Law Archives - Page 30 of 43 - Protection of Conscience Project Library

Euthanasia and related taboos

Eike-Henner Kluge

Canadian Medical Association Journal, CMAJ — Canadian Medical Association Journal

Extract
Like it or not, physicians are going to be reading a lot about euthanasia in the next few years. . . . Many physicians are more or less comfortable with the idea of withholding or withdrawing “medically useless” treatment. In other words, they accept passive euthanasia. . . . .If the medical profession thinks a physician might become responsible for a patient’s death through inaction, but without automatically bearing moral guilt, why does it insist that a physician who becomes responsible for the death of a patient through action automatically becomes morally guilty? . . . Medical ethics should never be decided by consensus or because of what is politically expedient. . .I am not making a plea for active euthanasia. I am suggesting that Canadian physicians should look at this issue honestly and openly.

Kluge E-H. Euthanasia and related taboos. Can Med Assoc J. 1991 Feb 01;144(3):359-360.

Justice minister tries to allay doctors’ fears about abortion bill

Patrick Sullivan

Extract
In a letter to Edulaw, a Calgary-based medicolegal newsletter, Kim Campbell says physicians have nothing to fear from Bill C-43, the federal abortion legislation that is currently before the Senate. . . In her letter to Edulaw, Campbell says “certain persons” opposed to the legislation are distorting its contents and potential impact in order to “cause fear on the part of medical practitioners”. She maintains that there are adequate safeguards in both the civil and criminal law “to prevent frivolous and malicious proceedings being brought against doctors”. . . In forming an opinion, says Campbell, physicians will be able to consider “such factors as rape, incest, genetic defects and socio-economic factors”.

Sullivan P. Justice minister tries to allay doctors’ fears about abortion bill. Can Med Assoc J. 1990;143(12):1220.

(Correspondence) Abortion as mayhem

R H Boardman

Extract
The criminalization of abortion in Britain stemmed from the crime of mayhem. Any act that left the victim less able to serve the monarch was mayhem. . . Abortion might deprive the monarch of a future British soldier, so it was considered mayhem. Its criminalization had little to do with the sanctity of life.

Boardman RH. (Correspondence) Abortion as mayhem. Can Med Assoc J. 1990;142(11):1183.

(Correspondence) CMA’s response to abortion bill

Donald S Stephens

Extract
Doctors, won’t you admit yet that abortion is the only medical act other than euthanasia whose purpose is to kill people?

Stephens DS. (Correspondence) CMA’s response to abortion bill. Can Med Assoc J. 1990 Apr 15;142(8):798.

(Correspondence) CMA’s response to the abortion bill

Donald Jansen

Extract
The recent decision of the CMA Board of Directors to approach the House of Commons legislative committee in regard to the proposed abortion law is not a bad idea; it’s just that the reasoning is unimaginable, and the conclusion the board has reached is outrageous. . . . Abortion remains what it has always been: the destruction of innocent life. As a medical procedure it shares company with the foulest of deeds. . . Are Canadians to believe that abortion should become an acceptable procedure in hospitals because physicians kill best?

Jansen D. (Correspondence) CMA’s response to the abortion bill. Can Med Assoc J. 1990 Mar 15;142(6):515-516.

(News) CMA brief slams abortion bill, says legislation not needed

Patrick Sullivan

Extract
The CMA has proposed an amendment that would make abortion an indictable offence “unless [it] is induced by or under the direction of a medical practitioner in accordance with generally accepted standards of the medical profession”. The association has also asked that a new section be added to protect patients, hospitals and physicians from the “threat and costs of unjustified, politically or harassment-inspired criminal charges”. That amendment would mean that no prosecution could be instituted under the new law without consent of an attorney general. The CMA thinks this would help eliminate the laying of frivolous charges by antiabortionists . . .

Sullivan P. CMA brief slams abortion bill, says legislation not needed. Can Med Assoc J. 1990;142(4):377-378.

(News) CMA board finalizes response to federal abortion bill

Patrick Sullivan

Extract
T he CMA Board of Directors has given final approval to a brief outlining the association’s stand on Bill C-43, the abortion legislation introduced by the federal government last fall. . . . It will restate physicians’ opposition to the placement of abortion – a medical procedure – in the Criminal Code. The CMA says abortion is the only medical procedure accorded such treatment. . . The brief will also address the problem of criminal and civil charges against doctors, and especially the harassment of physicians by those holding extremist views on this highly politicized issue. Many physicians are concerned this will happen if the bill passes in its original form.

Sullivan P. CMA board finalizes response to federal abortion bill. Can Med Assoc J. 1990;142(2):147-149.

(Correspondence) “Universal” moral principles

Wendell W Watters

Extract
Apart from such simple principles as the Golden Rule and the Greatest Good for the Greatest Number of People, what universal moral principles are there? Apparently Lemoine’s value system would compel unwilling pregnant women to become mothers against their will (the view of the Roman Catholic Church and other antichoice groups); this is in direct opposition to the position that couples should be allowed to regulate their own reproductivity, the view of the United Nations declaration on family planning, to which Canada was a signatory. Neither of these moral positions is universal or based on absolutes. The first arose out of the Christian Church’s desire to implement policies of demographic aggression against all other groups. The second arose in this century out of our collective appreciation that such policies may spell extinction for all forms of life on this planet. Many of the bloodiest episodes in history came about as a result of one group’s seeking to impose “universal” moral principles on others.

Watters WW. (Correspondence) “Universal” moral principles. Can Med Assoc J. 1989 May 01;140(9):1016.

Ecumenism and Abortion: A Case Study of Pluralism, Privatization and Public Conscience

James Kelly

Abstract
This paper uses the Churches’ responses to the controversy over abortion as a measure of the internalization of ecumenism. The data used in the essay include interviews with ecumenical officers and the minutes of the American Bishops Pro-life Committee. The main conclusion is that during the controversy “mainstream” Protestantism and Roman Catholicism reverted to post-Reformation and pre-Vatican II ideological roles, with Catholicism opposing under the banner of objective moral truth the legalization of abortion and liberal Protestantism under the banner of subjective conscience providing a belated religious justification to the legalization promoted first by secularist activists. This reversal to historic ideological roles actually distorted the more nuanced positions of these Churches in the controversy, but the lack of an ecumenical context obscured these shared tensions and prevented the Churches from contributing to a better public structuring of the moral ambiguities most Americans felt and still experience about abortion and the extent of its legalization. The essay concludes that only in an ecumenical context can religious pluralism lead to more inclusive moral commitments rather than to a further privatization of religion.

Kelly J. Ecumenism and Abortion: A Case Study of Pluralism, Privatization and Public Conscience. Rev Relig Res. 1989 Mar;30(3):225-235.

When caesarian section operations imposed by a court are justified

Eike-Henner Kluge

Abstract
Court-ordered caesarian sections against the explicit wishes of the pregnant woman have been criticised as violations of the woman’s fundamental right to autonomy and to the inviolability of the person-particularly, so it is argued, because the fetus in utero is not yet a person. This paper examines the logic of this position and argues that once the fetus has passed a certain stage of neurological development it is a person, and that then the whole issue becomes one of balancing of rights: the right-to-life of the fetal person against the right to autonomy and inviolability of the woman; and that the fetal right usually wins.

Kluge E-H. When caesarian section operations imposed by a court are justified. J Med Ethics. 1988 Dec;14(4) 206-211.