MONTPELIER, Vt. -
Former Vermont representative Peter Mallory inherited his political will from his uncle, U.S. Congressman Richard Mallory.
"He was a model that I knew I would never match, but it was worth trying," Mallory said with a laugh.
Congressman Mallory served 60 years in public office; most of that time was spent in Vermont as a select man, speaker of the House, senator, commissioner and secretary. Mallory spent the last years of his life fighting to give Vermonters the right to die. Little did he know he'd want the right himself someday.
"He had metastasized prostate cancer. It metastasized to his spine and he had a terminal diagnosis," his nephew explained.
If the end of life bill had passed in 2007, Mallory could have elected to die at the hands of a physician. Instead, determined not to deteriorate before his family, he took death into his own hands and committed suicide in September 2011.
"He made the choices he had always spoken of as being the choices he would prefer and that he would like other people to have the opportunity to make within the law," Peter Mallory said.
At the start of the 2012 session the Senate Judiciary committee made a list of their top priorities for the session. The end of life bill wasn't on it.
"There is not enough support for the bill either in the Senate or in my committee," said Sen. Dick Sears, D-Bennington County.
The bill sits before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Sears says that's where it will stay. He's one of several powerful senators against the bill, like Sen. John Campbell, D-Vt. President Pro Tem.
"We're dealing with giving somebody immunity to manslaughter which is huge; it's one of the major laws, it's a major felony," Campbell said.
The bill would make physicians assisting terminally ill patients with ending their lives immune from any charges. Campbell says this is one of many issues he has with the legislation; other concerns are more personal.
"Quite frankly, the last couple of days my mom was in terrible pain. It was incredibly hard to watch," Campbell said.
Campbell promised his mother on her deathbed that he wouldn't pass this bill, so he's staying out of the debate. He says he won't use his powers as president pro tem on either side of the debate. But he agrees with Sears that there's too much on the Senate's plate to take on this controversial bill.
"It would absolutely take away from what we're trying to do; balance the budget, trying to figure out how to not raise taxes, how to get through Irene, how to save kids from opiate addictions," Campbell said.
"The Vermont Senate is perfectly capable of walking and chewing gum at the same time. We not only can do many jobs at once, we do many jobs at once," said Sen. Richard McCormack.
McCormack says the excuse that there's too much before the Senate is a cop-out. It's what many said during the session in which same-sex marriage passed, ironically Campbell sponsored that bill.
"The argument that we don't have the votes, therefore we're not going to push the bill, is really dodging our duty as a Senate. Our job is to consider bills on their merits," McCormack said.
"If it did come to the floor and if it lost they would be really hard pressed to bring it back up again. So if I really wanted to block this knowing the way the votes aren't there, that's the way to do it. But I'm not going to do that," Campbell said.
Campbell says not only are there legal concerns with this bill, it invokes a gray area that would bring up lengthy debate and make the bill even more difficult to pass. One area of concern? A patient must make two oral requests and be deemed terminal and given six months or less to live to be administered lethal drugs from a physician.
"I look at people who suffer from Alzheimer's; they wouldn't be able to use this bill. People who couldn't vocally tell the doctor could not use this bill," Campbell said.
"Requiring someone to determine that you're within six months to death, I'm not sure that we have that good of system that can determine that. I've heard of a lot of people that were told they had 4-5 months to live and lived for years," Sears said.
Now advocates say even though patients unable to make oral requests would not benefit from this bill, it has the potential to end suffering for others who are terminally ill.
Both sides say at this point it's up to the public. Call your legislators and let them know where you want this bill to go. Lawmakers have until March to get bills out of the Senate and over to the House.
Related Story:
Right to Die, Part 1
