booth gardner - Washington Secretary of State

of Hospice & Palliative Medicine was on record against the term “physician-assisted
suicide.” Further, the 9 th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had ruled in 1996 that “to hasten by
medical means a death that is already in process should not be classified as suicide.”
To Duane French, a quadriplegic who directs a disability program in Washington’s
Department of Social & Health Services, it sounded like a cross between George Orwell
and Joseph Goebbels. “ ‘Suicide,’ if you look up the definition in Webster’s, is someone
taking their own life,” he said, “and when you ingest a lethal dose of medication, that
is taking your own life.” Unwaveringly civil, French would emerge as the most effective
spokesperson for the Coalition Against Assisted Suicide. At every opportunity, he testified
to his deep respect for Booth Gardner. He thought he had been “a wonderful governor”
and understood his pain. “I love him,” French said. “As a person with a disability, he is a
brother, but in this he is misguided.” The affection was mutual.
French had been in a wheelchair for 40 years. On a hot August day in 1968, he
went swimming with his pals. With the sun on his back and joy in his 14-year-old heart,
he dove off a 13-foot bridge into a portion of the river he didn’t realize was only three
feet deep. Like many “quads,” French has relied on laughter – and a healthy sense of the
absurd – to stay sane in a capricious world. The founder of the Washington chapter of a
national disabilities group called Not Dead Yet, he is, of course, a Monty Python fan. “Bring
out yer dead,” cries the collector of corpses in Monty Python & the Holy Grail as he trails a
handcart heaped with victims of the plague. But “I’m not dead!” protests one hapless chap
slung over someone’s shoulder. “Oh, don’t be such a baby!” he’s told. When his yelping
persists, the dead collector whacks him over the head with his club.
* * *
The same day he filed the initiative, Booth arrived at a meeting of the Tacoma School
Board to express his interest in becoming the district’s next superintendent. The board
was conducting a public hearing on what qualities the new leader should have. Before the
meeting got under way, however, Gardner stumbled, fell to the floor and slid into a wall,
sustaining a two-inch laceration over his left eye. Paramedics took him to the hospital. He
left his written comments with the meeting facilitator, who shared them with the board and
the audience. Gardner said Tacoma schools needed a superintendent who understood the
community; someone with a track record of working with unions, community groups and
families; someone with a strong background in assessment and instruction and “someone
who recognizes that schools continue to ‘lose or fail’ too many students of color or poverty
and knows that standardized tests alone are not the answer to improving academic success.”
Noting that Gardner was suffering from Parkinson’s, the Tacoma News Tribune
included his mishap in its report on the meeting. “Shame on you,” one reader wrote. “The
details regarding the incident added nothing to the story and probably did damage to this
very prestigious individual.” Others disagreed. “As a result of your article,” one said, “I was
‘challenged’ personally to seek out an understanding of this disease… Isn’t this the purpose
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