Executions and euthanasia

The Weekly Standard – but few if any other media of which I am aware – reports that Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber, M.D., strongly supports giving cancer patients access to lethal doses of pentobarbital.

Oregon's voters in 1984 overturned a court ban and reinstated capital punishment. But Dr.-Gov. Kitzhaber placed a moratorium on executions for the balance of his time in office.

In an astounding development, convicted murderer Gary Haugen sued – to be executed!

He gained an initial ruling that he has the right to refuse mercy.

But that decision was overturned on appeal, on the grounds that the governor has the power to prevent executions.

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How often in history has this ever – if ever – occurred before?

Since the Oregon Supreme Court has refused to rule against the governor, inmate Haugen – who wants to die – is being forced to live!

Oregon's state branch of an organization named Compassion and Choices (formerly named the Hemlock Society) met with the Oregon Board of Pharmacy to discuss establishing a nonprofit compounding pharmacy to manufacture a generic form of pentobarbital, which Compassion and Choices would then distribute for use in assisted suicides. But so far there is no news as to whether the state will approve.

In Belgium, reports Wesley J. Smith of the Discovery Institute's Center on Human Exceptionalism, the nation "is on the verge of executing its first murderer by lethal injection. Well not exactly 'executing.' The state isn't going to kill convicted murderer/rapist Frank Van Den Bleeken for his crimes. Rather, it is helping him be euthanized. By a doctor. At a hospital. To which he was transferred after a court ruled that Den Bleeken's request to end the suffering caused by his imprisonment (he has served 30 years of a life sentence) and continuing violent sexual urges fits snugly within that country's euthanasia law.

"Ironically, Belgium opposes capital punishment under any circumstances. But it legalized euthanasia in 2002. Since then, the country has fallen off a moral cliff, with a growing number of lethal injections administered by doctors not just to the dying, but also to those with severe mental illnesses, crippling disabilities, and chronic, nonterminal illnesses. There have been several medicalized joint killings of elderly couples who would rather die together than live apart. Belgium even permits euthanasia followed by organ harvesting and the assisted suicide of dying children if they make the request in writing (among other requirements). Killing a prisoner who would rather be dead than imprisoned is merely the next logical step. …

"California is prohibited by federal court order from using lethal injection protocols because doing so might cause pain. More recently, a federal judge has ruled that California's death penalty itself is cruel and unusual punishment, and therefore unconstitutional – because it is almost never carried out!

"The lethal-injection-as-cruel-and-unusual-punishment meme was furthered earlier this year after two 'botched' executions – one in Arizona that took 97 minutes to complete, another in Oklahoma that took 43 minutes. The ACLU lawsuits are flying."

I often disagree with the ACLU. But I agree with them in opposing the death penalty. This is primarily because of the possibility of executing the innocent and also because I cannot believe it is reasonable to show how much we oppose killing in cold blood – by doing exactly that to the condemned in executions.

I also believe in euthanasia. It seems merciless to deny a fatally diseased person the right to bring about immediate relief when death – which is ultimately inevitable – is deeply and immediately desired.

Media wishing to interview Les Kinsolving, please contact [email protected].