Today in Supreme Court History: February 27, 1901

2/27/1901: Champion v. Ames argued.

 

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[JoeFromtheBronx]

Washington v. Harper, 494 U.S. 210 (decided February 27, 1990): mentally ill prisoner could be treated with psychotropic drugs against his will; finding that he was danger to himself and others by panel of correction officials and medical professionals was adequate due process.

https://www.captcrisis.com/post/today-in-supreme-court-history-february-27-2

The opinion recognizes a liberty interest in refusing such drugs while arguing that the state interest warrants the policy while adequately protecting the inmate's interests. Three of the liberals disagreed. Blackmun concurred.

I thought of this case while watching 55 Steps,* a good film based on a significant California case involving Eleanor Riese, played by Helena Bonham Carter. She is excellent.

Riese's real-life lawyer (portrayed by Hillary Swank) praised the performance as true to the real-life person. One review:

She’s not a malevolent sociopath or an obsessive. Nor is she a sweetly delusional mentally ill woman. Eleanor Riese, as played by Bonham-Carter, can sometimes be sweet, but she’s also, as clearly stated by her lawyer Colette Hughes (Swank), “gravely obnoxious.” Bonham-Carter doesn’t play it for cute… She demands her rights as a patient, the rights to be treated as a sentient being capable of making decisions about her treatment…. She’s demanding, annoying, and sometimes imperious, but she’s also deeply human and passionate about empowering other patients.

(Huffington Post)

The ruling was followed by legislative action:

After the CA Supreme Court affirmed the right of short-term involuntary patients to give informed consent or refusal to psychiatric drugs in the Riese case, there was a huge battle in the legislature to get it passed there. (Since the court case was based on CA legislation, the legislature had the ability to overturn it.) Members of the California Network of Mental Health Clients played a decisive role in getting the legislation passed, along with dedicated patient advocates and lawyers, and the ACLU.

https://www.madinamerica.com/2021/01/madness-network-news/

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* The two cases broadly overlap but have clear differences.

A NYT article on the CA case noted:

Commonly prescribed anti-psychotic medications, including Thorazine, Haldol, Mellaril, Stelazine and Prolixin, are most commonly used to treat chronic schizophrenia. Many mental health professionals believe the drugs eliminate the need for straitjackets and other physical restraints in the hospital and help control delusions and hallucinations that prevent the patient from functioning in the community.

In recent years, these drugs have come under increasing attack from advocates of mental patients’ rights, in part because of side effects including drowsiness, restlessness, blurred vision, and an irreversible involuntary movement of facial muscles known as tardive dyskinesia.

The potential of such drugs does not erase the negative possibilities, underlining the importance of care application with due process protections for those involved.