Congressional Record, Volume 147 Issue 109 (Tuesday, July 31, 2001)

[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 109 (Tuesday, July 31, 2001)]
[House]
[Pages H4906-H4916]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 2505, HUMAN CLONING PROHIBITION ACT
OF 2001

Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I
call up House Resolution 214 and ask for its immediate consideration.
The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:

H. Res. 214

Resolved, That upon the adoption of this resolution it
shall be in order without intervention of any point of order
to consider in the House the bill (H.R. 2505) to amend title
18, United States Code, to prohibit human cloning. The bill
shall be considered as read for amendment. The amendments
recommended by the Committee on the Judiciary now printed in
the bill shall be considered as adopted. The previous
question shall be considered as ordered on the bill, as
amended, and on any further amendment thereto to final
passage without intervening motion except: (1) one hour of
debate on the bill, as amended, equally divided and
controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the
Committee on the Judiciary; (2) the further amendment printed
in the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying this
resolution, if offered by Representative Scott of Virginia or
his designee, which shall be separately debatable for 10
minutes equally divided and controlled by the proponent and
an opponent; (3) after disposition of the amendment by
Representative Scott, the further amendment in the nature of
a substitute printed in the report of the Committee on Rules,
if offered by Representative Greenwood of Pennsylvania or his
designee, shall be in order without intervention of any point
of order, shall be considered as read, and shall be
separately debatable for one hour equally divided and
controlled by the proponent and an opponent; and (4) one
motion to recommit with or without instructions.

The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Simpson). The gentlewoman from North
Carolina (Mrs. Myrick) is recognized for 1 hour.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the
customary 30 minutes to the gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Slaughter),
pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During
consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose
of debate only.
Mr. Speaker, yesterday the Committee on Rules met and granted a
structured rule for H.R. 2505, the Human Cloning Prohibition Act. The
rule provides for 1 hour of debate in the House equally divided and
controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee
on the Judiciary. The rule waives all points of order against the bill.
The rule provides that the amendments recommended by the Committee on
the Judiciary now printed in the bill shall be considered as adopted.
The rule makes in order the amendment printed in the Rules Committee
report accompanying the rule if offered by the gentleman from Virginia
(Mr. Scott) or a designee which shall be separately debatable for 10
minutes equally divided and controlled by the proponent and an
opponent. The rule makes in order after disposition of the Scott
amendment the further amendment in the nature of a substitute printed
in the Rules Committee report accompanying the rule if offered by the
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Greenwood) or a designee, which shall
be considered as read and shall be separately debatable for 1 hour
equally divided and controlled by the proponent and an opponent. The
rule waives all points of order against the amendment in the nature of
a substitute printed in the report. Finally, the rule provides for one
motion to recommit, with or without instructions.
Mr. Speaker, this is a fair rule which will permit a thorough
discussion of all the relevant issues. In fact, Members came before the
Committee on Rules yesterday and testified on two amendments. This rule
allows for both of those amendments to be heard. The first of these
amendments is the Greenwood substitute which allows human cloning for
medical purposes. I oppose the Greenwood amendment because it is wrong
to create human embryo farms, even for scientific research. The
Committee on Rules, though, recognizes that the gentleman from
Pennsylvania's proposal is the leading alternative to a ban on human
cloning. Because we are aiming for a fair and thorough debate, we
should make it in order on the House floor.
The second amendment is a proposal by the gentleman from Virginia
(Mr. Scott) to fund a study on human cloning. Again because the
Committee on Rules recognizes the importance of this issue and wants a
fair and open debate, we have decided that the gentleman from
Virginia's study deserves House consideration.
Mr. Speaker, as the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Hastings) said in our
Rules Committee meeting yesterday, this is an extremely important and a
very complex issue.

{time} 1315

Science is on the verge of cloning human embryos for both medical and
reproductive purposes. Congress cannot face a weightier issue than the
ethics of human cloning, and Congress should not run away from this
problem. It is our job to address such pressing moral dilemmas, and it
is our job to do so in a deliberative way. We do so today.
This bill and this rule represent the best of Congress. The Committee
on the Judiciary held days of hearings on the Human Cloning Prohibition
Act, with the Nation's leading scientists and ethicists. Today, this
rule allows for floor consideration of the two most important
challenges to the human cloning bill of the gentleman from Florida (Mr.
Weldon.) If we wait to act, human cloning will go forward unregulated,
with frightening and ghoulish consequences.
I have spent a lot of time considering this issue, because it is so
complex; and I have decided to vote to ban human cloning. It is simply
wrong to clone human beings. It is wrong to create fully grown tailor-
made cloned babies, and it is wrong to clone human embryos to
experiment on and destroy them. Anything other than a ban on human
cloning would license the most ghoulish and dangerous enterprise in
human history.
Some of us can still remember how the world was repulsed during and
after World War II by the experiments conducted by the Nazis in the
war. How is this different?
I urge my colleagues to support this rule, and I urge my colleagues
to support the underlying measure.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.

