Former Board Member Mollie Hazen with AB 374 (California's Compassionate Choices Act) co-author Assembly Member Patty Berg.

Compassion & Choices of Northern California is closely involved with improving end-of-life decision-making and care through the law.

LEGISLATION

The Right to Know End-of-Life Options Act (2008), AB 2747
Compassion & Choices of Northern California was very involved in advocating for AB 2747, the Terminal Patients’ Right to Know End-of-Life Options Act. On September 30, 2008, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed the Act into law. The Act is the first in the nation to provide terminally ill patients with a full disclosure of, and counseling about, all available end-of-life care options accepted in law and medicine. When requested, information about hospice care, refusal or withdrawing of life-prolonging treatments, voluntary stopping eating and drinking (VSED), palliative care and palliative sedation are discussed with the patient. The Act also requires that health care providers who do not wish to comply with a particular patient’s request must refer or transfer the patient to another provider.  The law went into effect for Californians on January 1, 2009.

AB 2747 Links
Read Assembly Bill 2747, The Right to Know End-of-Life Options Act (pdf).

Listen to Stewart Florsheim speak on KQED Radio about the Right to Know Act ( October 21, 2008).

The California Compassionate Choices Act (2007), AB 374
The California Compassionate Choices Act was based on the simple principle that people should be free to make important end-of-life decisions based on their own values and beliefs. The Compassionate Choices Act offered peace of mind to terminally ill patients in California by placing the power to seek a humane, peaceful death solely in their hands. Unfortunately, one day before the deadline in the Assembly, lawmakers declined to bring AB 374 to a vote.  Assembly Members Patty Berg and Lloyd Levine and Assembly Speaker Fabian Nunez co-authored the bill and championed the cause valiantly. Berg’s Chief of Staff Will Shuck told the Sacramento Bee, “The people are there, and the politicians aren’t.”

AB 374 Links
Read The California Compassionate Choices Act Fact Sheet (pdf).

Read Fran Johns' article from The Oakland Tribune calling for lawmakers to reject opposition from the hierarchy of the Catholic Church in the name of separation of church and state (pdf).

LITIGATION

Oregon v. Gonzales (2005)
In 2005, Compassion & Choices of Northern California worked to uphold Oregon's Death with Dignity Act in the United States Supreme Court decision, Oregon v. Gonzales. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of choice at the end of life. In a 6 to 3 decision, the court ruled the Attorney General’s attempt to intervene in affairs of the state’s aid-in-dying law exceeded his authority.

Read Fran John's article, "U.S. Supreme Court Upholds Oregon's Right-to-Die Law."

For more information on national aid-in-dying news, click here.