Right To Die

9

THE POSTER AT THE DOORS SAID THE DEBATE WOULD BEGIN promptly at eight P.M. with a book signing to follow at Plato's Bookshop. Two Boston cops routinely assessed me as I walked past them. One black and one white, both male and big. You can specify size if you're expecting trouble.

The Rabb Lecture Hall itself, carved out beneath the new wing of the Boston Public Library, would remind you of a particularly well-kept school auditorium. I wanted to be early enough to see most of the folks as they filed in. The metal chairs, upholstered with black cushions, were bolted onto a steep slope. All the seats faced the stage, someone having sashed off a section of the bottom rows. I sat on the aisle near the back right corner to give me the best scope for faces.

The stage was spartan. A podium under a baby spotlight. To the left of the podium, a grand piano that probably was easier to ignore than to move. Behind the podium, one chair, positioned subserviently in shadow. To the right of the podium, a longish table in medium light with three chairs. On the table, a paper cloth, a pitcher of water, and three glasses.

The hall began to fill up. A lot of academics and professionals. More black faces than you usually see outside the predominantly black neighborhoods. A smattering of students, some vaguely familiar from the class at Mass Bay that morning, others too young to be in law school yet. Concerned women with rosaries, their husbands in poorly tailored sport jackets, index fingers between collars and necks, trying to expand a sixteen to a sixteen and a half. The rest of the crowd looked like the sort of people you wouldn't stop to ask for directions.

I'd just spotted Walter Strock confiding in a cornsilk blonde who had "Kimberly" written all over her when I felt a strong hand on my shoulder.

I looked up the sleeve into the face of Alec Bacall, a slim black man hovering behind him.

"John! Glad you could make it. May we join you?"

"Sure."

I stood to let them go by me, communion style. Bacall was wearing double-pleated trousers again. They billowed as he shuffled his feet. Bacall sat himself between his companion and me, saying, "John Cuddy, Del Wonsley."

Wonsley leaned across Bacall, extending his hand. His complexion was deep black, looking almost spit-shined under the strong house lights. The nose was aquiline, a pencil mustache under it and a mushroom haircut above it. Wonsley wore a red sweater with maize horizontal stripes over a knit shirt, collar turned up. His slacks were cavalry twills, the creases sharp.

Bacall said, "We could sit closer if you'd like, John. The first few rows are reserved for family and friends."

"Better view from up here."

"Oh. Yes, of course."

Wonsley said, "Alec told me about you. Can you believe the turnout for this?"

He had a flat Chicago A in his voice.

I said, "Do we know who else is on the program?"

Bacall said, "A doctor from Mass General and a minister from a Protestant church."

Wonsley waved to a middle-aged black man in a lower row, who from the expression on his face curdled cream for a living.

Wonsley said, "Oooo – ooh, the look he gave me. For sitting up here in Sodom and Gomorrah country instead of down there with the Children of God."

Bacall patted Wonsley's forearm. "The best is yet to come, Del. The Hitler Youth make their grand entrance."

I was turning as Bacall said it, because I could hear the clumping on the floor. Five white kids, heads shaved, were stamping their boots just enough to attract the attention of the cops. The cops couldn't do much when the kids stopped their noise and held up their hands in mock innocence. They took three seats a few rows below us and two more seats immediately in front of the three. All wore brown leather flying jackets over white T-shirts and studded blue jeans, the jeans bloused into the boots like army fatigue pants. Body language suggested that the kid in the middle, a redhead from his eyebrows, was the leader. One of the others called him "Gun."

Maybe short for "Gunther," as in Gunther Yary, the author of the white supremacist hate letters in the Andrus file.

I said to Bacall, "Know them?"

"No."

"See anybody else I ought to worry about?"

Bacall murmured something to Wonsley, and they both craned forward, scanning the room. Each hesitated on a few places as people turned to talk to each other or stood to remove another layer of clothing. Wonsley looked at Bacall, shook his head, and settled back.

Bacall did the same but pointed toward the sashed area. "I can introduce you later, but the striking man sitting next to Manolo and Inés is Tucker Hebert."

