SAN FRANCISCO (AP) – The federal government resumed its
bid to ban Oregon doctors from helping terminally ill patients commit suicide,
filing papers Monday with an appeals court in an effort to strike down the only
such law in the nation.
Attorney General John Ashcroft is seeking to sanction and
perhaps hold Oregon doctors criminally liable if they prescribe lethal doses of
medication, as the voter-approved Death With Dignity Act allows.
“The attorney general has permissibly concluded that
suicide is not a legitimate medical purpose,” Justice Department attorney
Jonathan H. Levy wrote in the appeal filed at the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of
Appeals. Full
article
Why is it that the word dignity seems to always pop-up in
undignified groups and laws? Dignitas assists people with suicide in
Switzerland, Dignity discourages people with same-sex attraction from being
chaste, and Oregon’s Death with Dignity act. None of these examples of the use
of dignity makes a human life more respectful, worthy or honored.
