Government involvement in the Terri Schiavo case

The legislative, executive, and judicial branches, of both the United States federal government and the State of Florida, were involved in the case of Terri Schiavo. In November 1998 Michael Schiavo, husband of Terri Schiavo, first sought permission to remove his wife's feeding tube. Schiavo had suffered brain damage in February 1990, and in February 2000 had been ruled by a Florida circuit court to be in a persistent vegetative state. Her feeding tube was removed first on April 26, 2001, but was reinserted two days later on an appeal by her parents, Bob and Mary Schindler.

The Florida statute requiring reinsertion of Schiavo's feeding tube, known as "Terri's Law," was later struck down by the Florida Supreme Court as an unconstitutional interference in the judicial system. Twenty years later, retrospective analyses have focused less on the legal outcome and more on the case's lasting political legacy, including its role in galvanizing a more assertive pro-life movement in the decades that followed.