A Caring Jurisprudence: Listening to Patients at the Supreme Court

In deciding the abortion and physician assisted suicide cases, a majority of the Justices of the United States Supreme Court drew on medical knowledge to inform their opinions while dismissing the distinctively different knowledge offered by patients. Following the legal norms derived from the ethic of justice, the CourtOs deference toward the Ouniversal,O Oimpartial,O and OreasonedO knowledge of the medical profession and its disregard of the Oparticular,O Oinvolved,O and OemotionalO knowledge …