Ruling: Step in right direction

Montana now has the dubious distinction of being one of three states in the nation that will allow physician-assisted suicide, but that may not always be the case.

The Montana Supreme Court ruled Thursday that nothing in state law prevents the procedure. The Montana ACLU said that the ruling doesn’t free doctors from the threat of prosecution, but that consent is now an allowed defense.

Further clarification must now come from the Legislature, which is as it should be. Our biggest objection all along has been the way the new right came to be. A state district court judge, Dorothy McCarter of Helena, took it upon herself to create physician-assisted suicide as part of a “constitutional right” to individual privacy and human dignity. She thus bypassed the Legislature and voters and their constitutional role in passing laws.

Article II, Section 10 of the state Constitution indeed does guarantee a right of “individual privacy,” but McCarter conveniently overlooked the following provision that the right can be infringed with a “showing of compelling state interest.”

In vacating the lower court’s ruling, the Supreme Court Thursday said it did not find a constitutional right to physician-assisted suicide. Instead, the court found that there’s  nothing in state law or court precedent to prevent it.

So, it appears that if the Legislature or Montana citizens, through a ballot measure, now decide to ban the procedure, the court would uphold that decision. Or if lawmakers and the public choose to affirm the procedure as a right, they can do so as well. Either outcome would be preferable to having the right be created by a single district judge.

At least in the other two states where physician-assisted suicide is  legal — Washington and Oregon — the right was established by the people through ballot initiatives.

In Montana, public policy on the matter should be determined by the democratic process as well.