Hebert was turned sideways, deep in conversation with his wife's secretary. He had broad shoulders under a dull rose blazer. His hair was dishwater blond, but the cleft in his chin caught you even from the bleachers.

Del Wonsley said, "First time I saw him in tennis shorts, I cried myself to sleep."

The only empty spaces were around the skinheads. A few late arrivals chose to stand rather than sit near them.

Without fanfare, a side door on the stage opened, and the crowd began to applaud. A man and three women, one of them Maisy Andrus in her yellow sweater dress, walked out in a line. The man and one of the other women were white and wore suits. The third woman was black and wore a choir robe.

The skinheads made hooting noises. One of them said, "Christ, Gun, check out old Maisy in the yellow horse blanket."

Gun said, "Fuck all, Rick. She didn't shave her legs, I'da thought she was a Clydesdale."

Rick said, "Maybe the guy drives the Bud wagon knocked off a little early, y'know," then ducked his head and shrank from the look Gun gave him. Like it was one thing to feed Gun a line and another to top his joke.

The white member of the police team came down the aisle. He stopped at Gun's row and leaned in, armpit in a skinhead's eyes. A series of grunts was all you could hear, but when the cop walked back up the aisle, the skinheads were facing front and staying quiet. Wonsley laid his head lightly on Bacall's shoulder. "Ah, for the paramilitary life."

The white woman on the stage settled the other three into their seats behind the table and moved to the podium.

As the house lights dimmed, she stood in the baby spot and introduced herself as Olivia Jurick, the manager of Plato's Bookshop. Jurick thanked a covey of public and private benefactors for helping to sponsor the event before thanking everybody for coming out on a cold winter night for such an important and stimulating topic of our time.

Then, "Our first speaker will be the Reverend Vonetta Givens. Our second speaker will be Dr. Paul Eisenberg, and our third speaker will be Professor Maisy Andrus. After all have presented prepared remarks, there will be an opportunity for questions from the audience."

Jurick turned a page. "Reverend Vonetta Givens is the pastor of All Hallowed Ground Church of Roxbury. Born in Oklahoma, Reverend Givens is a graduate of Morehouse College in Atlanta and attended several theological seminaries prior to her ordination in 1979. She ministered to congregations in Atlanta, Memphis, and Trenton before assuming her present position in 1984. A charter member of Boston Against Drugs, Reverend Givens leads the African-American community's struggle against the scourge of crack cocaine. She also has been extremely active among the elderly and the infirm."

Olivia Jurick's voice dropped, and I expected to hear Reverend Givens at that point. So, apparently, did Reverend Givens, because she had gathered her papers into a sheaf, almost rising before Jurick continued.

"Our second speaker, Dr. Paul Eisenberg, is a graduate of Cornell University and the Harvard Medical School. Dr. Eisenberg is currently a member of the Department of Internal Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital and adjunct professor of ethics at the Tufts University School of Medicine. Between college and medical school, Dr. Eisenberg served for two years in the Peace Corps in Brazil, and enjoyed staff privileges at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York and Philadelphia Presbyterian before assuming his present position in 1986." Jurick held up a book. "Dr. Eisenberg is also the author of The Ethical Physician in the Modern World."

Eisenberg, poring over his notes, didn't look up at the audience.

"Our third speaker is Professor Maisy Andrus of the Law School of Massachusetts Bay. A widely known lecturer in the area of legal and societal mores, Professor Andrus is a graduate of Bryn Mawr and the University of Pennsylvania School of Law. Prior to joining the faculty at Mass Bay, she taught at Boston College School of Law and George Mason University. Professor Andrus practiced health and hospital law in Washington, D.C., also serving as a school committee member and a trustee of a battered women's shelter."

Jurick held up another book. "Professor Andrus is the author of Our Right to Die."

Jurick lowered the book. "It is now my pleasure to turn the podium over to our first speaker, the Reverend Vonetta Givens.

Reverend Givens?"

Steady applause began as Jurick retreated to the shadow chair. Parishioners shouted brief encouragement as Givens moved to the mike. Perhaps five three under a beehive wig, even the robe couldn't conceal the serious tonnage she carried. Wonsley whispered, "I've heard she's very good." The mike was on a gooseneck. Givens adjusted it, none too gently, down to mouth level. She spread her notes across the podium, clamped both hands on the sides of the surface, and opened fire.