[[Page H4907]]

(Ms. Slaughter asked and was given permission to revise and extend
her remarks.)
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from North
Carolina for yielding me the customary 30 minutes.
Mr. Speaker, I will be blunt: This is a bad bill and a bad rule. This
is Congress again playing scientist, and I urge defeat of the rule and
defeat of the underlying bill in its current form.
In its efforts to address the issue of human cloning, my colleague,
the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon) has managed to duplicate the
controversy arising from the administration's debate over whether to
ban federally funded stem cell research.
Mr. Speaker, there is a strong consensus in Congress that the cloning
of human beings should be prohibited. For many people, the prospect of
human cloning raises a specter of eugenics and genetic manipulation of
traits like eye color or intelligence, and none of us want to see these
types of abuses. Yet H.R. 2505 and its excessive fear of science and
the possibilities of scientific research attempts to deprive the
American people of their hope for cures and their faith in the power of
human discovery.
The Human Cloning Prohibition Act goes far beyond a ban on cloning of
an individual known as reproductive cloning. This legislation actually
also bans stem cell research and, finally, would prohibit the
importation of products that are developed through this kind of
research.
As a former scientist, I am profoundly concerned about the impact
this proposal would have on our Nation's biotechnical industry. If we
ban stem cell research, we risk ceding the field of medical research to
other nations. Top scientists in the field are already leaving the
United States due to the mere threat that this type of research may be
banned.
If H.R. 2505 is passed, we must accept the fact that preeminent
scientists, and, indeed, entire research facilities will move overseas,
in order to pursue their studies. If we stifle our Nation's research
efforts, patients will suffer as well.
This research holds the potential to treat diseases that afflict
millions of Americans, including diabetes, cancer, heart disease,
stroke, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, brain or spinal cord injury or
multiple sclerosis. If scientists overseas were to develop a cure for
cancer using stem cells from a cloned embryo, Americans would be banned
from taking advantage of that cure here in the United States because we
could not import it. Surely we should not deny our constituents access
to life-saving cures.
Moreover, we should be prepared for the evolution of two classes of
patients, those with the resources to travel abroad to receive the cure
and those who are too poor and must therefore stay in the United States
to grow sicker and die.
Fortunately, we have before us a balanced responsible alternative,
the substitute offered by our colleagues, the gentleman from
Pennsylvania (Mr. Greenwood) and the gentleman from Florida (Mr.
Deutsch).
The House of Representatives stands today at a crossroads in our
support for scientific endeavors.
Mr. Speaker, we really should not be debating this at all. None of us
is equipped to do so. We simply do not know enough, and for this House
to take the step that we are about to take today is unconscionable.
We must not allow our fears about research to overwhelm our hopes for
curing disease. We must not isolate this Nation from the rest of the
scientific world by banning therapeutic cloning.
Make no mistake, we are sailing into unchartered waters. Our decision
here today could have consequences for generations to come.
Under this inadequate rule, the majority is giving us a meager 2
hours to hold this momentous debate. So I urge my colleagues to vote no
on the rule and no on H.R. 2505.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield 7 minutes to the gentleman from
Florida (Mr. Weldon), the sponsor of this bill.
Mr. WELDON of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for
yielding me time. I rise obviously to speak in support of this rule and
