Megan Conley

Throughout North America, committing suicide or attempting to commit suicide is no longer a criminal offense. However, helping another person commit suicide is a criminal act. One exception is the state of Oregon which, since 1997, has allowed people who are terminally ill and in intractable pain to obtain a lethal prescription from their physician and end their chronic suffering. This is called "Physician Assisted Suicide" or PAS.

1991: Washington state: defeated narrowly 54% to 46%

1992: California: Defeated narrowly 54% to 46%

1998: Michigan: Defeated overwhelmingly 71% to 29%

2000: Maine: Defeated very narrowly 51% to 49%.

Between 1994 and 2006, there were 75 legislative bills to legalize PAS in 21 states. All of them failed.

Permitted in Oregon under very tightly controlled conditions.

Not specifically mentioned in the laws of North Carolina, Utah and Wyoming.

Specifically criminalized in the remaining states.

“The voters of Oregon acted with great humanity when they decided to allow terminally ill people to determine when they have suffered enough.” New York Times

“How can there be ‘death with dignity’ when the patient must humbly petition the doctors, then meekly wait for a unanimous ruling?” Sheldon Richman, senior fellow at The Future of Freedom Foundation.

“The longer you keep an act in place, the more people become desensitized to it, and it no longer causes the appropriate righteous indignation.” William Toffler, MD, national director of Physicians for Compassionate Care.

The Death With Dignity law went into effect in Oregon in 1997. It allows some terminally-ill patients to request assistance in committing suicide. By the end of 2004, 208 individuals have ended their life with the help of lethal prescriptions. The number appears to be leveling-off at about 40 assisted suicides per year. Physician assisted suicide under the act accounts for only one-seventh of one percent of all deaths in the state.

92% reported a decreasing ability to participate in activities that made life enjoyable

87% reported loss of autonomy

78% reported loss of dignity

In January of 2006, after years of litigation, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Oregon program is constitutional and legal under current federal laws. It may continue, in spite of Federal Government efforts to close it down. However, they left the door open for future federal laws that might outlaw the practice.