go around killing people who want to die.
Modern medicine takes some of the control and dignity out of death, and this law has been working quite will at putting it back into it.
It also has not met any of the feared drawbacks opponents had suggested it might.
It is an option that has been rarely used and applied in the manner and context desired by it's writers.
I am with the voters of Oregon on this one too.
excepted=accepted
You people keep saying that; do you think it's something to be proud of? "I'm with the majority!" So...... you're still wrong.
I'm not sure exactly what your objection to the Oregon law is, or how you would like to see it overturned without granting the federal government dangerously-broad commerce clause authority.
The law works like this - someone who is diagnosed as being in the late stages of terminal illness (by 2 doctors) can apply to get a prescription for a lethal dose of drugs.
The doctor doesn't "kill them," the doctor just writes the prescription. The patient gets the prescription filled, and then has the drugs on-hand - some people never use the drugs. They pass away with no assistance, or they decide that their pain is bearable. So, even though a doctor gave them the option of taking the drugs, no "assisted suicide" takes place.
This is because some patients want the drugs as a last-resort; a safety mechanism that can be used if things become unbearable for them. It is very comforting for some terminal patients to have this option, especially given the persecution of pain-management specialists under federal drug laws.
This is not a new thing - in fact, family doctors have been giving people "a little extra medicine" in their last days since medicine has existed. It was recognized throughout modern times that this was one of the roles of a physician, as a person who eased the passage from life to death for people in the final throes of terminal conditions.
So, in the not-so-distant past, an "assisted suicide" statute would have been redundant, since that was something that a physician could already provide. However, in modern times, drug regimens and end-of-life treatment has gotten far more controlled and sophisticated. In a big way, the "assisted suicide" legislation was a way to restore to patients the role that the family doctor had to relinquish due to changing times and technology.
Now, note that there is nowhere in the federal drug code stating that "doctors cannot prescribe end-of-life patients with lethal doses of medication." That phrase, or something like it, has been inferred; which means that the federal government wants to trump a state law on the basis of a shadow of a contradiction. It means that the feds want to rule people's lives, again, via the commerce clause.
There is no similarity here to abortion - abortion is about deprivation of a right to life. It is a rights-taking measure. The assisted-suicide statute is a rights-granting measure. No one exerts their power or control over anyone else under that law; it is a patient-directed decision. Federal intervention against it would actually be more akin to abortion, in the way that it would be another rights-taking measure - and at the expense of state's rights.
And that approach should trouble small-government conservatives.
People are free to reject extraordinary treatments and free to ease their pain with medication, and die a natural death. You ignore that to use such a situation as a red herring in your crusade to kill sick people.
That's not the same as having your doctor kill you because you think the rest of your natural life won't be good enough to be worth living.
This is a mistake
The Republican legislature of Oregon sent this back to the people for a re-vote. They said to the people;"Are you sure about thus?" And when the people returned a stronger majority saying, "Yes, we are sure," they should respect that.
If this is so important, revisit an attack on the law at state level again down the road.
Some of us do not take kindly to the rights of our states to determine issues like this when an administration does not get it's way.
In fact, we find it an alarming spectacle.
And doctors in particular should be barred by their oath, at the very least, and then by law, from killing their patients in this manner.
Someone in a terminal condition who requests "more" pain relief has always been something that doctors encounter. Many times every day, the doctor will "help" them in that manner. That's just how the end of life works. The Oregon statute just makes it possible for patients to control this aspect of end-of-life care on their own terms.
If you find the law offensive, you can:
-Lobby in Oregon for a new ballot measure to overturn the law
-Not use the law yourself
I just don't see how federal power enters into this at all, unless you are comfortable with a massive over-reach of federal authority via the commerce clause, against state's rights.
In this particular case, as I've said, either the whole interpretation of the commerce clause goes (which I don't think likely) or the Oregon law goes.
Very sorry to hear about your dad and what he went through before he died...it must have been so very hard on you and your family, and your dad...
My dad died many, many years ago...he had cancer, and his chemo treatments did not help at all...he was going to die and die soon..dad knew this, as did our whole family...
When I talked to dads oncologist, I expressed to him, that everyone in the family, including dad, knew how bad things were, and our main concern at this point, was that dad should die pain free...and the oncologist agreed...he, being the cancer doc, knew that dad had a very short time left...and he promised me, that at that point, one of his primary concerns regarding my dad, was to make sure that my dad would be comfortable, and as pain free as was possible...
