The Right to Die: The courageous Canadians who gave us the right to a dignified death

by Gary Bauslaugh

Overview

"Who owns my life?" Sue Rodriguez was dying of a form of ALS (or Lou Gehrig's disease) when she asked this question of the Supreme Court of Canada in 1993. She was fighting for the right to a physician-assisted death before she became fully paralyzed. At the time, assisted suicide could result in jail time for the participating physician. In a narrow decision, Rodriguez lost her case. She died in 1994.

In a historic reversal, in 2015 the Supreme Court of Canada changed its mind. The court ruled that Canadians suffering unbearably from illness or disease do not have a duty to live. The landmark, unanimous decision was the culmination of two decades during which public opinion came to favour assisted suicide. The shift was the result of the efforts of courageous Canadians who asked for the right to a dignified death. In this book, Gary Bauslaugh tells their stories.

Among those whose stories are told are:

• Sue Rodriguez, whose experience led to a split decision by the Supreme Court of Canada to retain laws against assisted suicide
• Robert Latimer, convicted of second-degree murder for ending the life of his daughter who lived with debilitating cerebral palsy
• John Hofsess and Evelyn Martens, who spent years giving practical assistance to those seeking help in dying
• Donald Low, a renowned doctor who battled Toronto's SARS outbreak, yet was denied control over his end-of-life when diagnosed with a brain tumour
• Kay Carter and Gloria Taylor, the Vancouver women whose end-of-life struggles were at the heart of the 2015 Supreme Court case

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781459411173
Publisher:	James Lorimer & Company Ltd., Publishers
Publication date:	04/06/2016
Sold by:	De Marque
Format:	eBook
Pages:	160
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

GARY BAUSLAUGH'S investigative writing has appeared in many publications, including The Skeptical Inquirer, The Vancouver Sun, and The Humanist. He contributed an essay on the debate about creationism versus evolution in Universities at Risk (2008). He was Editor of Humanist Perspectives for five years and has served as President of the Humanist Association of Canada. He was a teacher and an administrator in Canadian colleges and universities for many years. He lives in Duncan, BC.

Table of Contents

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION     On Matters of Life, Death and the Law

CHAPTER 1     Forty Shades of Mercy

CHAPTER 2     Robert Latimer: Justice Goes Awry — 1993

CHAPTER 3     Sue Rodriguez: Who Owns My Life? — 1993

CHAPTER 4     John Hofsess and his Underground Railroad

CHAPTER 5     The Trial of Evelyn Martens — 2004

CHAPTER 6     A Breakthrough in the B.C. Courts — 2012

CHAPTER 7     Some Doctors Weigh In — 2013

CHAPTER 9     Gillian Bennett, Dead at Noon — 2014

CHAPTER 10     The Supreme Court of Canada Hearing — 2014

CHAPTER 11     The Historic Decision — 2015

CHAPTER 12     Responding to Unjust Laws

CHAPTER NOTES

APPENDIX 1     Catalogue of Canadian Legal Cases Involving Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia

APPENDIX 2     Failed Attempts at Legislative Changes

APPENDIX 3     Palliative Sedation

APPENDIX 4     Other Countries

APPENDIX 5     The Ruling of the Supreme Court of Canada — February 6, 2015

SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

INDEX