Cloning: Where Do You Draw The Line?

Members of Congress said they felt "humbled" last week as they rose to debate the Human Cloning Prohibition Act, and that was an entirely appropriate response to their assignment. The goal was simple: stop anyone from trying to clone a human, a prospect that strikes just about everyone as medically dangerous and morally repugnant. The problem was how to do it in a way that did not also outlaw all kinds of other promising research that relies on some of the same techniques. The stakes could not be much higher--Will we or will we not allow the custom-creation of children?--and the outcome was never much in doubt. But as a preview of battles to come, the debate signaled just how hard it is to write laws about issues so complex, values so transcendent and interests so competing; and it revealed what kinds of moral trades politicians were willing to make when it comes to science that both holds such promise and raises such concern.

The cloning vote landed right in the middle of the Summer of Science, in which politicians, reporters and a President have all gone back to school for a refresher course in cellular biology. This was political science at its most scientific--and its most political. It is no accident that the vote came just as George W. Bush is poised to announce his decision on whether to allow federal funding of embryonic-stem-cell research. A majority of Americans and members of Congress favor such research, which holds great promise in curing such diseases as Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and diabetes. Whatever Bush decides, in the end it will probably be left to Congress to craft a compromise over all kinds of research involving human embryos. Last week's vote was a test of conscience for the moderates who represent the swing vote on these issues, a chance to show where they are willing to draw some lines, raise some guard rails.

Both bills before the House promised to outlaw "reproductive cloning," i.e., cloning to create a baby. But lawmakers had to decide what price they would pay to make sure that ban really stuck. The hard-line choice was Florida Republican Dave Weldon's bill, which would bar the creation of cloned human embryos for any purpose and punish violators with 10 years in jail and a $1 million fine. The alternative amendment, introduced by Republican Jim Greenwood of Pennsylvania, would also bar reproductive cloning but would allow "therapeutic cloning," in which scientists create embryos in order to harvest the precious stem cells that can be derived from them. Shut that research down, argue the scientists, and the most promising frontier in medicine is suddenly off limits. Let it proceed, say opponents, and you have crossed a line toward the manufacture of humans as tools, and there is no going back.