Legalization Of Assisted Suicide example essay topic

Do We Have The Right To Die? Goldfarb, Jennifer ENC 1102 Mrs. Cart right In October of 1939, Louis Repouille chloroformed his thirteen-year-old son described as "an incurable imbecile". The boy was deformed and mute since birth and therefor bedridden. Due to a brain tumor, he became blind. Two months afterward, the father was found guilty of manslaughter in the second degree. No man or woman can honestly say that this boy should have stayed alive to suffer inevitably or that his father should have sanely watched him.

Euthanasia is the right for any human being who is terminally ill to find the means to end his or her life. Mentally stable adults, who are deathly ill, have a right to die. Euthanasia has been practiced throughout time and in many cultures. When an elderly Aymara Indian of Bolivia becomes terminally ill, relatives and friends are summoned to the home of the death vigil. The family will withhold food and drink until the dying person slips into unconsciousness and dies. In Eskimo cultures, an old or sick Eskimo tells his family when he is ready to die and the family will immediately comply by abandoning the aged person to the ravages of nature or by killing him themselves.

Aged Ethiopians allowed themselves to be tied to wild bulls. The natives of Amboyna, ate their failing relatives out of charity. Congolese jumped on the tired and old until their life was gone. In Athens, magistrates kept a supply of poison for anyone who wished to die. Aiding death was often done out of respect for an ill person. (Humphrey, 2) In Christianity, on the other hand, suicide was denounced.

Anyone who took his or her own life was denied a Christian burial. With a reaffirmation of Greek and Roman values, the concept of an easy death gradually came to be regarded once again. What distinguished the sixteenth century attitude toward suicide from that of the Middle Ages was a reawakened interest in individualism. (Humphrey, 8) During the eighteenth century, Parades, a physician, wrote "Oratio de Euthanasia". He recommended an "easy death" for a patient who is incurable and suffering.

In 1777, a year after his death, David Hume's essay, "Of Suicide" was published. He wrote, "when life has become a burden both courage and prudence should engage us to rid ourselves at once of existence". Schopenhauer stressed man's assailable title to his own life and person. "It will be generally found that, as soon as the terrors of life reach the point at which they outweigh the terrors of death, a man will put an end to his life". (Humphrey, 11) It was believed that incurable pain overwhelmed man and death was indeed a merciful release and suicide a laudable act. In 1911, the Lafargue family committed suicide.

In a written statement, the husband pointed out that he has orchestrated his own death "before pitiless old age which is taking from me one of the pleasures and joys of existence, and depriving me of my intellectual strength, paralyzed my energy, breaks my life and makes me a burden to myself and others. Years ago, I promised myself not to live beyond seventy". (Humphrey, 12) In 1938, in New York, a grand jury refused to indict Harry Johnson for asphyxiating his wife who had been repeatedly quoted saying she wanted to die. He was charged with first-degree murder. Quadriplegic Elizabeth Bou via was refused permission to starve to death in a hospital. William Battling pleaded with the world and the courts to be taken off of his respirator.

He died while fighting for his right to die. Clair Connroys family won the watershed right to disconnect her from the artificial feeding, setting a precedent that pleased some and dismayed others. In Raleigh Firkin-Paul Morgan Memorial Hospital versus Anderson, a woman refused treatment for religious reasons during her eighth month of pregnancy. The Supreme Court of New Jersey ordered a transfusion since the welfare of the baby and mother is inseparable. In John F. Kennedy Memorial Hospital versus Heston, Delores Heston was admitted to the hospital due to an automobile accident. Doctors concluded that in order to survive she would need an operation that would require a transfusion.

Her mother and herself were Jehovah's Witnesses and refused consent. Although she carried a card for over six years that stated her choice not to receive a transfusion, the blood was administered. (Humphrey, 232) The law has, for the most part, prohibited Euthanasia. Karen Ann Quinlan was 21 on April 14, 1975, the day that she swallowed a combination of valiums and alcohol that put her in a coma.

Many doctors said, "she had no hope of emerging" and was put on life support. Karen's parents petitioned for a court for permission to remove her from the life support so that she could die "with grace and dignity". On March 31, 1976 the New Jersey Supreme Court issued its landmark ruling: "The Constitutional right to privacy encompassed a person's decision to forgo life-sustaining medical treatment in certain circumstances". The court said that Karen's father could make the decision for her. After she was disconnected from the respirator, she confounded the experts. She remained unconscious, but still breathing.

