Pubdate: Sat, 17 Nov 2001
Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch (MO)
Copyright: 2001 St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Contact:  http://home.post-dispatch.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/418
Author: Leonard Pitts Jr, Miami Herald

DR. ASHCROFT OVERRULES OREGON VOTERS

WASHINGTON - You'd think John Ashcroft would have better things to do than 
pick on sick people. I mean, what with anthrax in the mail and terrorists 
on the loose, I find it incredible that he has the time -- not to mention 
the inclination. Specifically, he went gunning last week for the state of 
Oregon's Death With Dignity Act. The act, twice approved by voters, allows 
a terminally ill patient to seek a doctor's help in ending his or her life. 
Two physicians must first agree that the patient has less than six months 
to live. The patient must also be certified mentally competent to make that 
decision.

Ashcroft ordered Drug Enforcement Agency officials to crack down on doctors 
who dispense controlled substances with the aim of ending a patient's life. 
That, he said, is not a "legitimate medical purpose." A federal judge has 
since issued a restraining order and the dispute is headed for a legal 
showdown. Ashcroft ought to reconsider. His order is intrusive and 
offensive. And I say this as a less-than-staunch supporter of 
physician-assisted suicide.

Frankly, it's hard to imagine the circumstances under which I might decide 
to end my own life. I believe you must always leave room for miracles. And 
that life is always preferable to death.

But it's easy to say that when your health is good. Would I still say it in 
the end stages of a terminal illness, drifting in a universe of agony as 
unbearable as it was unending? Would I say it if life became a torment, and 
death a release?

I like to think I would. But I don't know. None of us can ever truly know 
how we would respond in such a circumstance until, God forbid, we are in 
it. And if I can't say for sure what I would do if I were there, how can I 
presume to decide what you must do when you are?

The attorney general, who once promised not to use the law to enforce his 
personal beliefs, is cheerfully using the law to enforce his personal 
beliefs. This, despite the fact that his political party -- the GOP -- 
preaches a gospel of less-intrusive government and declares that people 
ought to be left alone to decide most things for themselves. Apparently, 
that only holds true if the people decide as the government wishes.

His specious rationalizing about the proper use of controlled substances 
aside, it's hard to see where John Ashcroft's order upholds the 
constitution, protects the safety of others, validates any worthwhile 
principle or, indeed, serves any interest beyond putting the force of law 
behind his unease with physician-assisted suicide. I don't begrudge him the 
unease. Many reasonable people certainly share it. But unease alone is no 
basis for him to wedge himself into a question already decided by Oregon 
voters.

I'm reminded of what was, for me, the most horrific image of Sept. 11: the 
people jumping. Some holding hands, some all alone, they stepped from 
burning skyscrapers and plunged toward death.

I can never know what they saw or felt that was so awful that this became 
the preferred alternative. I do know that, appalling as it was, there was 
also something in the act of suicide under those conditions that was 
defiant and even life-affirming.

Think about it. Death was an imminent certainty, imposed upon them by 
factors beyond their control. And they seized back their own destiny. They 
would decide the moment and manner of their destruction.

I bet most of us watching instinctively understood why they did what they 
did. I suspect the attorney general would not reproach them for it.

So why reproach people in Oregon who do the same thing?
- ---
MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart