Disability Rights Community Responds to the Tucker Hire

The Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund coordinated the disability rights community coming together for this response. (Link to this article published by Not Dead Yet).

September 13, 2014

Dear Board members, Disability Rights Legal Center:

We understand you have hired Kathryn Tucker as the new executive director of DRLC.

Many of the signatories to this letter have worked with DRLC for years, enjoyed our working relationship toward furthering disability rights, and appreciated the work of DRLC.

We wish to engage in dialogue with you about the serious concerns we have over Ms. Tucker’s work in her previous position at Compassion & Choices that has placed members of the disability community in significant danger.

As you probably know, many prominent disability rights organizations across the U.S. have taken formal positions opposing assisted suicide laws. The legalization of assisted suicide is a very serious problem, and is of the utmost importance to many in the disability community. Ms. Tucker’s actions have significantly and directly aided in establishing assisted suicide laws, and she has materially contributed to the efforts toward their further legalization, in state after state. While Ms. Tucker’s work on pain relief is laudable, it is overshadowed by her work toward the legalization of assisted suicide through her leadership role at Compassion & Choices.

As organizations many of which have partnered with DRLC in the past, and which hope to have productive collaborations with you in the future, we would be very troubled if the hiring of Ms. Tucker were seen as a message to the disability community—or to society at large—that the DRLC has taken, or may take in the future, an opposing position to that of the established disability community on the legalization of assisted suicide, isolating itself from its natural allies.

Recognizing the difficulties raised by this past work of Ms. Tucker, we hope you will engage with us in dialogue about this issue and how it might play out, if at all, during her tenure at DRLC.

If you are unfamiliar with the issue’s complexities or with how extensively it is misunderstood by the general public, we refer you to http://dredf.org/public-policy/assisted-suicide/ to learn more.

We suggest a teleconference with you—and, if you like, Ms. Tucker and/or other staff—to consider the above questions.

On behalf of the organizations and individuals who have signed on below, please communicate with Marilyn Golden, Senior Policy Analyst, Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund (DREDF), mgolden@dredf.org, (510) 549-9339.

We look forward to hearing from you soon.

Sincerely,
(Link to the partial list of sign-ons, in alphabetical order)

Links to other articles concerning disability rights and assisted suicide.

• Not Dead Yet and Six other National Disability Rights Groups submit Friend-of-the-Court brief in New Mexico Assisted Suicide appeal.
• Disability rights organizations oppose assisted suicide.
• Open letter to the Canadian Medical Association.
• Euthanasia threatens the lives of people with disabilities.
• Not Dead Yet UK campaign against assisted suicide bill.