SEATTLE — A looming battle in Washington state over efforts to create a right-to-die law for the terminally ill is a personal one for two men leading it, both of whom are ill. Fighting for the measure is a former governor who wants the freedom to exercise such a right; fighting against it is a former press secretary who can’t imagine anyone wanting to.

Proponents are wrapping up a petition drive for Initiative 1000, a death-with-dignity measure expected to face voters on the November ballot.

The initiative would let a doctor prescribe lethal drugs to terminally ill patients who are believed to have less than six months to live. Oregon is the only state with such a law; the U.S. Supreme Court upheld it in 2006.

Fronting the cause for advocates is two-term former Washington Gov. Booth Gardner, 71. He has Parkinson’s disease and has declared this to be his “final campaign.”

“There are people like me everywhere who are coping with pain — they know that their next step is death,” Gardner said in an e-mail interview. “When death is inevitable, we shouldn’t force people to endure agonizing suffering if we don’t have to.”

Gardner would probably not be eligible to access the proposed new law, because Parkinson’s is not terminal. Still, this is a fight he identifies with strongly. Gardner has had Parkinson’s for 14 years “with steady increasing loss of basic functions.”

“We have all made tough decisions throughout our lives, and we should be trusted to make tough decisions about the end of life,” he said. “It’s about autonomy, personal choice and respect. I was in control of my life. I should be allowed to be in control of my death.”

‘Irrational and selfish act’

Chairing the coalition against the initiative is Chris Carlson, who was press secretary to former Idaho Gov. Cecil Andrus. A longtime Democratic Party activist in the Northwest, Carlson, 61, who also has Parkinson’s, calls suicide an “irrational and selfish act.”

Carlson, who was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer in 2005, fought it with experimental treatment until his cancer was deemed “dormant.”

“That points to a major flaw in this initiative. Doctors can with some authority tell someone they have six months or less to live,” Carlson said. “I was supposed to be dead two years ago, but I’m still here.”

The coalition opposing I-1000, as the initiative is called, includes the Catholic Church, conservative Christians, right-to-life groups and advocates for the disabled. The Catholic Church underwrote the opposition to a similar measure that Washington voters narrowly defeated in 1991.