General Conference Cathar Church (USA)

(1996)

Vacco v. Quill, 521 U.S. 793 (1997) (No. 95-1858),
Washington v. Glucksberg, 521 U.S. 702 (1997) (No. 96-110).

Download pdf document. Download the full pdf brief from external source (Florida State University College of Law)

Also read:
Catholic Herald  article   "The NCCB's Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities noted that the only national religious group to support this position is the Cathar Church, which believes that the material world is the "Kingdom of Satan."
The Humanist; 3/1/1997
Catholic Citizens of Illinois  Steve Kellmeyer 3/30/2005 (Steve Kellmeyer is a nationally recognized author and lecturer who integrates today's headlines with his Roman Catholic Faith) "The power of the Catholic Church to intervene in the culture is largely gone. Secular government will have to deal with today’s Cathars. Sadly, there is no evidence we really understand what we are up against."
WESTLAW  Amicus Brief of 36 Religious Organizations, Leaders and Scholars, in support of respondents, Dec. 10, 1996  (subscribe)

Brief of 36 Religious Organizations, Leaders, and Scholars as Amici Curiae in Support of Respondents, Vacco v. Quill, 521 U.S. 793 (1997) (No. 95-1858), and Washington v. Glucksberg, 521 U.S. 702 (No. 96-110) (concluding that a right to assisted suicide is covered by the state constitutional right to privacy, and stating that a doctor had a right to "determine his own ethical, religious, and moral beliefs in declining or agreeing to assist");

In 1996, the Ninth Circuit Court (covering Washinton, Oregon, California, Arizona, Hawaii, and four other Western states) decided the case of Washington vs. Glucksberg. In this case, the issue at hand was whether there is a constitutionally protected right to die, and, if so, whether the ban on assisted suicide was in violation of this right. The plaintiff, Seattle oncologist Harold Glucksberg, cited the famous abortion case of Planned Parenthood vs. Casey, in which the Supreme Court ruled that there exists a right (the Casey Right) “to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life”. Chief Judge Barbara Rothstein found that the State cannot impose laws that infringe upon a citizen’s own right to answer the “profound spiritual and moral questions surrounding the end of life”, and ruled that Washington’s prohibition on physician-assistance with suicide was in violation of this right, and thus in violation of the Constitution of the United States.

In 1997, the United States Supreme Court unanimously reversed the decision of the lower Courts in the Quill vs. Vacco and Washington vs. Glucksberg cases. The Supreme Court disagreed with the concept of a fundamental right to death, thus negating the decision of the Ninth Circuit which decided the case of Washington vs. Glucksberg. The Supreme Court recognized a distinction between letting a patient die and deliberately causing that patient's death, and did not agree that the ban on assisted suicide was in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment, as the Second Circuit Court held.

In 1996, The Second Circuit Court of the United States (covering New York, Connecticut, and Vermont), upon hearing a case presented by Dr. Timothy Quill, some colleagues, and some patients, ruled that New York State’s ban on assisted suicide is unconstitutional, because it is in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Quill held that the ban on assisted suicide allows people who are reliant on artificial life-prolonging devices to control their own deaths by refusing treatment, but gives no options to those people who are not attached to any machines, who still wish to hasten their death to avoid suffering at the hands of disease. According to the reformers, the withdrawal of life-support could not be distinguished from the administration of a lethal prescription, because both are a form of relief from suffering and hastening towards death, and are the intrinsic right of competent patients.

In 1997, the United States Supreme Court unanimously reversed the decision of the lower Court in the Quill vs. Vacco case. The Supreme Court recognized a distinction between letting a patient die and deliberately causing that patient's death, and did not agree that the ban on assisted suicide was in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment, as the Second Circuit Court held.