Gov. Kathy Hochul announced on Wednesday that she will sign a bill that will allow terminally ill New Yorkers to end their lives, using unusually personal language as she settled an emotional, decade-long battle between religious leaders and right-to-die advocates.
The law will apply to adults who have incurable, irreversible illnesses and six months or less to live, and each patient will need the sign-off of three doctors.
Eleven states, the District of Columbia and several countries in Europe have passed similar laws over the objections of some disability-rights advocates and religious organizations, most notably the Catholic Church, which have characterized the bill as legalizing assisted suicide.
But Ms. Hochul, who is Catholic, said she had made what she described as the “difficult decision” to support the measure in part because of her faith. She wrote in an essay published Wednesday morning in the Albany Times Union that she had listened to people suffering through the agony of a slow death, and that their painful experiences mirrored her own observations of a beloved family member.
“I watched my own mom die from A.L.S.,” she wrote. “I watched that vicious disease steal away the strong woman who raised me as it took her ability to walk, to eat, to speak and, ultimately, to live. I am all too familiar with the pain of seeing someone you love suffer and feeling powerless to stop it.”
The governor, a Democrat, said that while she had struggled with the church’s position on the measure, she had come to believe that the issue was not about shortening life “but rather about shortening dying.”
“I do not believe that in every instance condemning someone to excruciating pain and suffering preserves the dignity and sanctity of life,” she continued.
She added, “I was taught that God is merciful and compassionate, and so must we be.”
In a statement on Wednesday, the New York State Catholic Conference called the state bill, the Medical Aid in Dying Act, “egregious” and said it signaled the state’s “abandonment of its most vulnerable citizens.” The church opposes assisted suicide and euthanasia, which the Vatican has called “intrinsically evil.”
The governor, who will hold a news conference about the legislation on Wednesday afternoon, said she intends to sign the bill after the State Legislature returns for session in January and formally adopts a raft of changes she made to the original bill passed by lawmakers earlier this year.
Ms. Hochul said her amendments were intended to address concerns that vulnerable New Yorkers could be pressured into life-ending decisions they would not have made on their own.
Each patient must provide written and oral requests to confirm that the life-ending decision was made of their own free will. The initial legislation required two physicians to testify to the seriousness of the patient’s illness; Ms. Hochul insisted a third certification be obtained from a psychiatrist or psychologist to ensure that the patient was not under duress.
The bill provides for a five-day waiting period, to offer applicants time to change their minds. The measure will take effect six months after it is signed, though a small number of waivers will be made available.
The original version of the bill also had no residency requirement, which would have allowed terminally ill patients from other states to come to New York to end their lives. Ms. Hochul’s version will apply only to New York residents, who have supported the measure in recent polls.
The measure has been heralded by a variety of medical associations and advocacy groups, as well as terminally ill people, some of whom have died while the bill was in limbo.
Dr. Jeremy Boal, a Columbia County physician facing a terminal illness, thanked the governor and the Legislature in a statement, saying Ms. Hochul’s announcement had lifted a cloud of fear lurking since his diagnosis.
“It has given me the peace of mind to live my best life for whatever time I have left,” he said.
The added safeguards come as other countries have expanded access to the process, raising questions about the government’s role in balancing the sanctity of life with individual freedom. In Canada, expansions of the law have allowed people with mental illness to end their lives, sparking debate about mental competency and autonomy.
Some disability-rights activists have also raised alarms about the measure, which they say could lead people to end their lives based on inaccurate diagnoses.
State Republican leaders characterized the governor’s decision as a “profound moral failure” and sought to use it to bolster Representative Elise Stefanik’s bid to become governor next year.
“At a moment when New Yorkers are struggling with isolation and mental health crises, she is choosing to tell the most vulnerable among us that their lives are expendable,” Ed Cox, the chairman of the state Republican Party, said of Ms. Hochul. “This is not compassion; it’s abandonment.”
Arguments like these have blocked the bill from advancing since it was first introduced a decade ago by Assemblywoman Amy Paulin, a Democrat. Proponents of the measure, some of whom are now in their 80s, have long been a familiar sight around the State Capitol. One group said it had brought hundreds of supporters to Albany over the years, many of whom were terminally ill. Dozens died during the campaign.
In her essay, Ms. Hochul put the issue into the context of other struggles for personal freedoms, including abortion rights and L.G.B.T.Q. equality — both of which she supports — saying, “In the true spirit of this country, government has a responsibility to protect, not interfere with, an individual’s deeply personal decisions.”
Grace Ashford covers New York government and politics for The Times.
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