in support of my underlying bill and in opposition to the substitute.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin by just talking a little bit about
the basic science of all of this. What is shown on this poster to my
left is a normal fertilization of an egg. Normal human cells have 46
chromosomes; the egg has 23, the sperm has 23. When united, they become
a fertilized egg, which then begins to differentiate into an embryo.
Here is depicted a 3-day embryo and then a 7-day embryo.
Under the technique called somatic cell nuclear transfer, you take a
cell from somebody's body. This could be a skin cell, depicted here.
You extract the nucleus out, which is shown here. Then you take a
female egg, a woman's egg. You remove the nucleus that was in there,
which is shown here being discarded with the 23 chromosomes, so you
have an enucleated egg. Then you implant that nucleus in there. This
becomes a clone of the individual who donated this cell. From this
point on, it begins to develop like a normal embryo.
Now, there will be some discussion today, I anticipate, where people
will try to assert that this is not a human embryo; that this somehow
is, and this is somehow not a human embryo.
I studied embryology in medical school. I am a physician. I practiced
medicine for 15 years. Indeed, I brought my medical school embryology
textbook, and I would defy anybody in this body to tell me what the
science behind making the assertion that this is not a human embryo.
There is absolutely no basis in science to make such a claim.
This technique, which we are banning in humans, is how Dolly was
created. They took a cell from the udder of a sheep; then they took a
sheep's egg, removed the nucleus, took the nucleus out of this cell and
put it in that egg depicted right there. Then it was put in tissue
culture, where it became a more developed embryo, and then it was
implanted in another sheep to create Dolly.
Now, to assert that a human embryo created by the somatic cell
nuclear transfer technique is not a human embryo is like saying this
was not a sheep embryo. Well, what is this? This is Dolly. To say that
a human embryo created by nuclear transfer technology is not a human
embryo to me is the equivalent of saying this is not a sheep.
Now, I have, I think, some pretty good quotes to support my position.
This is from the Bioethics Advisory Commission. The Commission began
its discussion fully recognizing that any efforts in humans to transfer
somatic cell nucleus into an enucleated egg involves the creation of an
embryo. So they support my argument. They have to, it is science, with
the apparent potential to be implanted in a uterus and developed to
term.
I have another quote from one of the Commissioners, Alex Capron.
``Our cloning report, when read in light of subsequent developments in
that field and of the stem cell report, supports completely halting
attempts to create human embryos through SCNT,'' or somatic cell
nuclear transfer, ``at this time.''
Now, I just want to point out, this is not a stem cell debate. There
will be people who will try to make this a stem cell argument. My
legislation does not make it illegal to do embryonic stem cell
research.
I would also like to point out this is not an abortion debate. Judy
Norsigian is shown here quoted, she is pro-choice, she is the co-author
of ``Our Bodies, Ourselves for the New Century'' with the Boston
Women's Health Collective. ``There are other pro-choice groups that
have supported my position that we do not want to go to this place,
because embryo cloning will compromise women's health, turn their eggs
and wombs into commodities, compromise their reproductive autonomy,
with virtual certainty lead to the production of experimental human
beings. We are convinced that the line must be drawn here.''
Finally, I have a quote from the National Institutes of Health
guidelines for research using human pluripotent stem cells. They deny
Federal funding for research utilizing pluripotent stem cells that were
derived from human embryos created for research purposes, research in
which human pluripotent stem cells are derived using somatic cell
nuclear transfer, the transfer of a

