![]() The Ninth Circuit's and respondents' various descriptions of the interest here at stake-e. Second, the Court has required a "careful description" of the asserted fundamental liberty interest. The Court's established method of substantive-due-process analysis has two primary features: First, the Court has regularly observed that the Clause specially protects those fundamental rights and liberties which are, objectively, deeply rooted in this Nation's history and tradition. (b) In light of that history, this Court's decisions lead to the conclusion that respondents' asserted "right" to assistance in committing suicide is not a fundamental liberty interest protected by the Due Process Clause. ![]() (a) An examination of our Nation's history, legal traditions, and practices demonstrates that Anglo-American common law has punished or otherwise disapproved of assisting suicide for over 700 years that rendering such assistance is still a crime in almost every State that such prohibitions have never contained exceptions for those who were near death that the prohibitions have in recent years been reexamined and, for the most part, reaffirmed in a number of States and that the President recently signed the Federal Assisted Suicide Funding Restriction Act of 1997, which prohibits the use of federal funds in support of physician-assisted suicide. Held: Washington's prohibition against "caus" or "aid" a suicide does not violate the Due Process Clause. 261, the Federal District Court agreed, concluding that Washington's assistedsuicide ban is unconstitutional because it places an undue burden on the exercise of that constitutionally protected liberty interest. Relying primarily on Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pa. They assert a liberty interest protected by the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause which extends to a personal choice by a mentally competent, terminally ill adult to commit physician-assisted suicide. They, along with three gravely ill plaintiffs who have since died and a nonprofit organization that counsels people considering physician-assisted suicide, filed this suit against petitioners, the State and its Attorney General, seeking a declaration that the ban is, on its face, unconstitutional. The State's present law makes "romoting a suicide attempt" a felony, and provides: "A person is guilty of when he knowingly causes or aids another person to attempt suicide." Respondents, four Washington physicians who occasionally treat terminally ill, suffering patients, declare that they would assist these patients in ending their lives if not for the State's assisted-suicide ban. Individuals do have the right to accept a natural death rather than artificially extending their lives, but they do not have the right to affirmatively seek out death when they would naturally remain alive. The Court generally seems to view the right to commit suicide, whether by oneself or with the assistance of others, differently from the right to refuse medical treatment, discussed in Cruzan v. If the Court recognized the right to die, even in some extreme cases, it would become hard to draw a line separating the permissible use of this right fom the impermissible use of euthanasia by a person or the person's family. Moreoever, Rehnquist pointed out that the state has a compelling interest in preserving the lives of its residents and protecting mentally ill individuals from mistreatment. The majority even looked back to English common law as a guide for what could be considered traditionally appropriate in the U.S. This could not be said of assisted suicide, which until recently had been considered socially improper and remained illegal in many states. ![]() East Cleveland, the Court had limited liberty interests to those that were deeply rooted in the nation's history. ![]() The majority looked back to how it had defined liberty interests protected by the Fourteenth Amendment to determine whether the right to assisted suicide should be included. Initially disagreeing with the lower court, the Ninth Circuit ultimately affirmed its decision after an en banc review. They persuaded a federal district court that the right to die was part of the liberty interest protected by the Fourteenth Amendment. The law was challenged by Harold Glucksberg and four other doctors in conjunction with a group of terminally ill individuals and Compassion in Dying, an organization that provided guidance for people considering assisted suicide. ![]() Under the Natural Death Act of 1979, the state of Washington prohibited assisted suicide. ![]()
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