|
|
Article: Assisted suicide: will the Supreme Court respect the autonomy rights of dying patients?
- Article from:
- Free Inquiry
- Article date:
- December 22, 1996
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1996 Council for Democratic and Secular Humanism, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
|
In October 1996, the Supreme Court announced that it will review decisions by the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Second and Ninth Circuits that have held that a state's blanket prohibition of assisted suicide for terminally ill patients is inconsistent with the Constitution. (The Second Circuit ruled on a New York statute; the Ninth Circuit ruled on a Washington statute.) The Supreme Court will hear arguments in these critical cases early in 1997, and its rulings will be issued at the end of the Court's term, in late June or early July. Although some commentators have predicted that the current Court is too conservative to uphold even a limited right to assisted suicide, ...