NPR on Baxter v. Montana.

From NPRs Frank James:

The Montana Supreme Court upheld a lower court's decision that nothing in state law bars physician-assisted suicide so long as the decision is made by a mentally competent, terminally ill adult who ultimately decides whether or not to end his life.

The Montana attorney general had appealed a lower court ruling, arguing that physician-assisted suicide was against "public policy."

But the state's supreme court said:

... We find nothing in Montana Supreme Court precedent or Montana statutes indicating that physician aid in dying is against public policy. The "against public policy" exception to consent has been interpreted by this Court as applicable to violent breaches of the public peace. Physician aid in dying does not satisfy that definition. We also find nothing in the plain language of Montana statutes indicating that physician aid in dying is against public policy. In physician aid in dying, the patient-- not the physician--commits the final death-causing act by self-administering a lethal dose of medicine.

The case was a posthumous victory for Robert Baxter, a retired truck driver suffering from lymphocytic leukemia who died late last year.