The Right to Die: Two different views
New Mexico State Representative Bill McCamley saw his father battle a progressive nerve disease for four years. As he was close to death, McCamley says his father had another option when he signed an advance directive.
“He got to choose the circumstances of his own death we were able to, all of us, were able to approach that with dignity and grace and I have no regrets about how that happened in the end,” he said.
The reason why McCamley was able to choose was because New Mexico was once considered a right-to-die state. This means that terminally ill people can work with doctors to end their lives.
New Mexico was on that list along with Oregon, Vermont, Washington, Montana, California, and most recently, Colorado.
The State Supreme Court in the Land of Enchantment ruled the right to die is not in the state constitution and doctors can be prosecuted under the state’s assisted suicide law.
McCamley is looking to change that. He is working on a bill that would allow people in hospice care to see aid-in-dying, which is similar to the death-by-dignity law in Oregon. The law in New Mexico would require a diagnosis from two physicians and a mental evaluation that deems them competent to decide.
Opponents say that the choice to die isn’t really yours.
“It’s not just a matter of our faith, or it’s something about being human that we have to have some humility about decisions that aren’t ours, whether it belongs to nature or it belongs to the God who creates us,” Bishop Oscar Cantu of Las Cruces told ABC-7. “As a person of the church, a Christian, that’s where we stand. It’s God who brings us into this life and it’s God who takes us out of this life.”
Bishop Cantu also went through his own challenges with his father, who he saw struggle for eleven years after suffering a stroke. They never talked about aid-in-dying but he believes there’s beauty in dying and giving people that choice would remove the lessons that come with dying.
“Carrying for someone who is debilitated changes the people around us,” Cantu said, “It’s a reminder that there is beauty in letting go.”
The bill will be up for debate in the next legislative session in January. Until then, McCamley is continuing to advocate giving a choice on what is a sensitive issue for many people.
“My argument is that I went through this and we were able to get the most out of his 4 years because he had that choice,” he says, “and providing choice to everybody is the best choice.”
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