For anyone keeping an eye on news involving the right to life, this has been quite a week. The American Medical Association’s House of Delegates refused to endorse assisted suicide. The next day, New York legislators voted to legalize assisted suicide. At this writing, the bill is on its way to the governor.
Deadly Compassion: the Death of Ann Humphry and the Truth About Euthanasia, a book published 30 years ago, seems startlingly relevant once again. While in part a history of a movement, it is primarily the story of Ann Humphry, her friendship with author Rita Marker, and the malignant influences that affected Humphry’s decision to take her own life. Such stories about individuals at their most vulnerable affect public policy more than any opinion poll or collection of statistics ever can.
Marker was founder of an organization dedicated to combating assisted suicide and euthanasia. In the course of her work, she met Ann Humphry, whose husband Derek was a leading light of the pro-euthanasia Hemlock Society. The two women developed a warm friendship that ended only with Ann’s death, the circumstances of which were closely tied to the movement promoted by her by-then-estranged husband.
Even in her grief over Ann Humphry’s death, Marker did not resort to melodrama when she wrote Deadly Compassion. She was smart enough to know that the bare facts were dramatic enough on their own.
If you’ve ever wondered how some of our states got to a point where the direct intentional termination of human life has been adopted by legislators as a desirable policy, the answer is “little by little.” Decades after its publication, Deadly Compassion continues to make the case for resisting the creeping tide.
Note: Following Marker’s recent death, her organization’s work is being continued by the Institute for Patients Rights.
Ellen Kolb 