Physician-Assisted Suicide as a Constitutional Right
Physician-Assisted Suicide as a Constitutional Right
复制标题
医生协助自杀是一项宪法权利
DOI：
10.1111/j.1748-720x.1996.tb01853.x
复制
发表时间：
1996
期刊：
影响因子：
--
通讯作者：
J. Linville
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
J. Linville
对医生协助自杀（PAS）的法律的处理是不断变化的。改革是由几股力量推动的，包括最近在第九和第二巡回上诉法院成功的新颖的宪法论点。我将回顾和讨论“垂死诉华盛顿州案”和“奎尔诉弗吉尼亚州案”中的宪法学，讨论宪法学的论点，然后简要地考虑这些新宪法学理论的吸引力和困难。在1990年之前，处理协助自杀的州刑法已经达成了一个非常稳定的共识：自杀并不违法，但协助自杀是一种犯罪行为，医生和其他协助者之间通常没有区别。相关刑法的细节因州而异。一些州有专门针对协助自杀的刑事法规，而另一些州则在更一般的杀人法规下处理这种做法。但在任何一个州，医生应垂死病人的要求开致命药物都是明确法律的。虽然在1970年代和1980年代期间，在临终病人权利的其他方面（包括拒绝复苏和其他维持生命治疗的权利，以及停止包括营养和水合作用在内的维持生命治疗的权利），出现了显著的法律的发展，但在《临终关怀法》方面却相对平静。
The legal treatment of physician-assisted suicide (PAS) is in flux. Reform has been impelled by several forces, including the recent success of novel constitutional arguments in the Ninth and Second Circuit Courts of Appeals. I will review and discuss Compassion in Dying v. State of Washington and Quill v. Vacco, addressing the constitutional arguments, and then briefly considering the attractions and difficulties of these new constitutional theories. Before 1990, state criminal laws dealing with assisted suicide had reached a remarkably stable consensus: suicide was not illegal, but assisting suicide was a criminal action with no distinction typically made between physicians and others who assisted. The details of the relevant criminal law varied from state to state. Some states had criminal statutes specifically addressing assisted suicide, while others treated the practice under more general homicide statutes. But in no state was it clearly legal for a physician to prescribe a lethal medication at the request of a dying patient. While remarkable legal developments took place during the 1970s and 1980s regarding other aspects of the rights of dying patients (including the right to refuse resuscitation and other life-sustaining treatments and the right to withdraw from life-sustaining treatment including nutrition and hydration), there was relative quiescence regarding the law of PAS.