Supreme Court Weighs Assisted Suicide Arguments

The Supreme Court and physician-assisted suicide--the ultimate right.

The U.S. Supreme Court will decide later this year whether to let stand decisions by two appeals courts permitting doctors to help terminally ill patients commit suicide. The Ninth and Second Circuit Courts of Appeals last spring held that state laws in Washington and New York that ban assistance in suicide were unconstitutional as applied to doctors and their dying patients. If the Supreme Cou...

Leaving the door ajar: the Supreme Court and assisted suicide.

Physician-assisted suicide and the Supreme Court: the Washington and Vacco verdicts.

In June 1997, the Supreme Court decided that statutes proscribing physicians from providing lethal medication for use by competent, terminally ill patients do not violate the Due Process or Equal Protection Clauses of the Constitution. The Court returned the question of physician-assisted suicide to the states, but did not foreclose future review of state laws that may be too restrictive of car...

Ruling on physician-assisted suicide near top of agenda at US Supreme Court.

THE US SUPREME COURT will soon rule on whether Americans have a constitutional right to physician-assisted suicide. Lawyer Karen Capen says Canadian physicians should keep an eye on the ruling because Canada and the US have similar standards of medical practice and ethical principles. Any solution remains difficult because the gap between supporters and opponents of physician-assisted suicide i...

The Supreme Court and terminal sedation: rejecting assisted suicide, embracing euthanasia.