The Impact of the Judicial Decision in the Case of Rodriguez V. B.C. (attorney General) on Canadian Law and the Rights of Citizens
Essay title: The Impact of the Judicial Decision in the Case of Rodriguez V. B.C. (attorney General) on Canadian Law and the Rights of Citizens
I believe that the impact of the judicial decision in Rodriguez v. B.C. (Attorney General) is that any changes in the law will now have to come from Parliament and that, until any changes are made, anyone convicted of assisting in a suicide will face up to 14 years in prison.
I believe that its impact on the rights of citizens is that citizens who are unable to physically commit suicide will be unable to do so unless somebody is willing to help them and face the legal consequences of their actions. I believe that that will cause terminally ill patients who would like to end their lives before they have to endure excruciating pain to simply decide to end their lives sooner rather than later, before their illnesses prevent them from being physically capable of ending their own lives themselves. That would shorten the lives of those patients significantly, which would not happen if this restriction were not in place.
I think that the courts may be able to decide that life-sustaining treatment should not be withdrawn at the patient’s request, using this case as a precedent, even though that is a firmly established right. The reason behind that is that the courts found it extremely important to protect life, and they found that government objective to be important enough to override constitutional rights. They could therefore argue that life-sustaining treatment is essential to protecting life and that it may not be withdrawn, no matter what, under the pretense that it is a form of euthanasia.
I believe that this decision is taking a step back rather than forward from the ultimate goal of having a truly liberal society. After all, permitting physician-assisted suicide neither forces