Associated Press story in the Seattle Times:

Organizers in Washington state are circulating petitions in search of about 225,000 valid voter signatures by July 3, seeking to place an assisted suicide measure on the November ballot.

The campaign has raised more than $1 million, leading to predictions of a fiercely fought and emotional campaign. The ballot measure would allow doctors to help terminally ill patients end their lives. Oregon passed a similar measure in 1994, and is the only state with such a law on the books.

Booth Gardner, the popular former governor of Washington who has Parkinson’s disease, is a vocal advocate of the measure. Opponents, including Gardner’s son as well as many doctors and disability rights advocates, say such laws could exploit depressed or vulnerable people who worry they will burden their families.

“This capitalizes on those fears people have about a disability, about people losing bodily control and function, that people would be better off dead than having to face that,” said Duane French, spokesman for Not Dead Yet.

This entry was posted on Monday, June 16th, 2008 at 1:41 pm and is filed under assisted suicide, law, NOT2BEMISSED, politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.