"You all have been told this is a debate tonight. I suggest to you it is no such thing. I suggest to you that it is a contest, a contest you shall witness between the forces of God and the forces that are not God's."

A few voices said, "That's right," stressing the first word.

"The forces that are not God's are those who would say that life is not for God to take but rather for man. For man to take when man has grown too tired of caring for the sick, too tired of doing for the elderly, too tired of fulfilling the natural and divine duty each and every one of us has to assist his brother and sister in their times of greatest need and weakness."

More "That's right" and several "Amens" piped up politely. "Which of you would cast the first stone by saying, 'It is too much trouble for me to tend my own? Which of you would sleep better, eat better, live better, knowing you had ended a life you knew and loved? A life which God as part of His almighty and miraculous plan had placed before you to nurture. When we wore the chains of the white slave owners, we were forbidden to learn how to read and write. It was a crime for anyone to teach us such things. Are we who know the worst of what it is to have decisions made for us and against us and on top of us, are we now to say, 'I know what is best for that life, and what is best is that I should end it?' "

What started as "That's right" and "Amen" became "No! No!"

"Of course we are not to say that. We are not to say that because we are creatures of God and creatures of conscience. Creatures that can love and pray and give thanks for loving and praying both, because those qualities are what truly separate us from the beasts of fang and hoof. If we were to kill our brothers and sisters, our fathers and mothers, who gave us life itself, just because it has become more expensive and less efficient to clutch these dear souls to our bosom, then what have we become? We have gone back and dropped down, we have rejoined the beasts of fang and hoof, tearing at kin and neighbor just to make our own lives easier. And that must never be."

A lot of the black members of the audience leaned forward in their seats, sensing the crescendo before I did. A thin sheen of perspiration above the reverend's eyebrows refracted the baby spot almost mystically.

"That must never be because then who would be safe from the twin swords of expense and efficiency? Who can we justify maintaining in our nursing homes as their lives draw to a close in God's unknowable time? Who can we justify healing and strengthening at the midpoint of a life so far not productive, so far not in the image that Wall Street and Madison Avenue would have us embrace? And who can we justify suckling and warming and bringing forth from the nursery, when we know deep down in our hearts that no one can predict what turn that life might take.

"I suggest to you, to you brother and to you sister, that no one can approach, that no one can exceed, that no one can" – Givens fixed Eisenberg and Andrus – "debate the infinite and everlasting judgment of the Lord God and Jesus Christ as to which of the creatures fashioned in Their image is now ready to be returned to Them. Amen."

Givens scooped up her notes and went back to her seat. Most of the blacks and perhaps twenty percent of the whites gave her a standing ovation, stamping their feet harder than they were clapping their hands.

Over the din I heard Rick, the second banana, say to Gun, "We do it, the cops are on us like fucking glue. The niggers do it – "

Gun cut him off by raising his hand in a stop sign.

Jurick waited until the tumult died away before moving to the microphone. "Thank you, Reverend Givens. And now, ladies and gentlemen, Dr. Paul Eisenberg."

Eisenberg, over six feet tall, got up in fits and starts, his chair not gliding back. He was bald, with a full beard and half glasses. His hand shook visibly as he laid his papers on the podium. Eisenberg began to read from them without readjusting the height of the microphone. He stopped and twisted the mike as people in the audience tittered.

Eisenberg started over. "Unlike Reverend Givens before me and Professor Andrus to follow, I am not an accomplished public speaker. Therefore, I have to hope that the logic of what I have to say to you can rise above my awkwardness in saying it. My ultimate message, however, transcends even logic. That message is, 'First, do no harm.'

"That is the cornerstone of all medical training. The physician must first be certain that he does – excuse me. that he or she – does no harm to the patient involved. Our entire mission is to save lives, not to contribute, directly or indirectly, to the taking of them. There can be no right to die because there can be no right to kill, not even one's own self, because suicide is an act recognized as a crime by the entirety of the civilized world. To be confronted with a situation in which a patient, or the family of a patient, requests that a physician end life is simply anesthetic – excuse me, is simply antithetical – to all we believe in as physicians within a civilized society."