She withered away to sixty-five pounds and stayed alive until June 11, 1985 when she died in a nursing home. Although she never knew it, Karen began the right to die movement. (Stout, 13 NJ) Rebecca Lou Badger was 31 years of age when she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, a degeneration disease of the nervous system. She could no longer walk, was subject to seizures and got through the day with prescription painkillers.

Ahead she saw nothing, but agony and finally requested her death come sooner. She wrote, "pain excruciating. Can't walk. Excrement all over myself".

In a Detroit hotel, she died from a lethal injection supervised by Dr. Jack Kevorkian. Then 68 years old, Dr. Kevorkian was the apostle of euthanasia. (Jerome, 53) A 53-year-old Canadian man named Austin Bastille, whose body had been crippled by multiple sclerosis, sat with a mask over his face and flipped a switch with his only limb still under his control. He sent carbon monoxide flowing through his lungs until he was gone. His wife, friend, and doctors (including Jack Kevorkian) sat in the room with him. He spoke on a video four days earlier.

He said that his death was a blow for freedom "not just for myself, but for every rational Canadian who someday may wish to have a choice in how they will die". The death certificate stated that he dies of "pathol ysis" a term Kevorkian used for assisted suicide. (Nichols, 47) Dr. Kevorkian injected Thomas Youk with a fatal dose of potassium chloride in order to assist him with his suicide. Youk was fifty-two years old and suffered from Lou Gehrig's disease. Parts of the videotape of the incident were aired on "60 Minutes" and charges were immediately filed. Kevorkian purposely publicized the death and challenged the prosecutors to charge him, obviously wanting to be a martyr.

Kevorkian has acknowledged a role in about 130 assisted suicides since 1990. He had been charged with murder before. The first time stemmed from the 1990 death of Janet Adkins of Portland, but the case was dropped because the judge ruled that the state had no rule banning assisted suicide. The retired pathologist was acquitted in three trials involving five deaths.

(Suhr, 1) Kevorkian, 71, is serving a 10- to 25-year prison term for his second-degree murder conviction. With so many cases of assisted suicide, government legislation needed to be introduced. "In a decision that took legal scholars and medical ethicist's by surprise last week (April 8), the Second Circuit Court of Appeals struck down a New York State law that prohibited physicians from helping their patients to die. It's already legal for doctors to withhold treatment at a patient's request. Now, as long as the patient is in the final stages of a terminal disease, mentally competent and able to take a lethal dose of medicine on his or her own, the state cannot bar a doctor from prescribing that dose". (Lemonick, 82) The debate continues over the legalization of assisted suicide, with opposing sides standing steadfast in their beliefs.

Attempts to change existing laws prohibiting euthanasia have met with strong opposition, especially from the American Medical Association and the Catholic Church. However, proponents hail Oregon's 1995 Measure 16, which "allows doctors to prescribe a lethal dose of medication to a dying mentally competent patient who has written a request agreed to by two doctors and signed by two witnesses. Other states have introduced similar legislation, but have met with strong resistance. (Henry, 1) Several Federal Court decisions reached in early 1996 have encouraged right to die advocates. A Washington appeals court overturned a state law forbidding assisted suicide. In April of 1996, a New York circuit court judge struck down two state laws forbidding doctor-assisted suicide.

These decisions, together with opinion polls indicating popular support for assisted suicide, have been sharply criticized by columnists and other observers. (Dority, 6) The power of physicians over life and death is illustrated by the account of two critically ill patients, their doctor and families. A patient's pain, chance for recovery and quality of life must be closely considered by an experienced physician when making the decision to avoid prolonging agony. Physicians should lead the debate to provide the public with a clear understanding of the ethical issues raised by euthanasia, as well as the need to formulate legal guidelines for decision making. A bill dealing with Euthanasia was introduced to Ohio legislature. It read, "when an adult of sound mind has been fatally hurt and is so ill that recovery is impossible or suffering from physical pain without hope of relief, his physician, if not a relative and if not interested in their estate, may ask his patient in the presence of three witnesses if he or she is ready to die...

Three other physicians are to be consulted". The bill, however, has dangers. Inept doctors could easily conceal features and confidence in them could be lost. The bill was defeated 78 - 22. (Humphrey, 12) Oregon passed the "Death with Dignity Act" which allows doctors in Oregon to help terminally ill patients commit suicide by drug overdose. The law has specific rules for this assistance and requires witnesses, consultants and written documents.

