Washington Vs. The State Of Washington

This case is the case of Rodriguez v. British Columbia in 1993. Sue Rodriguez had been diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis; more commonly know as Lou Gehrig’s disease, in 1991. Rodriguez was aware that this disease would eventually lead to her not being able to breathe on her own, move on her own, or even eat without a feeding tube. Rodriguez had the attitude that she wanted to enjoy as much of life as possible, but when the time came that she could no longer enjoy life, she wanted the assistance of a doctor to end her life. In her own words, she asked, “If I cannot give consent to my own death, whose body is this? Who owns my life?”(Windsor Sun). In the opinion of Rodriguez, she should have the choice to end her life, and that if she could not do the act without assistance, it should be legal for a physician to help her. She ended up losing her case in a Supreme Court appeal. The decision stated, “No consensus can be found in favour of the decriminalization of assisted suicide. To the extent that there is consensus, human life must be respected.” (Windsor

Physician assisted suicide was brought to mainstream attention in the 1990’s due to Dr. Kevorkian’s “suicide machine," who claims to have assisted over 100 suicide deaths of terminally ill patients with Alzheimer’s disease (Dickinson, p. 8). In the early 1990’s, for the first time in United States history the issue was brought to the voting polls in California, Washington, and Oregon (Dickinson, p. 9). The bill was passed in Oregon; legally allowing physicians to facilitate death of the terminally ill, but voters fails to pass the bill in Washington and California (Dickinson, p. 9). In 2008 voters in Washington State passed the Washington Death with Dignity Act (Dickinson, p. 277). Today

Oregon is one of only five states along with Vermont, Washington, Montana and New Mexico that allow medically assisted suicide. In the rest of the country, assisting people with suicide even if they are terminally ill will be accused as a crime. According to the KQED news, ”Advocates of assisted-suicide laws believe that mentally competent people who are suffering and have no chance of long-term

7. Delaware Code Ann. Tit. 11, § 645 – A person is guilty of promoting suicide when the person intentionally causes or aids another person to attempt suicide, or when the person intentionally aids another person to commit suicide.;

Even though the law is only in few states it can be known to those who believe in liberty and in freedom at making end of life decisions. Rd. Kevorkian’s invention of his machine increased confusion about whether he was assisting suicides or weather he was actively participating in helping patients who were suffering from an illness. His suicide machine was designed out of house hold items and parts that he had found at home e and garden stores. His machine involved 3 liquids and a timer, once a patient was hooked up on the machine the patient could pull the button and start the flow of drugs into the human body and system, this kind of involvement serves a point as Rd. Kevorkian served in prison a sentence that was 25 years or more but was released after 8 years continuing his death mission he died at the age of 83. The fact that people went to him because they knew he could help them with any possible matter of the patient having the right to die was automatically the best for them, people deserve to die at peace and make decisions for themselves and not the government deciding for them. Suffering in pain is not right. The death with dignity law should be established in the whole United States. Its only fair if somone who is dying has that option to choos for themselves, even if their young its them who wish to take that choice and decision but the fact that only few

The court case of Washington vs Glucksberg decided assisted suicide was unconstitutional, in 1997. Basically, Dr. Harold Glucksberg along with four other physicians and a few terminally ill patients went to court to argue with the ban on assisted suicide. Court decision was 9-0,

In Pennsylvania it is not illegal to commit suicide do to the fact that the actor cannot be charged. It is however illegal to aid or solicit someone to commit suicide. It is a second degree felony if the person actually commits suicide and a misdemeanor of the second degree if the person merely attempts to commit suicide. If a person is coerced to commit suicide then that person is guilty of second degree murder. Based on these laws the state of Pennsylvania has made it clear that the act of suicide is murder and the assistance thereof is a punishable crime. Pennsylvania does not consider the withholding or withdrawal of treatment as murder (20 Pa.C.S 5426) Therefore from a legal standpoint the law has made it clear that suicide is

Caring for patients at the end of life is a challenging task that requires not only the consideration of the patient as a whole but also an understanding of the family, social, legal, economic, and institutional circumstances that surround patient care.