[[Page H4908]]

human somatic cell into the human egg.
Now, there are some people who have been approaching me saying why
are we having this debate now? Well, there is a company in this country
that has already harvested eggs from women. They want to start creating
clones. So the issue is here now. If we are going to put a stop to
this, the House, I think, needs to speak and the other body needs to
take this issue up as well.
Additionally, this is a women's health issue. There was one article
published, I believe in the New England Journal. The way they harvest
these eggs is they give women a drug called Pergonal that causes super-
ovulation. Then they have to anesthetize them to harvest the eggs. They
typically use coeds. It is a class issue, who is going to volunteer for
this procedure? Poor women?
Let me tell Members what: The study showed that women who were
exposed to this drug have a slightly higher incidence of ovarian
cancer. So this is not a trivial issue, in my opinion. It is a women's
health issue. I believe the rule that has been crafted is a very fair
rule. It will provide for plenty of debate.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 8\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman
from Florida (Mr. Deutsch).
Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, there are two bills before us today,
effectively, the Weldon bill and then the Greenwood bill, that I am an
original sponsor with.
Let us be very, very clear to each other and to the American people.
Both of those bills absolutely totally ban human cloning. I am going to
say that again so there is no debate on that. They absolutely, totally
ban human cloning. There is unanimity, I think, in this Congress, in
the American public, about that. There are some extreme, extreme groups
that are distinct minorities, but I do not believe there will be one
Member who will stand up here and say we should do it.
We should not do it, for both ethical and practical reasons. Before
Dolly the Sheep was created, and I am not going to talk about all the
ethical reasons. I will talk for a second about the practical reasons.
And there are very serious ethical reasons against it. But before Dolly
the Sheep was created, 270 sheep died; and Dolly is severely
handicapped. I do not think any of us can even contemplate that in
terms of the human condition.
Let us talk about what this debate is really about. It is not about
human cloning. We are all against human cloning. What it is about is
the Weldon bill further bans somatic cell nuclear transfer. I am going
to say that term again, because that is a term that all the Members who
are going to vote in this Chamber and, in fact, in a sense all of the
American people at some point are going to have to understand that
term.
I think all of my colleagues now understand the term embryonic stem
cells, and I think the vast majority of Americans understand the term
embryonic stem cells. In fact the majority of Members, in fact, the
debate about stem cell research is over. A majority of this Congress, a
majority of the other body, both support embryonic stem cell research,
and a vast majority of the American people across polling data, 75, 80
percent consistently of the American people, support embryonic stem
cell research.
They do it and that breaks up into every sub-group of our population.
In terms of Catholics, the number is about 75-80 percent. People who
identify themselves as Evangelical Christians, 75-80 percent support
embryonic stem cell research.

