Montana Judge Considers Legalizing Assisted Suicidecitizenlink.org A district judge in Helena, Mont., is considering whether to allow doctors in the state to prescribe lethal doses of medication to terminally ill patients.
A lawsuit brought by a terminally ill Billings man, four Missoula doctors and a nonprofit group argues that mentally competent, terminally ill Montanans should be able to kill themselves, with help from their doctors.
Montana Assistant Attorney General Anthony Johnston disagreed.
"The laws governing the medical profession say the medical profession is to heal, not to kill," he told Montana's CBS affiliate.
Wesley J. Smith, a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute and an attorney for the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide, said the culture has become obsessed with death.
"Hopefully, the court will understand that it is a proper purpose of the state to protect everyone from self-destruction," he wrote on his blog.
— Jennifer Mesko