Lafayette Journal and Courier

'Unfortunate' that politics played role, professor says
By Erin Smith and Sophia Voravong

4/1/2005

Fifteen years ago, the U.S. Supreme Court, in its first right-to-die case, upheld a decision to reinstate artificial feeding and hydration equipment for 32-year-old Nancy Cruzan.

Parents of the Missouri woman, who was rendered incompetent in 1983 after suffering severe injuries in a car crash, argued that Cruzan did not want to live that way. Hospital employees refused to stop treatment without court approval.

The same year of the court's landmark decision, Terri Schiavo suffered a chemical imbalance, causing her heart to stop and leaving her in a persistent vegetative state due to severe brain damage.

She died Thursday at age 41, 13 days after a feeding tube was removed at the request of her husband. Despite her parents' repeated efforts to have the tube reinserted -- as well as actions taken by the Florida governor, President Bush and Congress -- the U.S. Supreme Court refused to step in.

Schiavo's situation caught the attention of the entire nation. Local experts say the widespread attention to the right-to-die case could result in adverse legal and political ramifications.

"The politics of it all struck me as being very singularly unfortunate," said Patricia Boling, associate professor of political science at Purdue University.

"This isn't the best way to make law ... for the rest of the people in the long haul."

Though many Americans showed support for Schiavo's parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, and their actions, public outrage erupted after federal officials intervened.

"What Congress and the president did was amazing from the concept of constitutional law," said William McBride, Arthur G. Hansen distinguished professor of philosophy at Purdue University. "It was unfortunate, but it seems not to have met with a lot of applause from people."

Boling, who specializes in privacy issues, said it's common practice in right-to-die cases for state law to take precedence over federal action. She called the actions of the Schindlers "jurisdiction shopping."

In the 1990 Cruzan case before the U.S. Supreme Court, justices narrowly decided that Missouri state law strongly leans toward the preservation of life.

Under Florida law, Schiavo's husband, Michael Schiavo, was deemed her legal guardian. Because Schiavo had not written directives of her wishes, her husband was responsible for making her medical decisions.

"It was not just OK but appropriate to end the feeding and hydration," Boling said of a Florida circuit court judge's ruling supporting Michael Schiavo's decision to remove the feeding tube.

McBride, who is teaching an undergraduate biomedical ethics course this semester, said his class has been following Schiavo's case. About half of his students are in nursing and have seen similar situations played out in hospitals and hospices.

The most surprising thing about the case, McBride said, was that Schiavo's situation turned into a religious issue. One of the lawyers arguing on Schiavo's behalf recently stated the removal of the feeding tube was a violation of her Catholic religion, "causing her to commit a mortal sin and (that it) would jeopardize her soul," McBride said.

"That's such a terrible argument. It's so totally absurd. He's saying that because some auxiliary, someone working there, pulled the tubes out, God therefore condemned Terri to hell. ... It's just amazing to me that some certain wing of the Catholic church has identified itself so much with this kind of attitude."

Catholic hospitals, historically supported by right-to-life advocates, have struggled with the issue, McBride said.

"It always depends on the individual case," he said. "One thing that occurred to me as discussion was going on today ... if the hospital or health care facility adopts the position that once some sort of artificial feeding equipment has been instituted it can never be stopped -- that puts pressure on the family to even put it in. In many cases, you don't know, medically speaking, if there's a chance for the person to come back or not."

The issue almost comes down to the debate of life after death, McBride said.

"The terrible thing about this is it's been made a circus," he said of the scene outside Schiavo's hospice in Florida. "It brings home a kind of strange attitude, a dominant attitude, toward death -- the attitude of denial."