Opinion: To Live and Die With Dignity

By Michelle Mann, Law Times (Ontario), Nov. 28, 2005

Surely many MPs in the [Canadian] House of Commons bemoaned Bloc Québécois MP Francine Lalonde's "win" after a lottery system selected her private member's bill C-407 for debate. When "an act to amend the Criminal Code (right to die with dignity)" was plucked fast on the heels of same-sex marriage, one could imagine a collective groan resonating throughout the Hill at the prospect of debating yet another issue engaging religion, morality, and human dignity. Yet debate it they will. Having had second reading on Oct. 31, the bill would amend the Criminal Code to allow an individual to aid a person close to death or suffering from a debilitating illness to end that person's life if he or she has expressed the free and informed wish to die.

And while first reading in June slipped by fairly innocuously, pending the election call, our MPs won't get off so easily this time around. Religious groups have already mounted aggressive campaigns against the bill for a variety of reasons, ranging from its breadth to the idea that only God can choose to end a life.

(For those who question my singling out of religious groups, google the bill.)

The breadth of the legislation is a valid issue. It permits assisted suicide for individuals who "experience severe physical or mental pain without any prospect of relief" as well as those suffering a terminal illness, on meeting certain conditions, including written consent.

The language rings some alarm bells, given that we don't know how it will be interpreted and whether there are adequate protections for those, say, suffering from depression. Given the contentious and transformative nature of legalizing assisted suicide, we may be best advised to focus on debilitating terminal illness.

We also need to build in safeguards, ensuring that no one is bullied into consenting to die because they are perceived to have become a burden. The degree to which this might occur is questionable, but does not negate the possibility.

Nonetheless, slippery-slope arguments belie our ability to draft legislation that achieves the goal of furthering the dignity of all lives.

There are those who argue that "only God grants death with dignity," apparently leaving non-believers to languish in indignity. This inclination to foist one's own religious views upon others, impeding their liberty, and the accompanying moral certitude are confounding to those of us who worship at the altar of the secular.
There is, however, an important difference between assisted suicide and mercy killing.

Sympathetic as I found Robert Latimer, the father who killed his very ill 12–year-old daughter who was suffering with cerebral palsy, the R. v. Latimer case raised ethical concerns around the disabled that assisted suicide, implemented with due rigor, does not.

Contrast Latimer with Rodriguez v. British Columbia, a case that personifies arguments for assisted suicide. Readers will recall that Sue Rodriguez, suffering from a terminal and debilitating illness, sought the right to have physician-assisted suicide so she might end her life, at her own hand, at a time of her choosing.

As recently noted at an equality conference at the University of Toronto's Faculty of Law, Rodriguez's case notably caused anguish for retired Supreme Court justices Peter Cory and Frank Iacobucci.

They are both haunted by a case in which they ruled on opposing sides.

Asked by Professor Peter Hogg whether sympathetic facts influence a decision, both former justices agreed they do not, though they may affect the judge on an emotional level.

Iacobucci, who ruled with the majority against Rodriguez's Charter challenge to the Criminal Code provisions preventing assisted suicide, referred to his "anguish" over the case.

Cory has nightmares about it. He questioned why, if Rodriguez was able to reach up and turn off the tube, it would be permissible, but at her written request, with a terminal illness, no one could help the woman of "tremendous heroism and strength" who wanted to hang in there for every possible minute for her teenage son.
It is unfortunate that members of the public were not there to hear these two men of not only great intelligence, but compassion, put a human face on the judicial process.

But I digress.

The assisted suicide bill will receive further debate and may make it to the Commons justice committee for review, though it would die there when Parliament dissolves for an election.

This is not necessarily a bad thing. I am unconvinced this bill is the best we can do, though assisted suicide, like gay marriage, is a right rooted in dignity whose time has come.

As succinctly noted by Cory, we are born, and we are going to die, but "we should be able to die with dignity as well as live with dignity."

Michelle Mann is a Toronto-based lawyer, freelance writer, and consultant. Her e-mail address is michelle@michellemann.ca.

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