Ohio Could Have Been the First!

It was recently brought to my attention by Stacey Reeh, one of my Estate Planning students during our discussion of the Oregon Death With Dignity Act, that a bill was introduced into the Ohio legislature in 1906 which would have authorized assisted suicide.

According to the Nightingale Alliance:

It provided that when a mentally competent adult was terminally ill or injured, his doctor could ask him in the presence of three witnesses whether he wished to die. If the answer was yes, three other physicians had to agree that the patient’s condition was hopeless before he could be put to death.