MIAMI — Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, acting under emergency authority approved earlier in the day, ordered a feeding tube restored Tuesday to a brain-damaged woman recently taken off life support at her husband's request.
Bush's order came at the end of two days of rapid legislative and executive action in the case of Terri Schiavo, 39, who has been in a coma-like state since 1990. Critics said the law that authorized Bush's action might be unconstitutional.
"This is a response to a tragic situation," Bush said. "People are responding to cries for help, and I think it's legitimate."
In the bitterly contested right-to-die case that has drawn national attention, Schiavo's husband, Michael, got the final green light from a Florida appeals court last week to have the tube removed. Her parents had opposed him in the courts for five years, contending that their daughter could be rehabilitated.
As she lay in a Pinellas Park hospice, Terri Schiavo's feeding tube was taken out Oct. 15. Experts said she might take as long as two weeks to die of dehydration. She had been fed via a tube since 1990, when she suffered heart failure that cut off oxygen to her brain and left her in a vegetative state.
Terri Schiavo began receiving fluids at a Clearwater hospital Tuesday -- preparation for feeding through a tube to resume.
Outside the hospice north of St. Petersburg where the woman was being cared for, well-wishers cheered and hugged each other after learning of the vote by the Florida Senate.
"This is blessed," said Bob Schindler, Terri Schiavo's father.
Michael Schiavo offered no immediate comment Tuesday. His lawyer, George Felos, said Schiavo was "deeply troubled, angry and saddened that his wife's wishes have become a political ping-pong. He, as many others, is absolutely stunned at the course of events."
Felos filed a request for an injunction with two judges, but was turned down both times.
"It is simply inhumane and barbaric to interrupt her death process," Felos said. "Just because Terri Schiavo is not conscious doesn't mean she doesn't have dignity."
Florida's governor normally does not have the power to reverse a judge's ruling. But the circumstances of the Schiavo case are such -- her husband says she would rather die, but she left no living will -- that some members of the Republican-controlled Legislature wanted Bush, also a Republican, to be able to intervene.