Doctors can only write a prescription for the drug for a patient who is believed to live less than six moths and cannot take part in lethal injection or mercy killing. The American Medical Association and Catholic Church were against the law, but it passed with fifty-two percent of the vote. (Brown, A 20) Opponents of Oregon's law are saddened. "For one patient to be given a lethal overdose instead of being offered hope and treatment is a terrible thing", said N. Gregory Hamilton, a physician and president for Physicians for Compassionate Care. "All we can tell from these reports is that some individuals are having their lives devalued and stigmatized by the state government with lethal consequences". Barbara Coombs Lee, executive director of Compassion in Dying, believes that Oregon is going forward with the law carefully and responsibly.

"Oregon doctors are being so careful to comply with all the aspects of the new law", she stated. (McMahon, p 6 A) To make a good decision on the right to die issue, you must weight the costs. Dr. William J. Robinson, argued that euthanasia measures were perfectly reasonable and justified when the incurable ill and hopelessly insane were involved. Life is sacred, he said but only if it was "pleasant, wanted and bearable". Morris Abram, former chairman of the Presidential Commission of Medical Ethics, said, "for every illness, there is some procedure that can delay the moment of death. The question is for how long, at what cost, at what pain, at what suffering?" Twenty-eight percent of the nation's $75 billion now goes to maintaining people in their last year and the bulk of that is spent during the last month.

In 1983, ten percent of the nation's product was on health and it has continued to rise. Many people receive unnecessary care that only increases costs and prolongs death. (Humphrey, 204) "The Constitutional right to privacy includes the right of a mature, competent adult to refuse to accept medical recommendations that may prolong one's life. The right to privacy includes a right to die with which the state should not interfere", Judge Alfred Williams said during his decision on the Heston case.

(Humphrey, 232) It is only natural to want to die when one is in severe pain or unnaturally living. The costs of keeping a patient on a machine or in a nursing home, for no apparent reason, is senseless. In essence, allowing euthanasia is the logical and ethical thing to do.

Bibliography

Brown, David, "Medical Community Still Divided on Oregon's Assisted Suicide Law", Washington Post, November 13, 1994, p.
A 20 Dority, Barbara, "In the Hands of the People", Humanist, July / August 1996, pp.
6-8 (Sirs Researcher, 96) "Family to Accept Award on Kevorkian's Behalf", Online Posting, April 8, 2000 Hallock, Steve, "Physician -Assisted Suicide: 'Slippery Slope' or Civil Right? , "Humanist, July / August 1996, pp.
8-4 Hanley, Robert, "Joseph Quinlan, 71 is Dead; Sought Daughter's Right To Die", The New York Times, December 11, 1996, p.
B 17 (The New York Times Ondisc) Henry, Sarah, "The Battle over Assisted Suicide: A Time to Die, California Lawyer, January 1996, p.
1 (Sirs Researcher) Humphry, Derek and Wickett, Ann: The Right to Die, New York: Harper & Row Publishers, 1986 Jerome, Richard, "Post Mortem", People Weekly, September 16, 1996, pp.
52 - 55 Kaddish, Sanford H. (ed. ), "Euthanasia", Encyclopedia of Crime and Justice, Volume 2, New York: The Free Press, 1983 Lemonick, Michael D.
Defining the Right to Die", Time, April 15, 1996, p.
82 (Sirs Researcher, 1996) McMahon, Patrick, "Oregon Reports 8 Suicides Under New Law", USA Today, August 19, 1997, p.
6 A Moore, Francis D., "Prolonging Life", Permitting Life To End", Harvard Magazine, July / August 1995, pp.
46-51 (Sirs Researcher, 1996) Nichols, Mark, "Dying By Choice", Maclean's, May 20, 1996, pp.
47-48"Right To Die", Ethics, Pasadena: Salem Press, Inc., 1995, Volume 3, p.
754 Rossellini, Lynn, "The Final Struggle of Jamie Butcher", US News & World Report, November 7, 1994, p.
67 Suhr, Jim, "Dr. Jack Kevorkian Charged With Murder", Associated Press, November 24, 1998 Stout, David, "20 Years: People", The New York Times, November 17, 1996, p.
13 NJ (The New York Times Ondisc) Tahmincioglu, Eve, he Cost of Dying", News Journal, July 10, 1994, p.
A 1 Weinstein, Henry, "Assisted Deaths Ruled Legal", Los Angeles Times, March 7, 1996, p.
1 A (Sirs Researcher, 1996).