One of the most controversial end-of-life decisions is “physician-assisted suicide” (PAS). This method of suicide involves a physician providing a patient, at his or her own request, with a lethal dose of medication, which the patient self-administers. The ethical acceptability and the desirability of legalization of this practice both continue to cause controversy (Raus, Sterckx, Mortier 1). Vaco v. Quill and Washington v. Glucksberg were landmark decisions on the issue of physician-assisted suicide and a supposed Constitutional right to commit suicide with another's assistance. In Washingotn v. Glucksberg, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that the state of Washington's ban on physician-assisted suicide was not unconstitutional.

Death is one of the most significant life events people experience. Most people want to die a peaceful death and desire the same outcome for their family and friends. Medical advancements have resulted in people living longer lives with chronic illnesses. Despite the advancements in medicine and the available treatments of today, sometimes the patient is still unable to escape intolerable suffering; the patient’s quality of life diminishes.

Physician-assisted suicide has been brought to the attention of the Supreme Court on several occasions, in order to test the constitutional backing. The result is always quite similar: the Supreme Court rules against physician-assisted suicide. There was one particular supreme court case, Washington v. Glucksberg. The state of

One of the main supreme court cases leading the legalization of Physician-Assisted Suicide (PAS), which took place in the state of New York was the Vacco vs. Quill decided on June 26 1997. In this case Quill lost 0-9 when they challenged the Physician-Assisted Suicide (PAS) ban from New York as they stated that it violated the 14th amendment clause of Equal Protection. This lead to a debate whether passive euthanasia should be allowed which is when a patient refuses treatment and dies of a natural way. This law seemed more reasonable for the court, implementing that patients have the right to refuse treatment. They ruled that preservation of human life was important over all and that the physician directly assisting the death would be

The U.S. Supreme Court upheld court decisions in Washington and New York states that criminalized physician-assisted suicide on July 26, 1997.12 They found that the Constitution did not provide any “right to die,” however, they allowed individual states to govern whether or not they would prohibit or permit physician-assisted suicide. Without much intervention from the states individuals have used their right to refuse medical treatment resulting in controversial passive forms of euthanasia being used by patients to die with dignity such as choosing not to be resuscitated, stopping medication, drinking, or eating, or turning off respirators.9

Through this ruling, it established the fact that “ U.S. has recognized the right of at least competent adults to refuse even basic, life-sustaining medical care” (Cassity 471). In a way, this show that states are “already condoning a form of suicide by recognizing the right to refuse care” (472). Following this logic, should it not be perfectly legal for patients to get access to assisted suicide when they already have the legal right to refuse to death? I mean by refusing treatment a patient, at most, is making a statement that they want to die. In a way, it’s a tedious and painful way of committing suicide because it takes a long time for it to actually succeed. By legalizing PAS, it minimizes the time and reduces the pain. I know this proposition was rejected by the U.S. Supreme Court in the court case of Washington v. Glucksberg, but if you look at it, “five votes on the Court appeared to be leaning in favor of recognizing a constitutional right to assisted suicide ‘for competent, terminally ill persons suffering severe pain’ (472). Seventeen years has pass since this ruling, and I believe if you presented this idea to the Supreme court today, then they will more then likely to rule this motion to be true, and apply PAS only to terminally ill. If you look at the percentage of americans who favors PAS for the terminally ill against the percentage who does not, it will show that “55 percent favor it against 45 who does not” (Hensley par 5). This statistical data is

Assisted suicide is a form of suicide where someone helps dying patients suffering from health problems die by taking medicine prescribed by their doctor to help them die in peace without suffering. In October 2015, California Governor Jerry Brown signed a bill to make assisted suicide legal in his state after the death of a California woman named Brittany Maynard (McGreevy, 2015). The Catholic Church was fighting Jerry Brown because they did not want the bill to pass since suicide is against religious teachings (McGreevy, 2015). The California Governor made the decision to sign the bill based on a person’s right to decide when and how to die (McGreevy, 2015). California joined Oregon, Washington and Vermont in making this legal. Other states such as New York, New Jersey, Tennessee, Connecticut, the District of Columbia and Maryland are trying to pass legislation to make assisted suicide legal (McGreevy, 2015).