May 06, 2003
'Death With Dignity' Court Hearing Wednesday Morning
First, I came across this Associated Press article about "death with dignity" supporters warning that the threat to the law from U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft continues:
The landmark Oregon assisted suicide law is still in danger from U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft despite approval twice from voters and a U.S. Supreme Court ruling affirming that states have the right to pass such a law, supporters said Tuesday.
"We have had nine years of uninterrupted assault from people in powerful positions -- this is just the latest episode," said Barbara Coombs Lee, president of the Compassion in Dying Federation and co-author of the Oregon law approved in 1994.
As this article reports, a "three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals was scheduled to hear oral arguments" tomorrow.
Then, I came across this posting to the Portland Independent Media Center calling for a rally outside the Mark O. Hatfield U.S. Courthouse Wednesday morning. Note that the time indicated in this posting (11:00 AM) has been superceded by a later correction switching it to 9:00 AM.
A stop at the Oregon Death with Dignity website leads to a reprinted article from the Statesman Journal which explains the facts of the case, and gives some details about the hearing:
A three-judge panel from San Francisco will be in Portland on Wednesday to hear oral arguments in Oregon vs. Ashcroft - the ongoing battle between the Bush administration and state and private lawyers over Oregon's physician-assisted suicide law.
...
Each side will have a half-hour to present its arguments. That means federal lawyers will get 30 minutes. Lawyers for the state will have 12 minutes, lawyers representing the plaintiff physician and pharmacist will have nine minutes and lawyers representing patients will have nine minutes.
The hearing is, apparently, open to the public. Which means I have to get a decent night's sleep if I'm going to try to go get a seat for this one.