Thursday 16 December 2010

The Morgantaler Effect

A very interesting article that finally provides a clear explanation of how Henry Morgantaler "gamed" our Criminal Court system through "civil disobedience".  It involved a legal strategy called Jury Nullification - where a jury fails to uphold the law because it goes against their community principals of freedom.  Which is what happened to Morgantaler - but then the Appellate Court overturned those decisions and substituted a conviction.  That brought in legislation by the Federal Government that restricted Appeal Courts to just overturning a decision - not substituting an alternative conviction and sentence.  That appeal was challenged and finally reached the Supreme Court in 1988 - just after the Charter of Rights was brought in in 1983 - and the Supreme's found that it was an undue restriction upon a "Women's right to chose" and impinged on her reproductive freedom.

This article suggests that advocates of "Assisted Suicide" will follow the same path of 1) "civil disobedience" in order to 2) provoke a Jury Trial by peers who will not find them guilty, or will find them guilty of a lessor charge. That will be 3) Appealled  and eventually lead to 4) a Supreme Court decision that will find individual rights to healthcare treatment include not submitting to it and that 5) it would be a infringement upon an individuals rights NOT TO allow them to seek help in ending their own lives through "assisted suicide".

Chilling rhetoric.

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