South Dakota

ATTEMPT TO PLACE A PROPOSAL PERMITTING DOCTOR-PRESCRIBED SUICIDE ON THE 2018 SOUTH DAKOTA BALLOT FAILS.
Supporters failed to collect enough signatures for the proposed ballot question, called the  “Death with Dignity” measure.

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2017

A measure to allow doctor-prescribed suicide would have been placed on the November 2018 ballot if the sponsor had obtained a sufficient number of signatures on petitions by November 2017. The measure was entitled: “An initiated measure authorizing a South Dakota licensed physician to prescribe drugs that a terminally ill patient may take for the purpose of ending life.”

Text of measure and SD Attorney General’s statement regarding the measure.
Analysis of measure.

South Dakota Backers Push Physician-Assisted Dying Measure
(US News and World Report — May 5, 2017)
Backers of the plan would have to submit nearly 14,000 valid signatures to the secretary of state by November 2017 to get on the ballot in 2018.
Former Rep. Fred Deutsch who opposes the measure said he expects it to qualify for the ballot.

South Dakota Law on Assisted Suicide
Any person who intentionally in any manner advises, encourages, abets, or assists another person in taking or in attempting to take his or her own life is guilty of a Class 6 felony.
S.D. Codified Laws § 22-16-37

South Dakota Senate passes resolution opposing physician-assisted suicide
(February 8, 2017)
“….[T]he Legislature strongly opposes and condemns physician-assisted suicide because the Legislature has an unqualified interest in the preservation of human life, and because anything less than a prohibition leads to foreseeable abuses and eventually to euthanasia by devaluing human life, particularly the lives of the terminally ill, elderly, disabled and depressed whose lives are of no less value or quality than any other citizen of this state…..”
Text of Senate Concurrent Resolution No. 11

2017
A measure to allow doctor-prescribed suicide will be placed on the November 2018 ballot if the sponsor obtains a sufficient number of signatures on petitions by November 2017.

The measure is entitled:
“An initiated measure authorizing a South Dakota licensed physician to prescribe drugs that a terminally ill patient may take for the purpose of ending life.”

Text of measure and SD Attorney General’s statement regarding the measure.

Articles:

South Dakota Backers Push Physician-Assisted Dying Measure
(US News and World Report — May 5, 2017)
Backers of the plan would have to submit nearly 14,000 valid signatures to the secretary of state by November 2017 to get on the ballot in 2018.
Former Rep. Fred Deutsch who opposes the measure said he expects it to qualify for the ballot.

“Spearfish woman fights for ‘Death with Dignity’ referendum”
(Washington Times — January 1, 2017)
By November 2017, supporters of the measure must gather signatures of 13,871 registered voters.  If certified, the measure would appear on the November 2018 ballot.