{time} 1330

But what this Weldon bill tries to ban is somatic cell nuclear
transfer.
Now, I really hate doing this to my colleagues and this is really one
of the reasons why we ought to defeat this rule today, but I have to do
a little bit of layman's science. This is a chart, and I will make it
available for Members, that actually shows what somatic cell nuclear
transfer does.
Most of us understand that by any definition, an embryo is created
when an egg and a sperm join with the potentiality of a unique human
being. That is not what this procedure is about. I am going to say
these things again, because for most of my colleagues they have not
heard this before, and this is somewhat of a science lesson.
A normal embryo, what we think of as an embryo, is created by an egg
and a sperm joining with the potentiality of a unique human being.
Mr. Speaker, that is not what this bill attempts to ban. What it bans
is somatic cell nuclear transfer. Again, as the chart shows, one takes
an egg, an unfertilized egg, an egg, and one then takes out the
chromosomes from that egg and then, literally, in the trillions of
cells in a body and, in other species, they take it out. Obviously, in
the human species, it is the female, of the literally trillions of
cells that exist in the human body, they take out one of those cells
and take out the 46 chromosomes out of one of those cells and then put
it into an egg.
At that point, why are they doing that? Let us talk about that a
little bit. This is part and parcel, this debate really is totally
intertwined.
The gentleman from Florida (Mr. Deutsch) said this is not about stem
cell research. It is about stem cell research because, let us talk
about what is going on.
Stem cell research, one of the reasons why the American people have
effectively said they want embryonic stem cell research is because they
understand the debate. They understand the debate at several levels.
At the first level they understand that in in vitro fertilization
embryos are created that literally get thrown away. We have a choice.
We can use those for research that literally has the ability to cure
the most horrific diseases humankind has ever seen, whether that is
paralysis, whether that is Alzheimer's, or any number of diseases.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. DEUTSCH. I yield to the gentlewoman from New York.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I would ask the gentleman, does it
trouble him that with all of the difficulty he is having trying to
explain what this is about, that our colleagues are going to be coming
down here pretty soon and voting on it, and it will affect everybody in
the United States.
Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, I agree with the gentlewoman 100 percent,
which is one of the reasons to defeat this rule. In my 9 years in this
Chamber, this is the least informed collectively that the 435 Members
of this body have ever been on any issue, and in many ways, it is as
important as any issue we face.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, it is frightening.
Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, why is this about stem
cell research? As I said, what the American people have said, and I was
talking about in vitro fertilization, that we have the ability to take
these embryos and do research on them to literally cure disease, and
the research is there. This past week, stem cells were inserted into a
primate's spine and a primate that previously had been unable to move
was able to move.
Just today, in today's Wall Street Journal, there is a report on
research of stem cells actually being able to create insulin cells. It
is in today's Wall Street Journal. This stuff is happening. Diseases
that had existed in the past, polio, other diseases have been cured. We
are getting there. We literally can. If we talk to the patients'
groups, if we listen to what Nancy Reagan is saying, if we listen to
the families, there are literally tens of millions.
I will move this next chart over here just to show my colleagues.
This is the number of people in America that we are talking about. We
are not talking about millions, we are talking about tens of millions
of people who are personally affected by these diseases, and if we put
their families in, we are talking about literally maybe 100 million
people in this country who are affected by these diseases.
Now again, let us talk specifically about: how does this intertwine
with stem cell research? It is very similar to the issue of organ
transplants. If we put an organ into someone's body, it will be
rejected. There are antirejection drugs which scientifically do not
apply to stem cells.
The best way to be able to actually maybe get a therapeutic use out
of this research, actually cure cancer, cure Parkinson's, cure
Alzheimer's, cure juvenile diabetes, the actual way to do that is to
develop research to develop a

