Machan's Musings - Terri Schiavo’s Sad Saga
by Tibor R. Machan
By the time this is being read, Terri Schiavo may have died. But she is virtually dead now, or so it has been reported by several doctors who should know. The situation isn’t so unfamiliar to many of us who have had relatives who have become nearly dead or brain-dead and whose life amounts to little more than a forcibly-induced condition.
I am now old enough to have made my will instructing that if I ever reach such a state, I do not want anyone to prolong my mere survival. Why?
Well, to begin with, I do not believe in imposing the cost of any such procedure on my relatives, let alone on total strangers. There is certainly no moral–and there should be no legal—duty for the latter to provide me with life supports, period, however much the “laws” of my community disagree with me on this. The law is just wrong when it coerces others to serve someone with such—or indeed any other—support. How dare it impose such burdens on people who didn’t sign up for the task of their own free will? That is grossly unjust.
In the Terri Schiavo case the matter is clearly complicated by the fact that hardly anyone dares bring up the issue of who is supposed to pay for all this support. But it is plain that if the parents want to do so, let them—her husband should relinquish his role as next-of-kin since no one is taking it seriously anyway. His report of Terri’s own choice to let her die if the current situation is to arise is apparently treated as irrelevant for many who are chiming in on the case, even though by all rights it is he, for better or for worse, who should have that authority. Well, if he is not allowed to exercise this authority, he should just let the parents take over the care of poor Terri. (I am not privy to all the legal complications but that is what seems to me the decent way to handle it. Certainly if I were in Terri’s position and someone, say a devoted student of my philosophical works, wanted to keep me going, I would not expect my children to refuse, although they should not be held responsible for any of the burdens this would create.)
I believe much of the trepidation about Terri’s fate has to do with this misguided notion that society—that is to say, other persons—must finance anyone’s life support system. Unless she got sufficient medical insurance to pay for her continued support, it isn’t justified that she be gaining the support from people who do not want to provide it. It may appear to be heartless—which, by the way, it isn’t—but no one owes another to serve them unless there is an explicit or at least clearly implicit agreement to that effect in force.
No doubt there are people all around who disagree, who believe that other people’s need counts as a justification for conscripting unwilling strangers to provide help. Well, that is to endorse slavery, or at least involuntary servitude. Slaves, too, were thought to owe their lives and labors to their masters, not to themselves. Conscripts, too, are robbed of their will to live as they choose, usually because the people who control the government believe they are entitled to make them serve a goal they believe is very important.
Free men and women, however, are not owned by anyone other than themselves. Nor is their labor, nor their resources, available, morally speaking, to be seized by others, even those who are in dire straits. That is the price of liberty—not being able to take from others what others refuse to give of their own free will.
Alas, neither conservatives nor liberals in the USA care much about these elementary matters today. Never mind that the fundamental political document of this country, the Declaration of Independence, spelled out the idea clearly and unambiguously—namely, that each and every human being has an unalienable right to his or her life and liberty and pursuit of happiness (among other rights). This means that others may not take their lives or infringe on their liberties unless permission from them has been obtained.
However much even millions may desire that Terri Schiavo be provided with more time, so that some miracle might make her recover, it should not occur at the expense of the lives and liberties of people who haven’t volunteered for this task.
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