Life Legal Defense Foundation has filed a friend of the court (amicus) brief in the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, urging the court to reject Delaware’s assisted suicide law and reaffirm the government’s duty to protect human life.
In its brief, Life Legal argues that physician-assisted suicide undermines one of the most fundamental principles of American law: that the role of government is to defend life, not facilitate its destruction.
“Human life is a fundamental constitutional right that states have a solemn duty to protect,” the brief explains.
Life Legal’s brief was joined by a coalition of 14 national medical, legal, and faith-based organizations, including physicians, bioethicists, disability advocates, and religious leaders who share concerns about the growing expansion of assisted suicide laws.
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The organizations warn that once assisted suicide is legalized, its use tends to expand beyond the narrow circumstances initially promised. What begins as an option for the terminally ill often broadens to include individuals suffering from chronic conditions, mental distress, or social hardship. In these environments, the option to die can quickly become an expectation—especially for patients who already feel like a burden due to illness, disability, age, or financial strain.
Data from jurisdictions where assisted suicide has been legalized show dramatic increases in deaths. In California, assisted-suicide deaths have risen by more than 700 percent since the state’s End of Life Option Act took effect, increasing from 111 deaths in the first year to nearly 900 per year today.
In Canada, deaths under the country’s Medical Aid in Dying (MAiD) program now exceed 16,000 per year, accounting for roughly one in every twenty deaths nationwide.
International developments raise additional concerns. In the Netherlands, euthanasia has expanded to minors under certain circumstances, and debates have emerged about extending euthanasia practices even further.
Government surveys also indicate that the most common reason patients request assisted suicide is not uncontrolled pain, but the “inability to engage in meaningful activities.”
“Compassion never means abandoning someone to death,” said Alexandra Snyder. “True compassion means protecting life and standing with people in their suffering—especially when they are most vulnerable.”
Life Legal continues to defend the sanctity of human life through litigation and advocacy nationwide, representing the unborn, protecting vulnerable patients and families, and defending the rights of those whose lives are often treated as disposable.
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