Death as Legal Presumption

MoJ readers may be interested in a new paper posted on SSRN by Florida State law prof Lois Shepard entitled, In Respect of People Living in a Permanent Vegetative State -- And Allowing Them to Die.  Here (thanks to Larry Solum) is the abstract:

This article considers the controversy surrounding the removal of Terri Schiavo's feeding tube and argues for a new approach in determining treatment decisions for people in a permanent vegetative state. Examination of the duty to respect living people as persons rather than as objects reveals that people in a permanent vegetative state are particularly vulnerable under our current statutory and case law to being kept alive only in service to the interests of others. The article proposes that we replace the current legal presumption in favor of continued life support with a presumption to discontinue it for those in a permanent vegetative state and that judicial or quasi-judicial review be brought to bear on decisions in favor of continued life support, particularly tube feeding.

I have not read the article, but the suggestion that a non-instrumental approach to human life requires a legal presumption in favor of death certainly grabs one's attention.

Rob