Dad was in the hospital, ,for his last two weeks of life...three days before he died, the pain began to increases dramatically...and the doc was alerted, and now dad was being given morphine...a prescribed dose, given at 4 hour intervals...this seemed to control his pain for about a day and a half..and then the pain became unbearable...
The doctor then talked to the family, explaining that the dosage of morhine given every four hours, was no longer efficient in controlling dads pain...that dad would need a higher dosage, given more often...the doctor also wanted us to understand, that a higher dosage, given more often, would certainly ease dads pain considerably...it would also probably, eventually result in an overdose...which, would also probably eventually result in coma, followed shortly by death...the doc wanted us and dad to understand fully, what we were embarking on, if we decided to agree to higher dosages of morphine, given more often...
Dad was in such great pain, he wanted the meds to stop the pain...mom, dads sister and I could not bear to see dad in such great pain...and so the decision was made to give dad the higher dosage of morphine, and it was to be given to dad on an 'as needed', basis...so when the pain returned, dad could request more morphine...
My dad just smiled, even in all his pain...just knowing, that the doc was going to alleviate his pain, even tho it meant risking imminent death, seemed to soothe dad...when he began to receive the morphine as he needed it, he was so relieved, and able to talk with us and be with us in a lucid fashion, and we could talk of our lives together, what we all meant to each other, and say what we all needed to say to one another at this time of dads life, and near death...
As the hours wore on, and dads meds eventually began to cause him to start to lose lucidity, we knew the end was near...soon he went into a coma....and several hours later he died...
Now, there will be those who will earnestly believe, that the doc killed my dad, with his and his families consent...I dont see it as such...I saw a doctor, who realized that his medical efforts to 'cure' my dad were no longer an option...that now his duty to my dad, was to care for my dads pain, even if alleviating his pain, meant hastening his death...
I do believe that this has been done for decades, and that it continues to be done today...the doctor does not intend to 'kill' the patient...he intends to alleviate the patients pain, even if alleviating that pain causes death to come a little sooner...
To me, there is nothing grand or sacred in dying in excrutiating pain, especially if there is a means of alleviating that pain...
I know that doctors swear to 'first do no harm'...for many doctors allowing a patient to die, screaming in pain, truly is doing harm...for other doctors, administering the needed pain meds(which may speed up the death process), is doing harm...Each doctor does have to take a stand when placed in these situations, and decide what the actual 'harm' is...
For me, I am so glad that my dad had a doctor, who tried his hardest to cure my dad, but when his efforts were not productive, then switched his care of my dad, to one of palliative care...
My dad died while in a coma, so of course, his death would seem peaceful...yet for the 1 day or so before his death, when he was receiving sufficent pain meds, dad was peaceful, calm, and able to be able to say his goodbyes to us, in the manner he wished...and for that I am thankful..
I would say that the doctor did what he could to maximize the 'total' quality of your father's remaining time. The time may have been shortened by the doctor's efforts, but the time he had was so much improved that it was worth it.
Indeed your are so right...and dads doctor, to me, was the ideal doctor...he did not stay in just his little area of specialty, treating cancer....rather, he consider the totality of my dads care...he saw my dad as a whole person, ,and took all his medical needs into consideration, not just concerning himself with the cancer treatment...
And you are so very correct...dads time may have been shortened a little, by having had so much morphine, but to dad and his family, the time left was so meaningful and improved, that it was indeed worth it...
You heard right.
Maybe Oregonians didn't really vote for this to begin with.
God forbid if they allow hearsay evidence in Oregon like they do in Florida.
That is frightening for the disability community and the line has already been crossed.
The federal government has no legitimate authority to do 90% of what it does with the "interstate commerce" clause. Unfortuhately, the Court seems unwilling to overturn Wickard v. Filburn. That the government uses its firepower to enforce such rulings, however, does not make them right.
Might doesn't make right, but it often wins.
Indeed, that is scary. And in cases where the killing is not deliberately done by the decedent, there may be room for Fourteenth-Amendment involvement. I really don't see any basis for federal intervention here, though, especially given that it's federal intervention which is responsible for the problems this law is trying to solve (the fedgov going after doctors who prescribe 'too many' painkillers for terminal patients).
Florida has nothing to be proud of because we've never voted on euthanasia but it happens here illegally all the time.
What we need are better disability laws because disabled Americans are a class of people who should have civil rights like any other class. Of course that's a different issue.
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