Court hears physician-assisted suicide case

The Supreme Court is expected to rule in June 2006 on whether the U.S. attorney general can supersede Oregon's Death With Dignity Act.

By Kevin B. O'Reilly, AMNews staff. Oct. 24/31, 2005.

Earlier this month the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in a case that will determine whether Oregon physicians may prescribe federally controlled drugs to help end the lives of terminally ill patients under the state's Death With Dignity Act.

The question before the court is whether then U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft exceeded his authority under the Controlled Substances Act when, in 2001, he issued a directive stating that physician-assisted suicide was not a "legitimate medical purpose" for which doctors could prescribe federally controlled drugs.

Ashcroft said physicians who prescribed drugs that assisted in suicides could have their federal drug licenses revoked and be prosecuted for violating federal criminal law.

In May 2004, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 2-1 that Ashcroft, overlooking a long tradition of deferring to states in the regulation of medical practice, had overstepped his authority. The federal government appealed the case to the Supreme Court.

The justices quizzed lawyers for the federal government and Oregon on the limits of their positions, the implications for other cases and the consequences of a ruling.

Justice Sandra Day O'Connor focused on federalism, asking Solicitor General Paul Clement whether the Controlled Substances Act specifically gives the attorney general the power to regulate medicine. No, Clement said. But he added that the 1970 Congress that passed the law never dreamed that a state would make it legal for physicians to help patients kill themselves.