Background

Once again, assisted-suicide proponents are working to change the law.  With a voter initiative on the 2008 ballot, they hope to make it legal for doctors to help their patients commit suicide.  As with other failed attempts, the Washington effort, patterned on Oregon's assisted-suicide law, is spearheaded by Compassion and Choices (the former Hemlock Society).

Text of proposed ballot initiative.

Analysis of Initiative 1000, Washington's assisted-suicide initiative.

Funding Watch: Assisted-suicide advocacy groups provide major funding for I 1000.

Washington Coalition Against Assisted Suicide

Washington Not Dead Yet  blog

Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund  (DREDF)

Debate about I-1000 (video)
Debate, sponsored by the University of Washington Evans School of Public Affairs, features Duane French and Booth Gardner.  

Articles

"A matter of life and death for state's voters" (Seattle PI, 5/27/08)
Kathryn Tucker, an advocate of the Oregon law described those in the assisted-suicide movement as people of "affluence" and "high education." 

"Oregon's Trojan Horse"
"If other states refused to pass laws patterned on Oregon's current, seemingly restrictive law, it was a sure bet that they'd be even less inclined to follow Oregon's lead if it were to be expanded."

"Suicide as a Medical Treatment"
Assisted-suicide campaign spokesperson admits it's only intended to be the "first step."

"I-1000 campaign seeks to sell voters on death" (Seattle P-I, 3/30/08)
"If you are campaigning for the 'right' of people to kill themselves, the first challenge is finding a nonlethal definition: Soft reassuring terms must be substituted for the off-putting phrase 'assisted suicide.'"

"Gardner crusade is a selfish last act" (Seattle P-I, 1/11/08)
Why Booth Gardner's "last campaign is harmful to the sick, the disabled, the vulnerable...and society. 

"Unlike father, unlike son" The Gardners are split on 'death with dignity" (Crosscut, 1/11/08)

"Just don't call it suicide, initiative's backers say" (Seattle Times, 1/9/08)
Assisted-suicide activists want to avoid the word "suicide" when discussing their proposal.

"Former Gov. Gardner becomes assisted suicide's advocate" (Herald, Everett, WA, 1/6/08)
Filing of the assisted-suicide measure is expected to take place on Wednesday, January 9.  Supporters set up a campaign committee last year and had raised $253,000 by Dec. 1. 

"Death in the Family" by Daniel Bergner (The New York Times Magazine, 12/2/07) 
"Booth Gardner, a former governor of Washington State who has Parkinson's, is urgently lobbying for a doctor-assisted-suicide law." "Gardner's campaign is a compromise; he sees it as a first step.  If he can sway Washington to embrace a restrictive law, then other states will follow.  And gradually, he says, the nation's resistance will subside, the culture will shift and laws with more latitude will be passed..." 

"Physician-assisted suicide symptom of broken system
(The Olympian, Olympia, Washington, 9/28/07) 
Washington State disability rights activist Joelle Brouner explains why Washington is no place for Oregon-style assisted suicide. "Is it so great a leap to think that a system with a record of perpetuating bias could abuse its power to promote death as a management strategy to achieve cost savings?"

"Ex-governor seeking death with dignity"  (Seattle Post-Intelligencer, 5/18/07)
Ex-governor Booth Gardner pledges to fight to legalize assisted-suicide.

"Gardner: I've thought about the end"  (Seattle Times, 2/10/06)
Former governor wants to legalize assisted suicide but doesn't want the word "suicide" used to describe it.