Assisted Suicide
Physician assisted suicide presents one of the greatest dilemmas to the
medical profession. Should someone who is mentally competent, but deemed
terminally ill, be allowed to engage in physician-assisted suicide? According to
the First Amendment of The Constitution of The United States, one has the
freedom to petition the government for a redress of grievances. The Fourteenth
Amendment states, The State cannot deprive any person of life, liberty or
property, without due process of law; nor deny any person within its
jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. The group believes that a
terminally ill patient has the Constitutional right to decide whether or not to
end his or her life with the help of a licensed medical doctor. There have been
many cases over the years where a terminally ill patient who is mentally
competent has made the choice to either partake in physician-assisted suicide or
euthanasia. Physician-assisted suicide occurs when the physician provides the
patient with the means and/or knowledge to commit suicide(Death and Dying,91).
Euthanasia is when the physician administers the death causing drug or
agent(Death and Dying,92). The most recent case is that of The State of Florida
v. Charles Hall. Charles Hall is dying of AIDS and challenged the State of
Florida to let him die by a self-administered lethal injection without fear of
prosecution(http://www.rights.org/ deathnet/open.html). On January 31, 1997, a
Judge ruled that Charles Hall could take his own life with the aid of a doctor.
Senior Judge S. Joseph Davis, brought in from Seminole County, found that
Florida’s strict privacy law and the equal protection clause in the U.S.
Constitution entitled Hall, 35, and Dr. McIver to carry out an assisted death
without fear of prosecution (Sun-Sentinel, 1A). On February 11, 1997, Charles
Hall’s ruling was overturned by the Florida Supreme Court: he no longer has the
right to end his own life. He will have to wait until May 9, 1997 until new
arguments will be heard.
Hall, who has been deemed mentally competent,
contracted the virus in 1981 through a blood transfusion. Some of the
complications he is encountering from the AIDS virus are arthritis, hepatitis,
pneumonia and a brain cyst (http://www.rights.org/deathnet/ open.html). The
Oregon Death with Dignity Act allows terminally ill adults who are mentally
competent to ask for a prescription for medication for the purpose of ending his
or her life in a humane and dignified manner(http://www.rights.org/deathnet/
open.html). This act, Measure 16, was approved by the voters in 1994. Renewed
efforts at the Legislative level to overturn Measure 16 may now be anticipated
to prevent the law from being used(http://www.rights.org/deathnet/open. html).
In June, 1990, the Supreme Court decided that the parents of 32 year old Nancy
Beth Cruzan, who had been in a car accident and in what Doctor’s called a
vegetative state for seven years, could not end her treatment. Later that same
year, a Missouri Court ruled that the feeding tube could be removed after
evidence that Cruzan would wish to terminate the treatment was proven. Nancy
Beth Cruzan died twelve days later(Death and Dying,26). The First Amendment
gives one the right to demand the correction of an injustice. Would one not
consider a terminal illness an injustice? Charles Hall contracted this deadly
disease from a blood transfusion not from shooting drugs or having unprotected
sex. So wouldn’t Hall be entitled to have this injustice corrected? The
Fourteenth Amendment gives one the right to life, liberty, or property, without
due process of law. However, is living with complications from a terminal
illness, so severe that one is unable to function dependently, life? The
government says that it is. Liberty is freedom, but is having complications
which do not allow one to be free and independent, freedom? The government says
once again that it is. Freedom is also having the ability to make choices. These
choices should include the ability to decide to end one’s own life when such
complications exist. In conclusion, evidence has shown that the First and
Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution entitles citizens of the United States
of America the right to die. The government was setup to govern, not to rule
with absolute power. If the people were to keep silent about what they believe
in, our government would not exist as the system that it is today. Our democracy
was created because of those brave souls who fought for their rights, and we
should follow in their footsteps. If everyone would voice their opinion in favor
for the right to die, the government would have to attend to the peoples’
wishes.
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