albion
01-17-2006, 11:53 PM
Supreme Court Upholds Oregon Physician-Assisted Suicide Law on 6-3 Vote
By GINA HOLLAND, Associated Press Writer
http://www.comcast.net/news/index.jsp?cat=GENERAL&fn=/2006/01/17/306037.html
WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court on Tuesday blocked the Bush administration's attempt to punish doctors who help terminally ill patients die, protecting Oregon's one-of-a-kind assisted-suicide law.
It was the first loss for Chief Justice John Roberts, who joined the court's most conservative members _ Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas _ in a long but restrained dissent.
The administration improperly tried to use a federal drug law to pursue Oregon doctors who prescribe lethal doses of prescription medicines, the court said in a rebuke to former Attorney General John Ashcroft.
The 6-3 ruling could encourage other states to consider copying Oregon's law, used to end the lives of more than 200 seriously ill people in that state. The decision, one of the biggest expected from the court this year, also could set the stage for Congress to attempt to outlaw assisted suicide.
"Congress did not have this far-reaching intent to alter the federal-state balance," Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote for the majority _ himself, retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor and Justices John Paul Stevens, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer.
With this decision Kennedy showed signs of becoming a more influential swing voter after O'Connor departs. He is a moderate conservative who sometimes joins more liberal members on cases involving such things as gay rights and capital punishment.
In some ways, the decision was an anticlimactic end to the court's latest clash over assisted suicide.
By GINA HOLLAND, Associated Press Writer
http://www.comcast.net/news/index.jsp?cat=GENERAL&fn=/2006/01/17/306037.html
WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court on Tuesday blocked the Bush administration's attempt to punish doctors who help terminally ill patients die, protecting Oregon's one-of-a-kind assisted-suicide law.
It was the first loss for Chief Justice John Roberts, who joined the court's most conservative members _ Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas _ in a long but restrained dissent.
The administration improperly tried to use a federal drug law to pursue Oregon doctors who prescribe lethal doses of prescription medicines, the court said in a rebuke to former Attorney General John Ashcroft.
The 6-3 ruling could encourage other states to consider copying Oregon's law, used to end the lives of more than 200 seriously ill people in that state. The decision, one of the biggest expected from the court this year, also could set the stage for Congress to attempt to outlaw assisted suicide.
"Congress did not have this far-reaching intent to alter the federal-state balance," Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote for the majority _ himself, retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor and Justices John Paul Stevens, David Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer.
With this decision Kennedy showed signs of becoming a more influential swing voter after O'Connor departs. He is a moderate conservative who sometimes joins more liberal members on cases involving such things as gay rights and capital punishment.
In some ways, the decision was an anticlimactic end to the court's latest clash over assisted suicide.