Alberto R. Gonzales, Attorney General, et al. v. Oregon, et al. (546 U.S. 243)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided January 17, 2006 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 546 U.S. 243 · 126 S. Ct. 904
- Decided
- January 17, 2006
- Term
- October Term 2005
- Vote
- 6–3
- Majority author
- Justice Kennedy
- Issue area
- Privacy
- Disposition
- Affirmed
- Outcome
- Petitioning party lost
- Ideological direction
- Liberal
Opinion excerpt
Justice Kennedy delivered the opinion of the Court. The question before us is whether the Controlled Substances Act allows the United States Attorney General to prohibit doctors from prescribing regulated drugs for use in physician-assisted suicide, notwithstanding a state law permitting the procedure. As the Court has observed, “Americans are engaged in an earnest and profound debate about the morality, legality, and practicality of physician-assisted suicide.” Washington v. Glucksberg, 521 U. S. 702, 735 (1997). The dispute before us is in part a product of this political and moral debate, but its resolution requires an inquiry familiar to the courts: interpreting a federal statute to determine whether executive action is authorized by, or otherwise consistent with, the enactment. In 1994, Oregon became the first State to legalize assisted suicide when voters approved a ballot measure enacting the Oregon Death With Dignity Act (ODWDA). Ore. Rev. Stat. § 127.800 et seq. (2003). ODWDA, which survived a 1997 ballot measure seeking its repeal, exempts from civil or criminal liability state-licensed physicians who, in compliance with the specific safeguards in ODWDA, dispense or prescribe a lethal dose of drugs upon the request of a terminally' ill patient. The drugs Oregon physicians prescribe under ODWDA are regulated under a federal statute, the Controlled Substances Act (CSA…
Excerpt of a 52,594-character opinion. The full text and citation network load in the interactive viewer above.