U.S. Supreme Court rejects Schiavo appeal
WASHINGTON - The U.S. Supreme Court turned down Terri SchiavoÂ’s parents Thursday, declining to intervene to keep the brain-damaged woman alive, while Florida Gov. Jeb Bush lost his bid before a state judge to help the parents regain control of their daughter from her husband.
The Supreme Court decision, announced in a terse one-page order, marked the end of a dramatic four-day dash through the federal court system by Bob and Mary Schindler.
The justices did not immediately provide legal reasons for the decision, and no justice issued a written dissent with the ruling. The Supreme Court had declined other opportunities to get involved in the Schiavo case and legal experts said there was little reason to believe justices would intervene this time.
SchiavoÂ’s feeding tube was removed last Friday and doctors have said she likely would die within a week or two at a hospice in Pinellas Park, Fla., where she is being cared for.
In Florida, Gov. Bush and FloridaÂ’s social services agency had filed a petition in state court to take custody of Schiavo and, presumably, reconnect her feeding tube. It cited new allegations of neglect and challenged SchiavoÂ’s diagnosis as being in a persistent vegetative state.
The custody request was denied by Judge George Greer, who has presided over the case for several years and issued the ruling last month that allowed the feeding tube to be removed.
The request was based on the opinion of a neurologist working for the state who observed Schiavo at her bedside but did not examine her.
The neurologist, William Cheshire of the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, is a bioethicist who is also an active member in Christian organizations, including two whose leaders have spoken out against the removal of Schiavo's feeding tube
Unjust death?
In their emergency appeal filed Wednesday night before the Supreme Court, the Schindlers had argued that their 41-year-old daughter faced an unjust and imminent death based on a decision by her husband to remove a feeding tube without strong proof of her consent. They alleged constitutional violations of due process and religious freedom.
The filing also argued that Congress intended for SchiavoÂ’s tube to be reinserted, at least temporarily, when it passed an extraordinary law last weekend that gave federal courts authority to fully review her case. Previously, only Florida state courts had ruled, and always in favor of Michael Schiavo, Terri Schiavo's husband, who has said she told him that she would not have wanted to live in her condition.
Republicans joined appeal
Republican leaders in Congress refused to give up entirely Wednesday. In legal papers prepared for filing at the Supreme Court, they argued that a federal appeals court that ruled against the parents earlier this week had “failed to adhere to the plain meaning” of the emergency legislation.
The legislation required that a new, independent evaluation of her case be made, according to papers. It also required the courts to “ensure that desperately needed nutritional support” is provided to Schiavo while the review is conducted, the papers stated.
Lawyers for Michael Schiavo said in their Supreme Court filing that Terri Schiavo would want to die. The filing said Congress violated the Constitution when it passed a bill allowing federal court review of her case, because that tried to overturn state court rulings in favor of Michael Schiavo.
“That is not an exercise of legislative power, but trial by legislature. ... Any law that suspends, nullifies, or reverses a final court judgment is an exercise of judicial, not legislative power,” the filing said.
The late-night appeal followed rapid-fire developments in the case.
In Florida, Gov. Bush tried to build support for Schiavo's parents by saying new evidence suggests her condition was misdiagnosed, even though doctors have said for years that Schiavo is severely brain-damaged and in a persistent vegetative state.
Republicans in the Florida Senate tried to pass a law that would prohibit patients like Schiavo from being denied food and water if they didnÂ’t express their wishes in writing, but their effort was defeated.
The flurry of activity came as President Bush suggested that Congress and the White House had done all they could to keep the woman alive.
‘Please let my daughter live’
Supporters of SchiavoÂ’s parents have become increasingly dismayed, and 13 protesters were arrested Wednesday outside her hospice for trying to bring her water.
“When I close my eyes at night, all I can see is Terri’s face in front of me, dying, starving to death,” Mary Schindler said outside the hospice. “Please, someone out there, stop this cruelty. Stop the insanity. Please let my daughter live.”
While the Supreme Court had declined to hear the case previously in appeals from state court rulings, what made it different this time was that the appeal would come from a federal ruling.
The Supreme CourtÂ’s history on right-to-die cases is pretty thin. It ruled in 1990 that a terminally ill person has a right to refuse life-sustaining treatment. In its next term, it plans to consider whether the federal government can prosecute doctors who help ill patients die.
Between those cases, the court has chosen to allow states to decide the issue.
Terri Schiavo suffered brain damage in 1990 when her heart stopped briefly from a chemical imbalance believed to have been brought on by an eating disorder. Court-appointed doctors say she is in a persistent vegetative state with no hope of recovery.
Her parents argue that she could get better and that she would never have wanted to be cut off from food and water.
