MicroBalrog
New member
Isn't the court able to reverse itself whenever it wants?
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an alternative browser.
You should upgrade or use an alternative browser.
U.S. Supreme Court Upholds Assisted Suicide Law (OR)
- Thread starter TheBluesMan
- Start date
The way I feel is, I came into this world with a doc, went thru life using a doc, having a cold or the flu, went to doc to get fixed up, felt better, then got better, had surgery to save my life, got better. I'm 58 yo, and for all of these years I chosethis route to feel better, to get better, to live longer, but when I choose that I've had enough It should be "Hey doc, how about some help! Just my .02
Raich was decided on the I.C. clause. If this Court could have found a way to make the euthanasia comerce, you can bet that they would have outlawed it, under Raich.
Don't be too worked up over stare decisis-- the SCOTUS has time and again overruled itself. (some would say that it did in Raich, after Lopez and Morrison.)
I've yet to read the full decision-- so far the snippets and the votes fall precisely along the lines I'd expected. I'll be interested to read Scalia's reasoning. Roberts' too, for that matter.
As a libertarian, I would have been a lot happier if this vote had gone 9-0 for OR. Let's hear it for Amendments 9 and 10!
Don't be too worked up over stare decisis-- the SCOTUS has time and again overruled itself. (some would say that it did in Raich, after Lopez and Morrison.)
I've yet to read the full decision-- so far the snippets and the votes fall precisely along the lines I'd expected. I'll be interested to read Scalia's reasoning. Roberts' too, for that matter.
As a libertarian, I would have been a lot happier if this vote had gone 9-0 for OR. Let's hear it for Amendments 9 and 10!
+1As a libertarian, I would have been a lot happier if this vote had gone 9-0 for OR. Let's hear it for Amendments 9 and 10!
It is long past time for the Feds to scale WAY back on this sort of thing, and start respecting the 9th and the 10th. The Feds never should have been involved in this sort of thing in the first place.
I really hate it when Kennedy writes an opinion. He simply tortures the language. But his reasoning is (sort of) sound, if you don't look at Raich and only look to statutory construction. But that begs the question: Why didn't he rely upon statutory construction in Raich?
Long Path, Roberts did not write a dissenting opinion. He merely agreed with Scalia.
Speaking of which, Scalia's dissent in Oregon is consistant with his position on Raich. Here, Scalia argues that the statutory construction permits the AG to define medical drug usage as they did. In Raich, he argued in his separate opinion, that the statutory construction permitted the AG to define marijuana usage.
If you trouble yourselves to really read the 3 opinions, they are not very long, you will see that Thomas is calling not just the majority hypocrites, but all of them. The problem is consistancy. If you are to go to Constitutional lengths to uphold Raich and not take the statutory construction route, then the same should have been done in Oregon.
Also, for the same reasoning that home-grown medically prescribed marijuana that had never traveled in commerce (intra or inter state) to be a part of commerce, because it in some (elusive) way affects commerce, then the same argument applies to drugs prescribed for assisted suicide.
And finally, the Court neatly sidesteps the issue (once again) of having to quantify the value of life (Roe is the precedent for this).
Long Path, Roberts did not write a dissenting opinion. He merely agreed with Scalia.
Speaking of which, Scalia's dissent in Oregon is consistant with his position on Raich. Here, Scalia argues that the statutory construction permits the AG to define medical drug usage as they did. In Raich, he argued in his separate opinion, that the statutory construction permitted the AG to define marijuana usage.
If you trouble yourselves to really read the 3 opinions, they are not very long, you will see that Thomas is calling not just the majority hypocrites, but all of them. The problem is consistancy. If you are to go to Constitutional lengths to uphold Raich and not take the statutory construction route, then the same should have been done in Oregon.
Also, for the same reasoning that home-grown medically prescribed marijuana that had never traveled in commerce (intra or inter state) to be a part of commerce, because it in some (elusive) way affects commerce, then the same argument applies to drugs prescribed for assisted suicide.
And finally, the Court neatly sidesteps the issue (once again) of having to quantify the value of life (Roe is the precedent for this).
Also, for the same reasoning that home-grown medically prescribed marijuana that had never traveled in commerce (intra or inter state) to be a part of commerce, because it in some (elusive) way affects commerce, then the same argument applies to drugs prescribed for assisted suicide.
Well, ya see, it affects commerce because, ya see, if docs can prescribe drugs for purposes other than those which are federally approved, then that undercuts the whole federal drug approval process, thus disrupting interstate commerce because we'll go back to a time before 1906 and the Pure Food and Drug Act.
(Actually, that Act carefully stepped around any purely intrastate activity, but anyway...)
That's the argument, as I understood it when I had it out with a very determined statist on this issue some time back.
Optical Serenity
New member
I agree that no matter what, there should be no govt funding of any kind to someone who wants to commit suicide. Whether assisted or not.