People shifted in their seats, many coughing. One loud sneeze produced a collective low laugh.

"As some of you may know, we have a system in Massachusetts under which the relatives of a terribly sick patient can petition a court of law to rule on the administering or withholding of certain life-sustaining processes. With all respect to the profession of the next speaker, I do not understand how a state like Massachusetts, which has outlawed within its judicial system the death penalty for even the most heinous crime, can then turn to that same judicial system and say 'Please impose the death penalty on a patient whose only transgression is to have fallen sick.' A patient who is typically comatose and who may present" – Eisenberg looked up at us for the first time – "as Reverend Givens so eloquently stated, a, uh… excuse me." Eisenberg ran a finger down the page. "… a burden, may present a burden both financial and emotional, to the family and the treatment delivery system. I am troubled with becoming an advocate and, worse, an instrument for the death of one patient so that another patient, who I believe might benefit more from treatment of a limited availability, could now be accommodated.

"However, I am even more troubled by a system in which such decisions are made secretly, without even benefit of a logically flawed justice system. I am most troubled by the very real possibility of people taking the law into their own hands in a way that is not only illegal but immoral and would undermine the very protections of the individual upon which our society is based. Each of us is only as safe as his or her neighbor. For any of us to be safe, all of us must be safe."

Eisenberg looked up again. "Uh, thank you for your attention."

Strained applause died away before the doctor resumed his seat. Nobody likes to be read to.

Olivia Jurick came to the high mike. On tiptoe she said, "And now, ladies and gentlemen, Professor Maisy Andrus."

Andrus stood smoothly, striding to the podium with no notes. Engaging the audience, she looked from section to section until there was no noise in the lecture hall, not a cough, not a rustle. Then, "I stand before you tonight for a very simple reason: I killed my husband. Under the laws of most countries, I was guilty of a crime. Under the laws of Spain, where the incident took place, I was guilty of a worse crime: as a wife, I committed parricide, the killing of the male head of the family.

"Well, what I did was no crime in my mind or heart, and I suspect it would be none in yours either. My goal is to have the feelings in those minds and hearts reflected in rational laws which permit society to evolve, as it must, if we are to survive as a species in close contact with each other. Despite Reverend Givens's impassioned presentation, the law is not some capital-letter, quasi-religious absolute. Despite Dr. Eisenberg's dispassionate presentation, the law is not some scientifically logical formula into which factors need merely be inserted to produce uniformly correct answers.

"The doctor alluded to suicide. The original purpose behind the prohibition of suicide was the same as that against male masturbation: to promote the continuation of our species. Given the size of the global population and its rate of reproduction, the rule against suicide is no longer needed to ensure that survival. Indeed, we are now presented with the converse problem.

"In 1988, two-thirds of the doctors polled by the American Medical Association reported being involved in decisions to withhold or withdraw treatment, and the American Hospital Association estimates that seventy percent of hospital deaths now occur because of family and medical termination of treatment. In response to these statistics, courts in twenty states ruled on the right to die, the Supreme Court of the United States recently confirming the constitutional basis of that right.

"The law can, and must, take into account aspects of our changing society. Religion depends on prayer, medicine on technology. But when our religious views become so entrenched and our medicine so sophisticated, we all simply must recognize a basic truth. Each and every one of us has certain rights of person, certain rights of spirit, that neither religion nor medicine nor a government supportive of both should be able to take away. Such is the basis of the right to abortion – "

Hisses and boos jumped out all over the room, vying with applause.

"Such is the right to sexual preference – "

More noise.

"And such is the right to die. To determine for oneself that the time has come when prayer is no longer availing, when the medicine that can prolong life can no longer improve it. I believe it barbaric to force our elderly, our infirm, our comatose and their respective families to continue to suffer when a veterinarian would be reviled for not bestowing a parallel mercy on a similarly situated dog or cat.

