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Thursday, January 05, 2012

Massachusetts "Death with Dignity" Initiative (2012)

Dignity 2012

Massachusetts "Death with Dignity" Initiative (2012):
The Massachusetts "Death with Dignity" Initiative may appear on the November 6, 2012 general election ballot in the state of Massachusetts as an indirect initiated state statute. The measure was filed with the Massachusetts Attorney General and would establish an "Act Relative to Death with Dignity". The petition number for the initiative is 11-12, and was filed by Michael Clarke.[1]

According to reports, the proposed measure would allow for a terminally ill patient to be given lethal drugs. A terminally ill patient would be defined as a patient being given six months or less to live. However, the patient looking to obtain the drugs must be coherent enough to make those medical decisions while consulting their respective doctor. Patients must be required to submit their request in writing twice, and those requests must be fifteen days apart.[2]

Dignity 2012: Supporting the Massachusetts Death with Dignity Initiative.

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I've got an email in to them. They need some help with social media.

Boston.com TNGG: OPINION: Why the Mass. Death with Dignity Act should appear on the November ballot.
A highly contested ballot measure that will likely epitomize the statewide citizen vote in 2012 may be inching toward actualization. The Massachusetts Death with Dignity Act, a proposal that says terminally ill patients facing imminent death should be allowed to self-administer a lethal dose of medication (also known as physician-assisted suicide), has received more than 86,000 signatures and been sent to the office of the Secretary of the Commonwealth.

If the state legislature fails to act on the proposal, it will go on the November ballot.
That post has a few things wrong.

Right to die:
The right to die is the ethical or institutional entitlement of the individual to commit suicide or to undergo voluntary euthanasia.

Secretary of State William Galvin to file statewide ballot questions proposing 'death with dignity,' medical marijuana and teacher evaluations.
The Massachusetts Medical Society has not taken a position on the death with dignity ballot question. An earlier version of this story incorrectly reported that the medical society opposed the question.

BOSTON -- Secretary of State William F. Galvin is moving forward four proposed statewide ballot questions including measures to allow terminally ill patients to self-administer drugs to take their lives and another to create a new system for evaluating teachers.

Galvin plans to file the four ballot questions with the clerk of the state House of Representatives on Wednesday, marking another step in the process for such citizen initiatives. Under the state Constitution, legislators will now have until May 2 to pass the ballot questions as bills. If the bills don't pass or legislators fail to act, supporters would need to gather an additional 11,485 voter signatures to qualify for the Nov. 6 ballot...

According to the "death with dignity" ballot question, patients would be allowed to ask for life-ending medications from a doctor if they are terminally ill. Modeled after a law in Washington state, the proposed law would be available for people with six months or less to live and they would need to take the medications themselves after obtaining a prescription.