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Editorials on Supreme Court's Assisted-Suicide Decision

Posted on: Wednesday, 18 January 2006, 12:00 CST

The following editorial appeared in the Chicago Tribune on Wednesday, Jan. 18:

SUICIDE AND STATES' RIGHTS

Oregon residents argued long and hard before they passed a 1994 initiative that allowed doctors to prescribe drugs to help terminally ill patients end their lives.

Both candidates for governor that year campaigned against the measure, as did the Catholic Church and the American Medical Association. The state's own medical association declined to vote on a resolution in support of the proposal because its membership was polarized.

Following this vigorous debate, the presumably well-informed people of Oregon voted, not once but twice, to approve the Death With Dignity Act. That should have settled it.

On Tuesday, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that it did, rejecting former Attorney General John Ashcroft's end run around states' rights.

Ashcroft asserted in 2001 that doctors who prescribed drugs to help patients kill themselves were violating federal laws designed to prevent drug trafficking, because assisted suicide was not "a legitimate medical purpose."

Under that reasoning, the federal Drug Enforcement Administration could revoke doctors' rights to write prescriptions, effectively preventing them from practicing medicine.

But the court's majority found that Ashcroft's decision was beyond the expertise and outside the authority of the attorney general.

It's up to the federal government to set uniform standards for regulating health and safety, Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote for the majority. The DEA properly does so when it prohibits doctors from using prescription-writing powers to engage in drug dealing.

But it's up to the states to regulate the medical profession within their borders, Kennedy wrote. The attorney general can't declare illegitimate "a medical standard ... that is specifically authorized under state law."

More than 200 people have ended their lives with the help of their doctors since Oregon's law took effect in 1997. The debate over physician-assisted suicide remains an emotional, divisive and political one, and for good reason.

There are fears that it will be made available to patients who are not terminally ill or not competent to make such a decision. There are fears that patients might feel pressured to commit suicide--not to end their own suffering but to relieve the emotional and financial suffering of those around them. In the Netherlands, where physician-assisted suicide is tolerated, there are documented abuses involving patients who weren't terminally ill or did not give their consent.

There are safeguards in Oregon's law, but the possibility of abuse is real and troubling. That probably explains why, so far, no other state has enacted such a measure.

Tuesday's ruling might change that. Let's hope the people of any state considering such a law argue long and hard about it. In the end, the decision rightfully rests with them.

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The following editorial appeared in the San Jose Mercury News on Wednesday, Jan. 18:

THE RIGHT RULING ON ASSISTED SUICIDE

Former Attorney General John Ashcroft's legacy took a well-deserved hit Tuesday.

The U.S. Supreme Court, in a 6-3 decision, wisely blocked the Bush administration effort to punish doctors trying to help terminally ill patients take advantage of Oregon's assisted-suicide law. Proponents of a similar law in California should take heart from the ruling and push harder for the state to allow terminally ill patients to die in peace.

Ashcroft, normally a strong advocate for states' rights, went out of his way to fight Oregon's right to set its own rules on assisted suicide. Despite a 1997 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in which Justice Sandra Day O'Connor specifically wrote that end-of-life questions should be debated in the ``laboratory of the states,'' Ashcroft announced in 2001 that Oregon doctors who assisted in suicides would be violating the federal Controlled Substances Act.

Justice Anthony Kennedy chided Ashcroft in his ruling, saying, ``The authority claimed by the attorney general is both beyond his expertise and incongruous with the statutory purposes and design.''

Oregon voters have twice made clear their thoughts on the issue, giving approval in two separate statewide elections to the concept of allowing the terminally ill to end their lives.

Oregon's law allows assisted suicide in only the narrowest of circumstances. At least two doctors must agree that a patient has less than six months to live, and patients must be sound of mind and must administer the medication themselves.

About 200 people have taken advantage of the law in its six years of existence. It has been primarily used by the small percentage of the terminally ill for whom medication is ineffective at blocking excruciating pain.

Nurses and doctors know better than anyone that for a small percentage of the terminally ill, pain medication is ineffective. California should allow those terminally ill people in excruciating pain the option of dying with dignity.

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The following editorial appeared in the Seattle Times on Wednesday, Jan. 18:

A STATE'S RIGHT TO ASSISTED SUICIDE

By allowing Oregon's assisted-suicide law to stand, the U.S. Supreme Court says a person with a terminal illness may make a deeply personal decision about his or her life. We support such a law. The ruling would have been better, however, had it also helped define the constitutional limit of federal power.

Oregon's law allows a doctor to prescribe a lethal dose of pain-killing drugs if certain conditions are met. First, the patient must want to die. Second, the doctor has to certify that the patient is sick, can't be cured and has fewer than six months to live. Third, a second doctor has to agree. Finally, the prescribing doctor cannot administer the drugs. The law affects only a tiny group. Under it, 37 patients were assisted in ending their lives in 2004. That is 10 in a million. We have heard no outcry against this from the people of Oregon, who voted for this measure twice. Clearly, this is a law they want.

Former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft didn't want it. He declared that suicide is not a legitimate medical practice, and set federal power against the power of Oregon. The dispute went to the Supreme Court, under the name of the current attorney general, Alberto Gonzales.

The 6-3 ruling in Gonzales v. Oregon is about how to interpret the Controlled Substances Act. It was not about the broader and more interesting question of whether assisted suicide is any of the federal government's business. Justice Antonin Scalia's dissent raised that issue and cast it aside, saying that if the federal government can ban marijuana, it can ban assisted suicide.

We don't think assisted suicide should be a federal issue. We did not support the court's decision last year, in Gonzales v. Raich, that made a federal issue of California's law allowing doctors to prescribe marijuana to the chronically ill. That seemed the sort of question California could decide for itself.

Tuesday's ruling would have been better had it stated that assisted suicide is a question Oregon could decide for itself.

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Source: Knight Ridder/Tribune

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