Posted on 03/22/2007 9:58:29 AM PDT by demographic_crisis
The Vermont House of Representatives voted against a proposal yesterday that would have made the state the second in the country to permit physician-assisted suicide, following Oregon.
House members voted 82-63 against the measure euphemistically entitled "Patient Choice and Control at End of Life," after a week of impassioned debate on the issue, the Associated Press reported. The legislation would have made it legal for a doctor to assist a patient with a terminal illness to commit suicide by prescribe lethal medication.
"In my view, (the bill) goes too far in enforcing one group's preferences on the traditional values of others," said Rep. Harvey Otterman.
Vermont Gov. Jim Douglas had opposed the assisted-suicide bill, saying while he supported the concept of death with dignity, he did not support doctor-assisted suicide.
"We need to make it dignified, we need to make it pain-free," Douglas said prior to the debates. "But to empower physicians--who take an oath to alleviate pain and do no harm--to hasten death is a step in the wrong direction."
Deborah Lisi-Baker, director of the Vermont Center for Independent Living, agreed.
"We know Vermont has a lot to do to increase access to hospice and palliative care, but we believe there are better ways to do it than the bill that was proposed," Lisi-Baker said.
Alex Schadenberg, executive director of the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, said the vote was a significant encouragement to euthanasia opponents.
"This represents an incredible victory for the good of our culture. The situation in Vermont didn't look very good at first," Schadenberg told LifeSiteNews.com.
"Many people of goodwill got involved and went all out by contacting politicians, financing, and supporting the campaign in other ways. Thanks to Vermont, we can now be sure that through a common effort that it is possible to defeat the assisted suicide push everywhere."
See previous LifeSiteNews coverage:
Vermont May Be the Next State to Legalize Assisted Suicide http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/feb/07022302.html
Give it time. The Vermont courts will rule that it's constitutionally required.
Remarkable, in that Vermont has been occupied by every left wing crank in the Northeast.
Thank God.
Our local representative, Janet Ancel, who is a neighbor of mine, and is extremely liberal on most issues, emailed her constituent list on March 7 to apologize in advance that she could not justify supporting the bill. I sent her a message of thanks and said I hoped she would persuade her colleagues that this bill was dangerously controversial and damaging. (I didn't think it would help to say that it violated the right to life.)
Since this was a public email to numerous people, I don't think I'm violating a confidence to repeat it here. Note that she sounds apologetic (probably most contacts urged her to vote for the bill, I would guess). And note that she manages to put it in terms of universal health care, which she would like to bring to Vermont (but there's no money to spare for it). Still, I was very pleased to hear she would vote no. Extract from her email follows:
As I read her message yet again, I would emphasize the influence on her thinking of "persons with disabilities." These are people whom Hitler would have called useless eaters, and would have exterminated. Evidently they told her that they feared what the consequences of such a bill would be to them and others in the same boat.
I don't know if she would vote otherwise if disabled people had the choice of free health care OR assisted suicide, but there simply isn't enough money in Vermont to provide that option, much as the moonbats would love it.
The Announcements sidebar is reserved for FR business.
Not this.
Thanks,
AM
I'll be much more impressed when Vermont outlaws the assisted murder of the unborn.
Freepmail wagglebee or little jeremiah to subscribe or unsubscribe from the moral absolutes ping list.
FreeRepublic moral absolutes keyword search
[ Add keyword moral absolutes to flag FR articles to this ping list ]
Thank You Jesus!
Alex Schadenberg, who directs the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition, called it "an incredible victory for the good of our culture.""Many people of goodwill got involved and went all out by contacting politicians, financing, and supporting the campaign in other ways. Thanks to Vermont, we can now be sure that through a common effort that it is possible to defeat the assisted suicide push everywhere," he told Lifesite.
~WND
The 82 – 63 vote on the "Act Relating to Patient Choice and Control at End of Life" (H.44, S.63 in the Senate) did not follow party lines and was not as close as was predicted by political watchers on both sides.Despite a large majority in the House – 90 of 145 members – the Democrats split with 35 members or 39 percent voting with the majority; 46 of 48 or 96 percent of Republicans opposed the measure.
~Catholic Online (warning: pop-ups)
"- 39% of Vermont Democrats voted for Life."
Which sure beats the living heck out of 0%.