Personally i disagree with assisted suicide, for the simple fact that IMO 90% of the people who want to exercise this option are not thinking very clearly. I want to live to see every new day that comes, no matter the amount of pain I am in.
Personally i disagree with assisted suicide, for the simple fact that IMO 90% of the people who want to exercise this option are not thinking very clearly. I want to live to see every new day that comes, no matter the amount of pain I am in.
My personal viewis suicide is immoral. That said, if someone wants to kill themselves they should be ultimately be able to do so. They and they alone will have to pay the consequences. However, keep physicians out of it. Better yet, keep the entire medical industry out of it. Western civilization has bad history when the medicial world gets involved in voluntary death. I dare say more people have died without the benefit of a physician than have died with physicians in attendance. Let's not prostitute the primary task of a physician.
I'm proud to be an Oregonian today. Wait! What's that? Storm clouds on the horizon. I understand there's talk in congress to make a new federal law to trump the court's decision. Now, to respond to the last few posts...
First, the cost of prescribing pain killers is minimal. That's all a doctor is doing. Yes he knows what it's for. Doctors in Oregon have the choice to prescribe or not. If he feels he cannot in good conscience do it he does not have to. There's no law requiring him to.
First, the cost of prescribing pain killers is minimal. That's all a doctor is doing. Yes he knows what it's for. Doctors in Oregon have the choice to prescribe or not. If he feels he cannot in good conscience do it he does not have to. There's no law requiring him to.
Glenn E. Meyer
New member
It is not your business to interfer with the right of someone with a painful and fatal illness or condition to ask a willing medical professional to aid them.
If you don't understand that, then cut the bull**** about how freedom is just owning a gun.
One can get lost in the legalisms that Scalia, Roberts, and Thomas used to foist their religious beliefs on everyone else. The key issue is the outcome in a paradigm of personal freedom. Social conservatives oppose personal freedom. But, oh, can I have a gun?
If you don't understand that, then cut the bull**** about how freedom is just owning a gun.
One can get lost in the legalisms that Scalia, Roberts, and Thomas used to foist their religious beliefs on everyone else. The key issue is the outcome in a paradigm of personal freedom. Social conservatives oppose personal freedom. But, oh, can I have a gun?
FirstFreedom
Moderator
My two cents from a quick read - Scalia, Thomas and Roberts dissent.
Just shows that social conservatives are just as controlling as anyone when they get their ideology/religion all a flutter. The matter seems to be a states' rights issue but the subtext is there.
Wonder what this means for the medical marijuana cases?
Glenn Meyer, you are exactly correct. We can see now early on that Roberts is going to be a Scalia-like right-wing political whore.
Thank God for this decision! It's certainly the right one.
One can get lost in the legalisms that Scalia, Roberts, and Thomas used to foist their religious beliefs on everyone else.
I don't agree with that. First, they lost, so they can't really foist anything on anyone, and second, it really is about the legalisms, the balance of powers created by our Constitution, and not the religious views of the Justices on either side of the issue. I saw religion seep into Scalia's conclusion:
I would have said If the term "legitimate medical purpose" has any meaning, it surely can exclude the prescription of drugs to produce death. If the feds have the power of controlling the prescription system, they can say what a "prescription" actually is, and in so doing, define a "legitimate medical purpose." Unless, that is, you wish to repudiate a whole bunch of New Deal era judicial activism. But conservatives like Scalia (and, apparently, Roberts) don't believe in reversing long-established law. Personally, I wouldn't mind repudiating a long and well-established principle of our jurisprudence...The Court's decision today is perhaps driven by a feeling that the subject of assisted suicide is none of the Federal Government's business. It is easy to sympathize with that position. The prohibition or deterrence of assisted suicide is certainly not among the enumerated powers conferred on the United States by the Constitution, and it is within the realm of public morality (bonos mores) traditionally addressed by the so-called police power of the States. But then, neither is prohibiting the recreational use of drugs or discouraging drug addiction among the enumerated powers. From an early time in our national history, the Federal Government has used its enumerated powers, such as its power to regulate interstate commerce, for the purpose of protecting public morality--for example, by banning the interstate shipment of lottery tickets, or the interstate transport of women for immoral purposes. See Hoke v. United States, 227 U. S. 308, 321-323 (1913); Lottery Case, 188 U. S. 321, 356 (1903). Unless we are to repudiate a long and well-established principle of our jurisprudence, using the federal commerce power to prevent assisted suicide is unquestionably permissible. The question before us is not whether Congress can do this, or even whether Congress should do this; but simply whether Congress has done this in the CSA. I think there is no doubt that it has. If the term "legitimate medical purpose" has any meaning, it surely excludes the prescription of drugs to produce death.
For the above reasons, I respectfully dissent from the judgment of the Court.