X-Message-Number: 8775 Date: Thu, 13 Nov 1997 10:59:03 -0700 From: David Brandt-Erichsen <> Subject: Oregon update Oregon officials turn up heat on DEA to clarify stand The Associated Press 11/13/97 3:53 AM Eastern PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) -- Oregon political leaders are stepping up efforts to find out whether the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration has the authority to penalize doctors who aid in the death of terminally ill patients. An aide to Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., said the senator plans to meet with Attorney General Janet Reno next week about whether the DEA has the power, under the Controlled Substances Act, to discipline the doctors who dispense lethal drugs. Wyden also will meet U.S. Department of Justice officials to review federal policy toward the Oregon law that allows terminally ill patients to choose to kill themselves. Representatives of Gov. John Kitzhaber and state Attorney General Hardy Myers are expected to participate. "We would like to see this cleared up within a week or two," Wyden's chief of staff Josh Kardon said. Kitzhaber plans to contact the Clinton administration in hopes of receiving assurances that the DEA will back away from its threat to revoke doctors' licenses to prescribe some drugs if they write lethal prescriptions. Wyden and Kitzhaber contend the DEA overstepped its authority when Administrator Thomas Constantine said, in a letter to the House and Senate judiciary committees' chairmen, that prescribing lethal medication to assist in a suicide would violate federal narcotics law. The letter was written just one day after Oregon voters reaffirmed their support of the physician-assisted suicide law they first approved in 1994. Kardon said the threat seems to have abated. "It appears that the DEA has a particularly weak case," Kardon said. One of the recipients of Constantine's letters, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Henry Hyde, R-Ill., said he still believes that the DEA should pursue doctors who prescribe lethal doses of medicine. But he said he has no plans to introduce legislation to overturn Oregon's law. "We got the right answer, so I don't have any plans for legislation or anything like that. I think the courts will deal with it, ultimately," Hyde said. Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=8775