This is an area that gets me into trouble with my fellow pro-life FReepers, but if we're looking for a partisan political strategy to end infanticide or assisted suicide, it's going to have to be approached in large part via the Democratic party. We've seen as much forward movement from the GOP as we're going to see on this. Until this last fall the GOP had control of the U.S. House, U.S. Senate, the Presidency, most legislatures, and GOP Presidents had appointed most justices to the SCOTUS. Yet infanticide is still legal in every state. If the GOP was truly interested in ending infanticide or assisted suicide, it would have done what was necessary to end these practices while it was in power.
Rush Limbaugh was quite right in noting that once a political party solves an underlying social problem, it ends it's ability to use that problem for political purposes in the future. Mr. Limbaugh focused his criticism on Democrats and their unwillingness to solve the problem of poverty. Mr. Limbaugh did not, however, go on to focus this same harsh light of criticism on the GOP and their apparent unwillingness to solve the problems of infanticide and assisted suicide.
In my personal opinion, I don't think that partisan politics is the "best" way to approach pro-life issues anyway. I think infanticide and assisted suicide are going to largely go away in America, but not because of partisan politics. In my view, the culture of death has sown the seeds of it's own destruction. Those who support infanticide and assisted suicide live their ethic such as it is, while those who are pro-life live their ethic. The end result is that the culture of death is already killing off it's would-be progeny, while the culture of life is going forth and multiplying. Children tend to take on the ideologies and perspectives of their parents. Especially if the children are educated in the home, or sent to private schools that reflect the perspectives of the parents.
The culture of death loses not so much as a result of politics, but because of math.
Second, thank you so much for taking the time to write to me, thank you for being a Right to Keep and Bear Arms and pro-life Democrat, and thank you for joining Free Republic and being a FRiend.
I agree with some of what you have said, and disagree on other points - points you argue peaceably, another thanks.
Yes, the majority the Republicans held in all three branches of government has been wasted. I do not believe that the Democratic Party or that "math" alone are the answer. I am one who believes that Jesus Christ is the answer to everything, for every one; He is in fact the Answer to every question. Therefore I posit that as eternal souls of men are individually brought from death to life in Him - even to a resurrection of America, a revival if you will - then also our life-valuing and individual liberty-affirming Constitution will be upheld by all. Just men are the recipients of just government, for it is the Lord who directs the hearts of leaders even as a watercourse, Proverbs 21:1.
We can't hear the call too often:
[I]f my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.
~2 Chronicles 7:14And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him.
~1 John 5:15
I believe this great and surprising victory in Vermont is a microcosm in proof of my theory for the whole, and I pray it is a sort of firstfruits, amen.
Thank you for the very nice post. Don't worry, I'm used to FReepers. I find it interesting, though, that the gunnies by and large tend to be very polite to debate with (by FR standards). Robert A. Heinlein was probably right.
As for your points. I hope you're proven right. Being embroiled in politics as long as I have been has given me a sense of realism about human nature that I find myself having to guard against.
Our Lord is indeed the answer to all of our questions. I just hope that people will exercise their free will and ask the questions and listen to the answer.
TANSTAAFL?
Have you considered that it was probably his intelligent, fiercely independent wife Ginny that led him to that conclusion? She acted as the first reader of his manuscripts, after all (I thank God for the Internet). She loved him 40-years-full and was faithful even beyond his death, but she surely wasn't perfect. Only Jesus is perfect, and perfectly free. I bet she charged Bob for his lunches.
Then again, if you were referring to Mr. Heinlein's political thesis in Time Enough for Love, then I say yes, the man is right. Under the sun foolishness abounds. Wisdom is singing everywhere though, and I'm listening.
...the gunnies by and large tend to be very polite to debate with (by FR standards).
I agree. I bet there is wisdom behind that, too.
"TANSTAAFL?"
That wasn't the quote I was thinking about, but he was probably right on that one as well. I was thinking about: "An armed society is a polite society."
I was not aware of the influence of his wife in his writings. I hope she did charge him for his lunches.
I find it interesting that in engaging various fellow conservatives in debate, my fellow gunnies tend to be more thoughtful and polite. Whereas some of the most acrimonious debates that I recall were over various aspects of pro-life issues (although it has become more genteel in the last year or so).
Considering that this is Vermont, it’s a significant and surprising victory. Good news for sure. Thanks for posting.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.