Essay on Bus Law Notes

Submitted By jren
Words: 3395
Pages: 14

Law Evolves
Due to Changes
Changes in values, morals, whats excepted … etc
Changes in technology
Issues come up sometimes and society looks at the law like “what should we do?”
Examples:
Plessy v Ferguson (1897)
Black person riding a train
2 train cars for white and blacks
Is this constitutionally right?
Does this violate constitution?
Basis to why unconstitutional
Equal protection challenge
14th…
The Louisiana state statute is unconstitutional because it denies equal protection
Civil war amendments
14th amendment
The states
Two due process clauses
Bill of rights vs 14th amend
Does bill of rights apply only to fed and 14th to only states?
Apply to due processes clause, still applicable to congress…???
The rights expressed in both apply to fed and state government
Decision: separate but equal
Brown vs Board of ed (1954)
Involving separate schools for white and black kids
Equal protection clause in 14th amend again
Same arguments as before
Struck down same doctrine on 1897
How to explain a decision that is completely opposite?
Change!
Values and views changed, it is not equal but separate
Examples of physician assisted suicide (involves separate powerpoint)
Is suicide illegal?
Ancint Rome
Good to be king – if someone commited crime, all your stuff goes to king, so ppl would kill selves if they were caught doing a crime to save fam…so suiside was made illegal
Eng common law
Suicide also a crime
Assisted suicide illegal in many states
You can refuse treatment for cancer
Karen Anne Quinlan – comatose…. Pull the plug? Parents – yes, hospital – no
Went to court… eventually took off resperator, could breath on own
Withered away and died 10 years later…
Living Wills – advanced directive
What to do when in comma? Water, food, air
Say in advance what you want done if this happens to me
After Karen quinlan, this living will became legal everywhere….right to refuse treatment
Also some states have durable pwr of attorney – appoint someone to make decisions for you if you cannot
Nancy Cruzan – comma also
Court not convinced that pulling plug from parents that nancy would have wanted this
Good friend came forward and said she would want plug pulled…enough evidence for court to say ok to pull plug
Dr. Kevorkian
Provide machine to give a drug that would help kill
Assisted suicides in 90s
Some states enacted legislation in response e.g. GA
Brought to court for murder 4 times
Last one he was convicted of murder
Who served on jury? Ppl in community
Jurors thought they would want this if it happened to them, so they acquitted him
Paroled in 07, and say he wouldn’t help kill anymore
Oregon’s death with dignity act
Passed, but immediately challenged in court
Effective in 97
Legal (societal) experiment
States have dif laws, and they should
Some states can try something and see if it works
51% of ppl in Oregon, said they should…maybe some states will follow, some may not could be the beginning of change, may not
Like blood letting in civil war times
Requirements on slides
Supreme court cases
Aids patients dying and doctors treating them
Dying patient on life support can ask to be taken off, but dying patient not on it cannot ask to die….
In washington its illegal, but Oregon it is legal…
Supreme reffered it to Laboratory of states
Let it play out in laboratory of states
Experimenting in states
Terry schiavo
Husband vs parents – to take off life support or not
Spouse decides if married, if not married, then parents
Went thru a lot for an easy answer
Other states
Death with dignity
Washington passed in 08
Vermont in 13
Montana
Privacy issue – right to privacy includes right to die
Montana supreme crt says ok for assited suicide
New mexico… in process of oking it… on the board judicially
The Netherlands
Legalized it in 2002
“intolerable suffering”
Slippery slope objective
What does intolerable include?
Refer to slides
Age of 12 to 16 need parent signurature!
After 16, free for self
The law (usually) makes sense
Coffee mcdonalds isuue