When they approved a special law last weekend to allow Terri Schiavo's parents to bring their case into federal court, congressional Republican leaders proclaimed a major victory.
But the law has proven little help to Bob and Mary Schindler, who seek to order doctors to once again put a feeding tube in their daughter's body.
In their petitions to the federal courts, the parents have argued that a Florida state judge's decision that allowed doctors to remove the feeding tube "violates and continues to violate" Schiavo's constitutional rights.
They argue that state Circuit Judge George W. Greer, who issued the ruling, failed to give Schiavo a fair hearing. The judge became biased against their daughter, they say, failed to appoint an independent attorney for her and violated her rights to equal protection of the laws and freedom of religion.
Lawyers for Schiavo's husband counter that "reinstitution of artificial life, even on a temporary basis," would violate her right to personal liberty.
Even if the parents can persuade the Supreme Court to give them a full hearing on their claims, the Schindlers could face a major obstacle: a 1990 decision by the high court establishing that a person in a consistent vegetative state has a right to be removed from a feeding tube.
That decision, in the case of Nancy Cruzan, has received support from liberal and conservative judges. In a 1997 case, for example, Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist wrote that the Constitution protected "the traditional right to refuse unwanted lifesaving medical treatment."
But the federal district judge and the 12 appeals court judges who considered the case Tuesday and Wednesday have largely avoided soaring issues of conflicting constitutional rights.
Instead, in rejecting the parents' claims, the judges have focused on less sweeping issues. They have given the special law a narrower interpretation than the Schindlers' lawyers wanted.
The special bill that Congress passed provided that federal courts could give "relief as may be necessary to protect the rights of Theresa Marie Schiavo under the Constitution and laws of the United States relating to the withholding or withdrawal of food, fluids, or medical treatment necessary to sustain her life."
Attorneys for Schiavo's parents say the bill was supposed to sweep away all procedural barriers and give them "a full trial on the merits" of their case.
