What Would Solomon Say About Stem Cell Research?

You know the Biblical tale of King Solomon and the baby: Two women come to the King, each claiming to be the mother of a squealing infant laid before him. Solomon looks at them and says, Okay, I'll cut the kid in two and you can each have half. The first woman says, "Fine, thanks," and the second bursts into tears and pleads with the king to give the baby to her rival. Solomon, of course, hands the baby to the second woman, knowing that she was the true birth mother. It’s a classic example of Solomon’s proverbial wisdom.

Now let’s put a modern twist on that tale. What if you brought an embryo before Solomon today and asked him to choose between two interested parties, each of whom wanted to claim the embryo for its own? In this case, the first party would be religious conservatives who say that the government should not fund stem cell research because it involves the taking of incipient human life. The second would be scientists and their backers, who see the embryo not as human life, but as the encapsulation of the staggering potential of stem cell research to cure and treat disease.

First, though, an analysis of Solomon's test: It was really all about who cared the most. By that standard, the solution seems easy. Religious conservatives only seem to care about the destruction of these embryos, not about their creation. Tens of thousands of these embryos are created every year for in vitro fertilization and thousands of them never get used. The religious conservatives don't seem to care that these embryos are consigned to eternal limbo or even discarded; they only seem to care if the embryos are used for stem cell research. You don't see too many pro-life protests outside of fertility clinics. It's like a reverse take on the old saying that right-to-lifers only care about life from the moment of conception until birth, but not after.

On the other hand, the scientists and their backers are screaming, Give me those embryos! We want, we need those embryos!

But that's not the whole story. I do believe the stem cell debate is one in which reasonable people can differ. There is a purity and simplicity to the right-to-life argument that is clear and consistent. It is not an argument to be sneered at or dismissed as old-world quackery. The scientific argument needs even less bolstering: Stem cell research has the potential to improve life for all the living by finding cures for diseases that have defeated us since the beginning of time.

Embryos as political pawns

One of the problems about the debate having become so political is that each side is using the embryos to score points. The left seems to be taking great pleasure in pointing out what they see as philosophical inconsistencies of those on the right who have taken an independent approach to the issue of stem cells. Senator Orrin Hatch, a staunch right-to-lifer, makes a distinction between an embryo in a petri dish and one inside a woman's womb. So does Connie Mack, another committed right-to lifer. They both suggest that embryos outside a woman's uterus are not potential life and can be used for research. "Ha!," those on the left seem to be responding, "if you really were a philosophical purist about the right-to-life you wouldn't be making such a compromise, you craven hypocrite, you."

But shouldn't they instead be commending Hatch and Mack for being thoughtful and broad-minded and humane, for proposing a kind of Solomonic compromise on a difficult issue? A compromise which will not please the Vatican, but one which will make sense to millions of Americans?

It's a frightfully difficult issue and it's not at all aided by researchers who are creating human embryos in the lab solely for the purpose of harvesting their stem cells. This has a Dr. Frankenstein aspect that threatens much of the hard-won good will scientists may have gleaned from supporters who remain a bit squeamish about using discarded embryos from infertility treatments.

And, yes, Bush has to reckon with the Clinton policy on this, which was already a compromise of a compromise: Use federal funding for the research, but not for the collection of the stem cells themselves. Here the Solomonic solution may actually be to cut the baby in half, and give something to each side. Even though it's not ideologically pure — and a little messy.