Terri Schiavo, 41 died today at 09:05am in Florida. Mrs Schiavo’s feeding tube was removed on 18 March in accordance with a ruling by a Florida appeals court after a protracted battle which included an intervention by state Governor Jeb Bush. She died 13 days later despite a number of last-ditch efforts by her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, to have her feeding tube re-inserted. But we will be sure that with her death the case does not end here, at least not for those directly involved.
As time was running out for the Schindlers, President George W Bush signed a law allowing a federal court to review the case and consider again whether doctors should be obliged to keep Mrs Schiavo alive.
It was the second time new legislation had been introduced to influence events in this particular case. The first, “Terri’s Law”, was passed by Florida’s legislature in October 2003 and allowed Governor Jeb Bush to order doctors to replace Mrs Schiavo’s feeding tube. That law was struck down as unconstitutional by the state’s Supreme Court in September 2004.
The unusual intervention by legislators caused alarm in many quarters. Individual states such as Florida – as well as US as a whole – have constitutions that enshrine a separation of powers between the executive, legislative and judicial branches of government.
In general, legislatures pass laws and courts interpret them in individual cases. But in this case, critics say, lawmakers in both houses of Congress allowed themselves to be swayed by an emotional argument and repeated broadcasts of a video showing Mrs Schiavo apparently awake and alert, even though many doctors had said she had no consciousness.
As I wrote before in this blog I particulary have problems with Bush making hypocritical statements about this case: “The essence of civilisation is that the strong have a duty to protect the weak. In cases where there are serious doubts and questions, the presumption should be in the favour of life.”
Now that sounds like a true statement that any normal thinking person would agree with. Unless you know this comes from a person that has the infamous record as an ex-govenor who spent about 15 minutes on each case before signing a record number or death penalties, even in cases were there were “serious doubts and questions”.