Sex and Death: Lawrence's Liberty and Physician-Assisted Suicide

Abstract

This Article explores whether physician-assisted suicide is necessarily included in the substantive due process liberty interest described in Lawrence v. Texas. A fundamental right for the terminally ill to hasten their deaths through physician assistance has previously been rejected. This Article argues that the bases for the previous rejection of the right have been eroded by doctrinal expansion of due process protection of liberty and by the growing political and cultural acceptance of physician-assisted suicide. In this Article, the doctrinal and political similarity of the claims successfully asserted in Lawrence and the claimed liberty interest in controlling the manner of one's death are analyzed and the likelihood of the Court's recognition of a right to physician-assisted suicide is examined.