• If you are having problems logging in please use the Contact Us in the lower right hand corner of the forum page for assistance.

Death With Dignity- in Montana Supreme Court

A

Anonymous

Guest
I predict the court will uphold Judge McCarters ruling and rule that death with dignity is a right under Montana's Constitution.....

Montana Supreme Court hears arguments on Death With Dignity
by: CarlaAxtman
Wed Sep 02, 2009 at 14:54:29 PM MDT

This morning in a Helena courtroom, the Montana Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Baxter v. Montana. This case will decide whether terminally-ill, mentally competent adults have the right to choose aid in dying.

The Montana State Constitution contains broad clauses for dignity and privacy. The question before the court is whether those clauses protect the right to aid in dying.

In December, District Court Judge Dorothy McCarter ruled in a summary judgment that aid in dying is indeed a protected right under the Montana Constitution. The case heard today will give the higher court an opportunity to affirm that decision.

A diverse array of individuals and groups have provided friend of the court briefs in support of aid in dying. Human rights groups, women's groups, people of faith, legal scholars and many others contributed to these briefs.

Compassion & Choices Legal Director Kathryn Tucker, co-counsel to the plaintiffs/respondents said, "This case is about the right of mentally-competent, terminally-ill patients to request a prescription for medication from their doctors which they can ingest to bring about a peaceful death. This is a choice the Constitution entrusts in them, not the government."
 

CattleArmy

Well-known member
This is such an emotion charged issue. Sometimes for family it is so hard to let someone go. I know it's selfish, but to finally put someone in the ground ends everything and for some they just aren't ready to do it.

My question would be when someone is terminally ill are they ever the same mentally to make such a huge decision?

I understand when one is in pain that decision being made but what for the one who just gives up before the battle begins?
 

hopalong

Well-known member
oldtimer you might be able to answer this.
Is it possible to have something in your living will to cover something like this?
Families might not want to do exicute an order to a death with dignity, but it would seem to me that it would be close to the same thing as discontinuing life support as supported by a living will?
 

hopalong

Well-known member
reader (the Second) said:
Your advanced medical directive states what your wishes are in terms of extreme measures to keep you alive -- such as feeding tube, ventilator, resuscitation, should you be terminally ill and unable to swallow or brain dead or terminally ill and suffering from opportunistic conditions like pneumonia.

As part of your advanced medical directive, you typically designate someone with durable power of attorney to make decisions for you if you cannot, based on your expressed wishes.

Sometimes as you all probably know, the brain may be no longer functioning in any normal way and the body may be terribly diseased and the individual may be wracked with horrible pain non-stop. Then the person with the medical power of attorney (or whatever it is called), has to decide whether to take extreme measures to keep the body alive and suffering.

Of course if it is your desire that your body be kept alive and suffering terribly even if it means resuscitating you or putting you on all artificial life maintaining machinery, that's your choice to specify in the directive.

Not the question reader!!!
I am aware for what my living will states!
The question is can I address the death with dignty by opting to end my own life by a Dr giving me a way oput???
 

hypocritexposer

Well-known member
reader (the Second) said:
Your advanced medical directive states what your wishes are in terms of extreme measures to keep you alive -- such as feeding tube, ventilator, resuscitation, should you be terminally ill and unable to swallow or brain dead or terminally ill and suffering from opportunistic conditions like pneumonia.

As part of your advanced medical directive, you typically designate someone with durable power of attorney to make decisions for you if you cannot, based on your expressed wishes.

Sometimes as you all probably know, the brain may be no longer functioning in any normal way and the body may be terribly diseased and the individual may be wracked with horrible pain non-stop. Then the person with the medical power of attorney (or whatever it is called), has to decide whether to take extreme measures to keep the body alive and suffering.

Of course if it is your desire that your body be kept alive and suffering terribly even if it means resuscitating you or putting you on all artificial life maintaining machinery, that's your choice to specify in the directive.

State issue or Federal?
 

hopalong

Well-known member
reader (the Second) said:
hopalong said:
oldtimer you might be able to answer this.
Is it possible to have something in your living will to cover something like this?
Families might not want to do exicute an order to a death with dignity, but it would seem to me that it would be close to the same thing as discontinuing life support as supported by a living will?

Sorry, I focused on the discontinuing life support. Tough question. I assume you are asking with the assumption that the patient is unable to express their wishes themselves. It sounds like the answer would be "no" for the time being given the term "mentally competent".

What if it was expressed in the living will?
Given and dated at the time of menatal compentcy?
You are still not getting the question i asked oldtimer
:wink:
 
Top