California Attorney General Xavier Becerra vowed to appeal the ruling, and Snyder anticipates a hard—but worthwhile—fight. She said the legalization of assisted suicide doesn’t affect just the terminally ill or those in great physical pain: “This is about how it will affect all patients, and ultimately what it does to a society when you say that it’s OK to kill yourself and we’ll help you do it.”

A California judge overturned the state’s assisted suicide law last week, saying lawmakers violated the state’s constitution when they passed the End of Life Options Act during a special legislative session in 2015 after failing to pass it during the main 2015 legislative session.

The bill, which allows doctors to prescribe lethal drugs to patients diagnosed with a terminal illness and given six months or less to live, faced strong opposition from pro-life constituents, but its backers revived it in a special session convened by Gov. Jerry Brown to address Medicare funding shortfalls created by the Affordable Care Act.

“When you’re in a regular legislative session, people can track what’s going on,” Mat Staver, chairman of legal group Liberty Counsel, told me. “It was a stealth move by the legislators to try to sneak this bill in when the focus should have been on Medicare funding.”

Not only was it stealthy, it was illegal, according to Riverside County Superior Court Judge Daniel Ottolia, who ruled that legislators violated a California statute that requires bills considered during a special legislative session to fall under the mission of the session.

“Giving terminally ill patients the right to request aid-in-dying prescription medication and decriminalizing assisted suicide for doctors prescribing such medications have nothing to do with healthcare funding for Medi-Cal patients, the developmentally disabled, or in-home supportive services,” Ottolia wrote in his ruling.

Proponents of the bill cried foul, but pro-life advocates cheered the move.

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