## Facts

- Robert Baxter, a 76-year-old Montana resident, had terminal lymphocytic leukemia and experienced persistent, significant pain.
- Baxter sought the option to end his life by ingesting a lethal dose of medication prescribed by a physician at a time of his choosing.
- Baxter, four physicians, and Compassion & Choices sued the State of Montana and the Attorney General seeking declaratory relief.
- Plaintiffs alleged Montana’s homicide statutes were unconstitutional as applied to physicians who provide “aid in dying” to mentally competent, terminally ill adults.
- Plaintiffs relied primarily on the Montana Constitution’s provisions regarding individual dignity and privacy.
- The district court granted summary judgment for plaintiffs, declared a constitutional “right to die with dignity,” and concluded that right protected physicians from prosecution under the homicide statutes as applied.

## Issues

1. Whether the Montana Constitution’s dignity and privacy provisions create a fundamental right for a competent, terminally ill patient to obtain physician aid in dying.
2. Whether, under Montana statutes, a physician who provides aid in dying to a competent, terminally ill adult may invoke the victim’s consent as a defense to homicide, or whether such consent is ineffective as contrary to public policy.

## Decision

- The Montana Supreme Court declined to affirm a constitutional right to physician aid in dying.
- The court resolved the case on statutory grounds, focusing on Montana’s consent defense.
- The court held that a physician who prescribes lethal medication to a mentally competent, terminally ill adult at the patient’s request may raise the patient’s consent as a defense to a homicide charge.
- The court found no Montana statute or controlling precedent declaring physician aid in dying to be against public policy such that consent would be categorically ineffective.
- The court limited its holding to competent, terminally ill adult patients and left further regulation or prohibition to the legislature.

## Legal Principles

- When narrower statutory grounds can resolve a dispute, a court may avoid deciding broader constitutional questions.
- Under Montana law, a victim’s consent may be a defense to criminal liability, including where the charged offense turns on causing a result, unless consent is rendered ineffective by law or public policy.
- In the absence of an express statutory prohibition or clear public-policy bar, courts will not infer that physician aid in dying is categorically forbidden such that consent cannot operate as a defense.
- The decision recognizes a defensive shield (availability of a consent defense) rather than an affirmative constitutional or statutory right to receive physician aid in dying.

## Conclusion

The Montana Supreme Court rejected the district court’s constitutional rationale but held that, for mentally competent, terminally ill adults who request aid in dying, a physician may rely on the patient’s consent as a statutory defense to homicide because Montana law did not clearly render such consent ineffective on public-policy grounds.


Baxter v. Montana, 354 Mont. 234, 224 P.3d 1211 (Mont. 2009)