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Last-Minute Vote Switches Keep Assisting Suicide Illegal in Hawaii.
A bill to legalize assisting suicide in Hawaii was defeated 14-11 in the state Senate May 2 when three state senators who had previously voted in favor of it switched their votes. The ?Death with Dignity? bill had been passed by Hawaii?s House of Representatives, and was strongly supported by Hawaii?s outgoing governor, Democrat Ben Cayetano.
The debate and vote were the culmination of an intensive roller coaster battle which drew forth the utmost efforts of Hawaii Right to Life and its allies in the fight against assisting suicide. Hawaii?s bill would have made it legal for a doctor to prescribe a lethal drug overdose to a qualifying patient, defined in the bill as a competent person, at least 18 years old, diagnosed with a terminal illness and given six months to live. It was almost identical to Oregon?s law, which remains the only law in the nation that specifically authorizes assisting suicide.
The legislation had been halted in the Senate Committee on Health and Human Services. However, pro-suicide forces suddenly revived the bill in a sneak attack on April 30, two days before the end of the legislative session, and garnered a 13-12 preliminary vote in its favor.
The Senate held its final, emotional debate on the bill in a packed chamber on the afternoon of Thursday, May 2.
State Senators Bob Hogue, Donna Mercado Kim, and Rod Tam, who voted in support of the bill on April 30, explained why they changed to opposition.
?Upon reviewing the bill, the e-mails, faxes and phone calls, it is my decision that such an important and emotional issue involving life-and-death decisions should not be decided in the short time span we have left in this session,? said Tam in a prepared statement printed in the Honolulu Star-Bulletin.
Donna Mercado Kim echoed Tam?s sentiments in her comments on the Senate floor. She said she favored assisted suicide in theory, but was disturbed by some of the flaws in the bill, such as the possibility that a doctor could prescribe a lethal dose to a patient he or she had known only two weeks.
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Source: HighBeam Research, Last-Minute Vote Switches Keep Assisting Suicide Illegal in Hawaii.