Review the case "Extending the Right to Die.". In the Vacco v. Quill case it was argued that if a right to die could be found under the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, then a law that allowed a patient who wanted to be disconnected from

Question

artificial life support to do so, but barred others who wanted to take lethal drugs to similarly hasten their death, would violate the amendment's equal protection guarantee because it treated the two groups differently. Some have worried that the acceptance of such a right is a slippery slope, which will inevitably lead to the expansion of the categories and endanger groups such as the elderly or handicapped. Defend or refute the use of the slippery slope argument in this case.

Answer 1

Slippery slope arguments in regard to predicting the future are suspect. There is also the question as to whether, in fact, the ventilator-dependent patient who requests removal and the individual wishing a lethal prescription are really in the same category. If they are not, the use of one to extend to the other does not hold up.