[[Page H4909]]

therapy to actually put the stem cells into the body, and that is
exactly what is being done here. Cells from a person's body are being
used, through somatic cell nuclear transfer, to be able to create the
potentiality of curing these horrific diseases.
Calling that an embryo does not make it an embryo. It is not an
embryo. It is not creating life by any definition of creating life. It
is the potentiality to continue life.
I would say it in several ways. If someone, by reason of their
theology, their personal belief system, does not allow them to do that,
then I say let them choose not to do that. But for the tens of millions
of patients, 100 million family members, do not stop them from doing
it, number one. This bill goes to an extreme and even says that we
cannot import drugs for use in this country. I am sure there is not a
Member in this chamber who could look a family member in the eye of one
of those tens of millions of Americans when that drug is created in
England or France or Ireland or wherever and say, you cannot have that
drug. I know there is not a Member that could do it, and we should not
do it today.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from
Florida (Mr. Weldon).
Mr. WELDON of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for
yielding time. We are going to have a lot of debate and I assume some
of the arguments that the gentleman has put forward will be debated
further in the course of the afternoon. I will just point out one or
two quick things.
The procedure that they would like to make legal is illegal in
several European countries. There is really only one that currently
allows it, and they have come under a lot of criticism. I think by
passing my bill, we actually bring the United States into conformity
with a lot of thinking that is going on in the world.
The gentleman from Florida (Mr. Deutsch) mentioned a ``study'' where
paralysis had been reversed. I do not know where he got that reference
from. There was a story in the press of a rat that had paralysis and a
lot of the press reported it as embryonic stem cells. It was not
embryonic stem cells, it was fetal stem cells. It was not even a study,
it was a scientist who took some video footage. It was not peer
reviewed. Nevertheless, it was reported in the press as a ``study.''
This is not about embryonic stem cell research, it is about whether
or not we are going to carry this whole issue one step further, no
longer using the excess embryos in the clinics, but now creating
embryos for research purposes.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentlewoman from
Colorado (Ms. DeGette).
Ms. DeGETTE. Mr. Speaker, today, the House is faced with one of the
most complex and potentially far-reaching medical and ethical issues it
will ever face. As a body, we should have time to examine the
ramifications of the many issues involved in cloning, time for
deliberative judgment, time for exploring alternatives and crafting
enforceable legislation. But today, we are not being given that time,
and that is why we must reject this rule.
We are being given less than 3 hours today when most Members have not
had the time to understand and explore the potent ramifications of this
issue to decide an issue which will not only impact tens of millions of
Americans today, but will also impact future generations.
Cloning is one of the most important and far-reaching issues we will
examine in our public service. Its impact may be incalculable. Cloning
will alter our world. It is true that powerful, potent and perhaps
dangerous research efforts currently proceed unchecked. Technological
knowledge grows exponentially with new and important results announced
daily. The rush of data creates a surging, uncontrolled current that
finds its own course.
We must not legislate long after the damage has been done, and that
is why we need to try to find a way to have foresight and vision,
providing leadership for others around the world. We must find a way to
ban human cloning, while allowing research to continue.
Therefore, I support the revised Greenwood-Deutsch substitute which
bans reproductive cloning, but allows strictly regulated, privately
funded therapeutic cloning. Reproductive cloning practices which must
be banned are an attempt to create a new human being and, as we heard
in hearings throughout the spring, there are fringe groups who would
like to clone humans. This is wrong, and it must be stopped.
Conversely, somatic cell nuclear transfer, or so-called ``therapeutic
cloning,'' is the way to take stem cell research and all of its promise
from the lab to the patient who has diabetes, Parkinson's Disease,
Alzheimer's, spinal cord injury, and other health problems. Stem cell
research helps us take a stem cell, a cell that is a building block to
be made into any other cell, and turn that cell into a variety of
different tissues for the body.
But medical experts tell us that that stem cell, because the DNA
differs from the DNA of the individual that the new tissue is to be
donated to, will often be rejected, because the genetic makeup of that
tissue is different. Somatic cell nuclear transfer gets around that
problem of rejection, because the stem cells that create the organ or
tissue are from the patient. As a result, the patient's body will not
recognize the organ or tissue as a foreign object.
Let me give my colleagues an example. A diabetic, if we take a cell
and we make a stem cell and then we make an Islet cell that produces
insulin from that stem cell, the person's body will still reject that
Islet cell without immunosuppressive drugs because the DNA is
different. But with somatic stem cell transfer, if we take an egg, an
unfertilized human egg, we remove the 23 chromosomes and we take the
diabetic patient and replace the 23 chromosomes with 46 of that own
patient's chromosomes, we can make Islet cells that that person's body
will not reject.
The other thing, the very dangerous thing the Weldon bill does is, if
there are nonhuman cloning techniques which are used for therapies
abroad, we can never import those therapies, to have to say to someone
who needs a skin graft that a therapy developed overseas cannot be used
to replace one's own healthy skin.
The ancient Greeks developed mythological answers for questions they
did not understand. Their mythology brought order into chaos. We do not
have that luxury in our society. We cannot stand back, shrug our
shoulders and say, it is the will of the gods. Cloning is man's
discovery and man has to take control over cloning and all of its
consequences, good and bad.
Mr. Speaker, I urge rejection of this rule, and I also urge adoption
of the Greenwood-Deutsch substitute. Let us have a debate. Let us have
a full discussion, and let us figure this out in a way all of us can be
proud of in a reasonable, not a political way.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from
Pennsylvania (Mr. Greenwood)
Mr. GREENWOOD. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding
time. I also want to thank my opponent in this debate, the gentleman
from Florida (Mr. Weldon), for letting me use one of his charts to
which I will refer in a moment.
This rule makes in order the Greenwood-Deutsch substitute. The
Greenwood-Deutsch substitute, just like the base bill, makes it illegal
to create a human being through cloning. We all, the gentleman from
Florida (Mr. Weldon) and I, and all of the speakers we will hear from
today, all believe that it is not safe and it is not ethical to create
a new human being through cloning. We need to ban that.
What we do not want to ban is, as has been said, the somatic cell
nuclear transfer research, because that, my colleagues, that is what
gives us the most promising opportunity to cure the diseases that have
plagued humanity for centuries.