"I began tonight by saying that I killed my husband, but there is a difference between cruelly killing someone with kindness and mercifully killing that person kindly. Let me close by describing to you what my husband's life would have been like without my helping him. He was fifty-two years old, he had suffered a stroke. A doctor himself, he knew that the only possible prognosis was irreversible deterioration. His condition cost him his native tongue; cost him the ability to move his limbs, to swallow, to sit up, even to control his bowels. He was no longer a tenth of the vital, loving, caring person he'd been all his life. The alternative to my helping him would have been months of humiliation and pain, both mental and physical, and toward what end? To set some sort of unofficial record for suffering in a sport where everyone insists upon adherence to the rules but no one rewards those who try the hardest. Please, let us reconsider together, unblinded by religion or logic, and simply endorse what is right and fair and appropriate: the ending of life when life has ceased to be what any of us would call living. Thank you."

Sincere applause, growing as Andrus reached her seat. She looked down into the sashed area, smiled, and nodded. I could see Tucker Hebert flash her a thumbs-up.

Olivia Jurick returned to the podium. "Thank you, Professor Andrus. I'd now like to take questions. If you have something to ask, please raise your hand. I believe everyone will be able to hear a bit better if you stand while putting your question. Uh, yes, ma'am, you, please."

An austere woman with straight hair the color of chrome rose and began to speak with Locust Valley lockjaw. "I think it obvious to any rational person that tonight's debate has demonstrated the absolute bankruptcy of the so-called Dukakis 'Massachusetts Miracle' which was always a function of Reagan administration deficit spending on the Commonwealth's defense contractors."

Del Wonsley said, "A wild-card favorite."

As Jurick leaned into the microphone to interrupt, the austere woman said, "That's all I have to say," and dropped back into her seat.

Jurick quickly pointed to an older man with short gray hair. Standing awkwardly and wearing a cardigan sweater, his voice was raspy.

"Professor Andrus, my daughter was sick and got ahold of your book." He held up a copy by the binding. "Three weeks later she went and killed herself. How do you feel about that?"

A number of people in the audience gasped. Alec Bacall smiled grimly. "Off to the races."

Jurick didn't seem to know what to do as moderator. Maisy Andrus never left her chair. "Since I don't believe I knew your daughter, sir, I – "

"Her name was Heidi. Heidi Doleman. Now you know."

I came forward in my seat. I couldn't see any bulges over Louis Doleman's hips, but that didn't mean he wasn't carrying up front for a cross-draw.

"As I was about to say, Mr. Doleman, since I don't believe I knew your daughter, I don't know what to think of her death. If she was suffering, I hope that you and any other loved ones supported her in what she believed to be best."

"Weren't any other loved ones, Professor. Just Heidi and me. But you've said just about what I thought you would."

As Doleman sat back down, Olivia Jurick nearly sighed in relief over the mike. She pointed to a teenage girl directly between us and the stage.

The girl wore a pink beret over sandy hair. "Professor Andrus, do you think it's right for little babies to be taken from the womb and killed before they get asked whether or not they're ready to die?"

Grumbling and shushing in the audience.

Again from her chair, Andrus said, "We're not here tonight to argue for or against abortion, but yes, I think the woman carrying the fetus has such a right, though it is intellectually distinct from the right to die."

The girl raised her voice over more grumbling and less shushing. "I'm not asking you intellectually, Professor. I'm asking you morally. Is it right to kill that baby'?"

From the lower left section, a black female voice said, "Answer the child."

Andrus said, "I've already given you my best answer on that."

Reverend Givens cut in. "Child, you want my answer on that?"

Reluctantly, I thought, the pink beret said, "Sure."

"Well, my answer is simple. You kill that baby, and you'll never forgive yourself. You'll never in your life forget. You have that baby, and somebody will give it a fine home and a good upbringing."

Gun yelled out, "What if it comes out half black?"

Givens shaded her eyes with her hand, and others in the audience turned to glare at Gun, then turn away as he and his cohort gave them the finger. The salt-and-pepper police team looked at each other and started forward.

Givens said, "I can't see you, but I'm guessing from the tone of your voice you're the type that does better wailing from the darkness than speaking in the light."

A solid round of applause. The cops hesitated, then went back to the wall and crossed their arms.

Givens said to the pink beret, "Child, however that baby comes out, you come see me if you have any troubles about it."

More applause as Olivia Jurick gratefully pointed to a well-dressed older black man.

