Issue
The question before the Supreme Court was whether the U.S. Constitution permits the federal government to forcibly administer antipsychotic medication to a mentally ill, but not dangerous, criminal defendant for the sole purpose of rendering him competent to stand trial for serious but nonviolent crimes, thereby violating his cognitive liberty. Civil liberties organizations contend Dr. Sell's right to physical and mental integrity is guaranteed under the First, Fifth and Sixth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.
Read more about this topic: Sell V. United States
Famous quotes containing the word issue:
“If someone does something we disapprove of, we regard him as bad if we believe we can deter him from persisting in his conduct, but we regard him as mad if we believe we cannot. In either case, the crucial issue is our control of the other: the more we lose control over him, and the more he assumes control over himself, the more, in case of conflict, we are likely to consider him mad rather than just bad.”
—Thomas Szasz (b. 1920)
“The area [of toilet training] is one where a child really does possess the power to defy. Strong pressure leads to a powerful struggle. The issue then is not toilet training but who holds the reins—mother or child? And the child has most of the ammunition!”
—Dorothy Corkville Briggs (20th century)
“Take away from the courts, if it could be taken away, the power to issue injunctions in labor disputes, and it would create a privileged class among the laborers and save the lawless among their number from a most needful remedy available to all men for the protection of their business interests against unlawful invasion.... The secondary boycott is an instrument of tyranny, and ought not to be made legitimate.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)