X-Message-Number: 8209
Date: Wed, 14 May 1997 11:26:33 -0700
From: David Brandt-Erichsen <>
Subject: Oregon update

        Abridged from an Associated Press story, May 13, 1997

        House back new statewide vote on suicide law
        BRAD CAIN

        SALEM, Ore. (AP) _ The stage was set Tuesday for another statewide
        campaign on physician-assisted suicide when the House decided to
        ask Oregon voters this fall whether they've changed their mind and
        want to repeal the law.

        The House voted 32-26 to ship HB2954 to the Senate, which is
        expected to approve it.

        The House vote came after an emotional three-hour debate that in
        many ways mirrored the emotional campaign that surrounded the
        ballot measure in 1994. Various legal challenges so far have
        prevented the law from being implemented.

        The House earlier rejected two proposed substitute versions that
        would have made various technical changes in the law.

        Both sides predicted a tough campaign this fall.

        Barbara Coombs Lee, chief petitioner for the assisted suicide law,
        predicted that foes of assisted suicide won't get far by taking
        the issue back to voters.

        "They think that if Oregon voters are hammered on enough with a
        very expensive, multimillion-dollar campaign financed by the
        Catholic Church, that voters will change their mind. We don't
        think that's true," she said.

        But a leading critic of assisted suicide, Bob Castagna of the
        Oregon Catholic Conference, said the debate has changed since the
        issue first was considered by Oregonians in 1994.

        "We are optimistic that the people of Oregon will be persuaded
        that this is a seriously, if not fatally, flawed measure," he
        said.

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