Dying with Dignity: Carter v Canada (AG)

I used to work with Heather Douglas at the Legislative Assembly of Ontario back when we were both in undergrad. She has recently been called to the bar and in this post from her blog she gives a cogent analysis of the Carter decision and how the test for departing from established legal precedent can cause problems further down the road.

Heather Douglas

Carter v Canada legal team. Image credit: Alistair Eagle, courtesy of Lawyers Weekly.

To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them…

In Carter v Canada (2015), the Supreme Court of Canada in an unanimous decision overturned the famous Rodriguez v British Columbia (Attorney General) decision from 1993. The Rodriguez decision upheld the criminal provisions that outright banned assisted dying. I suspect that underlying the Majority’s decision in Rodriguez was the Judeo-Christain belief that God alone has the right to give and take life.

The Court stated in Carter:

[42]                          The adjudicative facts in Rodriguez were very similar to the facts before the trial judge.  Ms. Rodriguez, like Ms. Taylor, was dying of ALS.  She, like Ms. Taylor, wanted the right to…

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