Massachusetts: Assisted Suicide Bill Timing "Wrong"

To view full press release on Not Dead Yet, click here.                   

John Kelly

Second Thoughts Massachusetts issues the following statement in opposition to the favorable report given by the state legislature’s Joint Committee on Public Health to Bill S. 2745, legislation that would legalize assisted suicide in Massachusetts.

Assisted suicide legislation sends a message of ‘better dead than disabled’ while completely immunizing doctors, heirs, and caregivers who can encourage or even engineer a person’s death without fear of prosecution,” said Second Thoughts Director John B. Kelly.

Virginia: "Patient-Directed Suicide Has Morphed into Family-Determined Suicide"

Thomas Eppes, M.D.

This article, published as a letter to the editor in 2018, is nonetheless timely today. - Margaret Dore.* 

Recently the effort to legalize physician-assisted suicide has ramped up in Virginia. For 2,500 years, medicine has claimed the role of healer, but this dangerous public policy would change that by requiring a doctor’s participation in a patient’s demise .

Patients should never be conflicted about which role their physician plays.

Minnesota Website Update

Minnesota State Capitol

The 2019-2020 Minnesota Legislative Session features three bills seeking to legalize assisted suicide and euthanasia, as those terms are traditionally defined. The bills are HF 2152, SF 2286 and SF 2487. For more information, see bill histories here, here and here.

On September 11, 2019, there was an informational meeting in the House Committee on Health and Human Services regarding HF 2152. No other activity is indicated. Presumably, there will be similar bills next session.

For information about similar bills in prior years, go to Choice is an Illusion Minnesota.

Massachusetts Euthanasia Bills Have Reportedly Moved Out of Committee

State House

According to unconfirmed sources, the Massachusetts "End of Life Options Act," seeking to legalize assisted suicide and euthanasia, has advanced out of the Joint Committee on Public Health to the Healthcare Finance Committee (S. 1208/H. 1926).

To learn more about problems with the Act, please see the legal/policy analysis below. If you have further information as to the exact status of the bills, please write me at margaretdore@nmargaretdore.com Thank you.

Margaret Dore, Esq.

Assisted Suicide Bill HB 5420 Dead for Now

Stephen Mendelsohn

Stephen Mendelsohn:

We still need to be concerned about a special session, but for now, 8 years with no bill passing a single committee.

Story below courtesy of Connecticut News Junkie:

HARTFORD, CT — They never expected it to end like this, but legislative leaders decided Monday that it’s not safe for them to return to the state Capitol before the constitutional adjournment of May 6.

New Jersey Motion for Reconsideration

Margaret Dore

To view Dore's brief as submitted, click here.

I.   RELIEF REQUESTED

Margaret Dore moves for reconsideration of the Court’s order dated April 1, 2020, which upheld the constitutionality of the Medical Aid in Dying for the Terminally Ill Act.[1]

II. THE ACT MUST BE SET ASIDE

The Court did not reach the Act’s violation of the object in title rule, which is dispositive to set the Act aside. The Court should reach this issue now to overturn the Act.

The Court’s order states that Dore asked the Court to declare the Act unconstitutional “on grounds not asserted by plaintiffs.”[2] The plaintiffs, did, however, ask the Court to rule on the issue, stating:

Ms. Dore’s brief should be considered by the Court since if the law is unconstitutional under the single object rule, it should be the Court’s responsibility to raise that issue sua sponte even if not raised by Ms. Dore or the Plaintiffs.[3]

The Legislature understood that it was enacting a strictly voluntary law limited to assisted suicide for dying patients.[4] The prior judge expressed a similar view. See, for example, the transcript from the hearing on August 14, 2019 (“This case is not about euthanasia”).[5]

This case, however, is about euthanasia. The Act is also not limited to dying people. Patient voluntariness is allowed, but not required. These are material facts not disclosed by the Act’s title and related findings. The Act is unconstitutional and must be set aside.

Connecticut: Legislators Need to See Our Tears

Author testifying in 2015

By Cathy Ludlum

American democracy is based on the idea that the voices of the people matter. As legislators struggle with difficult issues, trying to balance the needs of conflicting constituencies and solve complicated problems, they need to hear the perspectives of the people most directly affected.

This is why they listen to hour after hour of in-person testimony. Written testimony has its place. Studies and charts provide important information; but being in the presence of the people, hearing their passion, and sometimes seeing their tears brings us together as human beings and makes it possible for legislators to make the best decisions.

New CDC Data Shows Suicide Was Leading Cause of Death Among Oregon Youth in 2018

Note: Oregon's suicide rate began rising after physician-assisted suicide became legal in 1997. This is "the elephant in the living room," not mentioned by the article below. 

To learn more about suicide contagion in Oregon, click here. To view the article below in its entirety, click here. 

Salem, Ore. -- In February the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released data showing that suicide was the leading cause of death among Oregon youth ages 10 to 24 in 2018, up from the second leading cause of death in 2017. Oregon is now ranked 11th highest in the nation for youth suicide death rates (up from 17th in 2017).

Margaret Dore: Euthanasia Act "Must Be Set Aside"

E. David Smith

On March 24, 2020, a hearing was held in Glassman v Grewal, a lawsuit, which seeks to invalidate New Jersey's euthanasia law, formally known as the "Medical Aid in Dying for the Terminally Ill Act."

The specific matter before the court was a motion to dismiss brought by the defendant, New Jersey Attorney General, Gurbir S. Grewal.

The plaintiff, Joseph Glassman, represented by E. David Smith, opposed the motion, as did Margaret Dore, president of Choice is an Illusion, representing herself as amicus curiae.

Dore, who had filed both an amicus brief and a reply brief, argued that the Act must be set aside pursuant to the New Jersey Constitution. Her arguments largely tracked her reply brief, a portion of which is set forth below.