3
3
B.C. the elderly and sick of Greece would come to an annual banquet where they ceremoniously
consumed poison. They believed they could celebrate their lives instead of having years of
suffering before death (Fontana 2002). But the demarcation of the role of physicians in this
practice clearly came at about 400 B.C. when Hippocrates, the Greek physician and “Father of
Medicine” stated his opinion on the subject by saying ‘I will give no deadly medicine to any one if
asked, nor suggest any such counsel’ (Euthanasia 2003).
As Christianity arose, the practice of euthanasia was largely condemned. However,
suicide continued to be common throughout the Middle Ages (Fontana 2002). In the 13
th
century,
it was recognized that the slaying of oneself was equivalent to slaying another and the idea that
suicide by a sane man was considered a felony led to the oldest known entry about the subject
into English common law (Washington v. Glucksberg 1997). The “good death” debate resurfaced
again during the Renaissance and the Enlightenment and a few of the eighteenth century secular
laws showed greater tolerance for such acts (Fontana 2002).
In 1828, New York statutes contained the earliest American law banning assisted suicide
and many states and territories followed suit. Dudley Field led the New York commission that
drafted a criminal code prohibiting the aid of a suicide with a deadly weapon or drug (Washington
v. Glucksberg 1997). Then, in 1920, came the publication of the German tract Permitting the
Destruction of Life not Worthy of Life by Alfred Hoche (a psychiatrist) and Karl Binding (a legal
professor), wherein the authors argued that under controlled conditions a person seeking aid in
committing suicide should be able to obtain that aid. This book is significant because Nazi
Germany used it to support involuntary euthanasia (Euthanasia 2003). Hitler ordered a
widespread mercy killing in 1939 under the code name “Aktion T 4.” His order to physicians was
to deem these individuals incurable and consider the diagnosis as a mercy death (Euthanasia
2003).
In more recent history, the state of Oregon in the U.S. enacted the Death with Dignity Act
in 1997, which legalized physician-assisted suicide in that state (Paul 2002). However, since
adoption it is estimated that PAS accounts for less than 1 in 1,000 deaths in the state (Bates
2002). At this writing, similar legislation has been proposed in several more of the American
Convention