PINELLAS PARK, Florida - A federal judge will allow a brain-damaged woman to die, despite intervention by Congress and President George W. Bush in a national debate over "death with dignity."
"I'm deeply disappointed by today's court decision that denies Terri Schiavo another chance to live," Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said.
"It is a sad day for all Americans who value the sanctity of life," said Frist, who led Republicans in passing a law, which Bush returned from vacation to sign, shifting Schiavo's case from Florida's state court to a federal judge.
"Im hopeful for a different result on appeal," Frist said.
Terri Schiavo, 41, has been in a "persistent vegetative state" for 15 years and has no hope of recovering, examining physicians have said. Her husband, Michael Schiavo, ordered her feeding tube removed, which would cause her death in about two weeks.
However, Schiavo's parents have for seven years fought the husband's wishes, and insist she can recover.
They released a video of their daughter's open eyes and grimaces as evidence that she is alive. The video has played repeatedly on national television.
The parents, Bob and Mary Schindler, have filed an appeal to Tuesday's federal court decision in Tampa, Florida allowing the woman's feeding tube to remain disconnected, as it has been since Friday.
Federal district court judge James Whittemore ruled earlier that Florida courts had not violated Terri Schiavo's rights by ordering her feeding tube to be disconnected.
"Theresa Schiavo's life and liberty interests were adequately protected by the extensive process provided in the state's courts," he ruled.
The case ended up in Whittemore's courtroom on Monday, after the US House of Representatives met in an extraordinary session to pass the law changing jurisdiction to the federal court, and Bush signed it into law shortly after midnight.
Schiavo has been kept alive since a 1990 heart failure damaged her brain. Doctors have said in a long series of court battles that Schiavo is unable to speak or help herself.
Michael Schiavo says his wife told him prior to her disability that she would never want to be kept alive artificially.
Schiavo's parents will now likely take their case to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta, Georgia, lawyers said. Terri Schiavo's brother, Bobby Schindler, told WFLA radio of his family: "They'll have to keep on trying to see what happens."
If her parents win the case, Schiavo will be rushed from her hospice home to a hospital for rehydration and surgery to reconnect the tube.
The attorney for Michael Schiavo argued that reinserting the device would go against Terri Schiavo's wishes to end her life instead of being kept alive artificially.
Schiavo has surged to the forefront of the US political scene in recent days.
US officials brushed aside concerns of overstepping their constitutional limits and government intrusion into family affairs with the passage of the bill.
"The legal issues, I grant everyone, are complicated, but the moral ones are not," said Tom DeLay, leader of the Republican majority in the House of Representatives.
"In cases like this one, where there are serious questions and substantial doubts, our society, our laws and our courts should have a presumption in favor of life," Bush said in a statement.
Father John Paris, a Roman Catholic priest and professor of bioethics at Boston University in Massachusetts, accused Republicans of "pandering to the religious right, and it is pandering at its worse."
03/22/2005 16:48 GMT