There are several aspects to suicide and the law, but we are only going to discuss a few of them. First of all we will examine why anyone would want to take their own life and decipher the differences between a rational suicide and an irrational suicide. Secondly we will look at ways assistance has played in the area of suicide. Next, we'll look at what the constitution says and see if any of the states have allowed suicide. Finally, we'll study some of the cases that have been brought before the American courts.

Suicide has become a big part of American society, year after year more people are taking their own lives for many different reasons. A lot of philosophers have

The big question in America is whether or not you have the constitutional, or moral, right to commit suicide. There have been very strong arguments for both cases. Joel Feinberg argues that the constitution does not give us that right simply because of Thomas Jefferson's famous words "that all men are endowed with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life..." He says "How could a person have a right to terminate his own life (by his own hand or the hand of another) if his right to life is inalienable?..."(Mayo 224).

t is what he said about showing signs of competency. He just wants to make sure that the person who is about to take his own life is of sound mind and will not do unnecessary harm to himself or anyone else that is around him.

William V. Rauscher sums this passage up very well by saying, "The phrase in Paul's letter that interests me the most at this point is 'to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account.¹ I have emphasized 'on your account' because is seems to me that this is the key to the whole of Jesus' teaching about both life and death. The suffering that Paul knew he would be called upon to endure so long as he remained alive was not for himself. Suicide was, indeed, a tempting 'way out' of continued suffering. But he refused to choose it because of his conviction that his life and his service were intended to be for others-'on your account.'"(Rauchser 104-5)

h so by grouping them and placing criteria on them it allows them to accept it in an easier manner.

What Sullivan is saying is that the Constitution has given us the right to have self-determination over matters in our life. The first amendment alone gives us the freedom to determine what religion we want to believe in, and the right to say what we want when we want to say it. The fourteenth amendment gives us the right to determine what we want for ourselves. Sullivan says, "That suicide is a 'fundamental right' and those are explicitly guaranteed by the Bill of Rights. The Supreme Court has recognized another class of fundamental right whose source lies outside specific guarantees of the Constitution, such as the rights to marital and sexual privacy, the right of a woman to exercise control over her body, the right to travel freely from one place to another, and the right to learn certain subjects in school."(Mayo 232) Sullivan feels the right to take your own life falls into this category of fundamental rights. Yet he does put a stipulation on the right to suicide and tha!

So if terminally ill patients are the only ones who have a good rational reason to commit suicide, then where does that leave everyone else? Well just about everyone else commits suicide because of a little thing that enters everyone's life at some time and that thing is called depression. Depression can come from several different things, such as a loss of something like a job, a loved one, a limb such as an arm or leg, or anything else that might be held dear to that person. Other things could be rejection at home or in the work place, abuse, and sometimes even the thought of getting old and not wanting to know what tomorrow holds in store. There are alot of arguments that these are rational reasons but just because you are having a bad day doesn't actually mean you have a rational reason to go out and throw yourself off a building or tie a rope around your neck.

He makes a good argument, by saying that it does, would infringe on our right to live that the founding fathers said was ours

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Approximate Word count = 2358
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)