"Dr. Eisenberg. Can you tell me, Doctor, how all of us are going to be able to afford keeping all these patients alive while you and your friends at the hospital get upward of five hundred dollars a day?"

Eisenberg winced. "That's, uh, more a question for a hospital administrator than a doctor."

"But you're the one's been saying it here."

"Yes, well, you see, it's not really you who pays for all that. The insurance companies do."

"Out of the goodness of their hearts, huh?"

"Well, no, no, of course not. From premiums they collect and investments they make. But – "

"And who be paying those premiums, Jack?"

Del Wonsley said, "Right on."

Jurick said, "I wonder if we could have another question? Yes?"

The black man shook his head in disgust as he sat back down. Jurick's finger pointed to Walter Strock.

Strock rose, Kimberly watching him as if he were the Hope diamond. "Two questions, if I may. First, for Professor Andrus. Professor, earlier you referred to a constitutional 'right to die'. Now, you'll certainly agree that the Supreme Court of the United States in the Cruzan case established only that a patient has the right to decline life-sustaining medical aid. I wonder, where in the Constitution do you encounter the right to life – terminating assisted suicide?"

Andrus spoke very evenly. "Our country was founded on the principles of 'life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness? The right to liberty must include a right to die. Otherwise, 'life' and 'the pursuit of happiness' would become inconsistent concepts now that medical technology can, as I said earlier, prolong a painful, hopeless 'life' without any possibility of 'pursuing happiness'. "

"How imaginative of the Founding Fathers to include all that."

Over the laughter his sarcasm triggered, Strock said, "And my second question is for Dr. Eisenberg. In your remarks, Doctor, you voiced concern over the situation in which you are asked to terminate a patient who has become a burden on his family?"

"Yes?"

"I wonder, are you more concerned about terminating a patient whose timely death might benefit his family?"

Alec Bacall said, "The pompous little shit."

Eisenberg sensed something, but I'm not sure he got Strock's innuendo, because he just said, "Why, yes, of course."

Strock closed with a flourish and a smile. "Thank you, Doctor. That's all I have."

As Olivia Jurick looked over the crowd, Gun got to his feet.

"Hey, I got a question."

Jurick said, "If you could wait – "

"My question is how come you don't have somebody who can talk for real Americans on this panel?"

Jurick said, "Sir, if you – "

The other skinheads prepared for protection as the cops moved toward them.

Gun cranked it up. "How come we got to listen to a shine, a kike, and probably a dyke did her own husband? How come nobody talks about the race criminals in this country trying to strangle it and strangle the people who built it. huh?"

The cops were trying to get to Gun, the rest of the audience trying to retreat, but Rick and the other skinheads had moved toward the aisle to act as a barrier. No weapons I could see.

Jurick said over the microphone, "Officers, if you would please – "

"Fuck all, bitch, you got your goddamn nigger cops and your goddamn kike judges, but you can't silence the real Americans, and we're going to take back what we never should have lost in the first place."

Two skinheads began scuffling with each cop but not throwing any punches. The crowd got really nervous now and started scrambling out of the confining rows and into the surging aisles.

I said to Bacall, "Save my seat, will you?"

Going over the tops of chairs, I grabbed Gun's right ear, my fingers wrapping around the cartilage like a pistol grip. I squeezed until he bent forward at the waist and started squeaking.

I yelled, "Enough."

There was a momentary pause in everything, a video frame of uniforms and skinheads.

"Gun, tell your friends to let go of the cops."

Rick the skinhead said, "Shit, Gun, knock his hand away."

I said, "He knocks my hand away, his ear comes with it."

Gun squeaked some more. "Do it, Rick… Let them go."

Rick released the white cop and said "Shit" again just as he got whirled onto the floor.

Security guards from the library upstairs appeared, and I maneuvered Gun over to the black cop. As I walked back to my seat, Jurick was saying, "… and I want to thank our speakers and all of you once more and remind you of the book signing that will…"

Alec Bacall said, "And how did you enjoy the debate, John?"

"It was all right. Kind of a cold crowd, though."

Del Wonsley said, "Oh, I don't know. I thought that many were appalled, but few were frozen."

Bacall grinned. "That's why I love him so."