{time} 1345

Every one of us has had the experience that I have had in my office
over and over again: a mother and father bring in their little diabetic
child, sometimes with a big bottle of needles showing how many times
they must inject themselves while they buy time to see if diabetes will
eventually kill them.
Every one of us has had the experience that I have had where a
beautiful young mother comes into the office, she cannot raise her arms
for Lou Gehrig's disease, and is trying to raise

[[Page H4910]]

a child and trying to race death that is certain to come from Lou
Gehrig's disease.
We have all had people in our office trembling from Parkinson's. We
have all had people in our office tell us the tragic stories of their
parents with Alzheimer's. We have all had people come to visit us in
wheelchairs, quadriplegics, paraplegics, with life-ending, life-
destroying spinal injuries. We work on people who have suffered from
head injuries, never to regain their normal function, and people in
coma.
We have all heard these stories. What do we do? We do the best thing
we can think of. We say, let us double the funding for the National
Institutes of Health. Let us spend billions of dollars to save these
people, to save future generations from the scourge of premature death,
disability, torturous pain.
What is the research that we think is going to be done to find these
miracle cures? Mr. Speaker, it is somatic cell nuclear transfer.
Let us look at this diagram. What the gentleman from Florida (Mr.
Weldon) did not say in his explanation of the diagram is that when we
take the skin cell, the somatic cell, and put it in the nucleus of the
denucleated or enucleated cell and allow it to divide for 5 to 7 days,
when we get to this point, when we get to the point where we have that
cell division, we stop the process of cell division and extract from
that blastocyst pluripotent stem cells.
When we have those stem cells, the scientists do research where they
look at the proteins and the growth factors at work; and they say, what
made that skin cell from someone's cheek become a stem cell, a magical
stem cell that can become anything? And then, what miraculous proteins
and processes can convert that pluripotent stem cell into a specialized
spine cell or brain cell or liver cell?
When they unlock that secret through this research, what they will be
able to do to our constituents is that little child with diabetes will
be able to have some of its skin cells taken, turned in with these
proteins, no more eggs, no more embryonic work at all, take her somatic
cell, convert it into a stem cell, and convert it into the islets for
her liver, convert it into the cells that will cure and repair her
spine, convert it into the cells that wake a comatose patient back into
consciousness. That is what this research holds for us.
Now, why would we kill this research? Why would we condemn for the
world and for future generations not to have the benefit of this
miracle? We would do it because some will say, but wait a minute, once
we put the cheek cell of the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr.
Greenwood) into this empty cell and it divides, we have a soul. That is
the metaphysical question here, do we have a soul there?
Mr. Speaker, I would be mightily surprised if we took my cheek cell
and put it in a petri dish and it divided, that God would choose that
moment to put a soul on it, and say, Mr. Greenwood's cheek cell is
dividing; quick, give it a soul. It has to have a soul. Then we can
hold hands and circle it and say, It must now become a human being. Mr.
Greenwood's cheek cell is dividing. It has a soul. It has to live.
That is ridiculous. It is ridiculous. It does not say that in the New
Testament. What the New Testament says is love; and with this therapy,
we make the love a reality.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentlewoman from
California (Ms. Lofgren).
(Ms. LOFGREN asked and was given permission to revise and extend her
remarks.)
Ms. LOFGREN. Mr. Speaker, it is worth reading the bill that is before
us today. If we do read the bill, as I have and the other members of
the Committee on the Judiciary, we will see that the bill outlaws
somatic cell nuclear transfer. It makes it a felony with a 10-year
sentence.
If we read further in the bill, there is a ban and also a felony
remedy for those who ship or receive any products that are derived from
somatic cell nuclear transfer.
Now, what does this mean? This means that scientists in labs around
the country who are doing research and who may have cultures of cells
that are products of somatic cell nuclear transfer will soon become
felons in their labs if they ship or send these cells to colleagues in
the scientific world.
Further, under the bill, it is illegal, it is a crime, to accept a
cure that is developed outside the United States if a cure for a
disease is the product of somatic cell nuclear transfer.
Now, that is a very realistic possibility. Just last month, this
month, the head of stem cell research at the University of California
in San Francisco announced that he was leaving the United States
because he could not do his research in the United States. He is moving
to England. When he joins other scientists in England, there is quite a
good chance that they will come up with cures for horrible diseases
that are suffered throughout the world, including America.
If we pass this bill, we are saying Americans are not allowed to get
those cures. That, too, would become a crime.
The National Institutes of Health mentioned in their recent report
that the human ES-derived cells could be advantageous for
transplantation purposes if they did not trigger an immune rejection.
They also point out in the next paragraph that ``potential
immunological rejection of human ES-derived cells might be avoided for
by using nuclear transfer technology to generate these cells.''
I urge my colleagues to vote against this rule. It is preposterous
that we are allowing ourselves 2 hours of debate to decide whether we
should call to a screeching halt research that has the promise of
curing cancer, of allowing those who have suffered spinal cord injuries
to recover, allowing Alzheimer's victims to recover, allowing
Parkinson's victims to recover.
We should reject this bill. We all agree that cloning of human beings
is something we ought to outlaw. Let us not outlaw research along with
that.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman
from Louisiana (Mr. Tauzin), the chairman of the Committee on Energy
and Commerce.
(Mr. TAUZIN asked and was given permission to revise and extend his
remarks.)
Mr. TAUZIN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding time to
me.
Mr. Speaker, let me first say that I think we are all in agreement
that cloning to reproduce human beings ought to be illegal, and the FDA
does not have authority in my view to make it legal today. All they
have is authority to say it is a safe process or not, and that is the
last authority they have on the subject. We need to make cloning of
human beings illegal.
The tougher question is one the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr.
Greenwood) poses: Should we have therapeutic cloning for research
purposes to get stem cells?
If that were the only place to get stem cells, if that were the only
way in which to learn these incredible cures and these incredible
possibilities for replacing human organs and curing diabetes, that
would be a pretty tough debate for us today. But we are not in that
position.
I commend Members to an article in Discover Magazine that has just
come out this month about four remarkable brothers, the Vacanti
brothers. In the article, they talk about amazing breakthroughs not in
stem cell research but in research that has discovered some 3-micron,
very small, cells in every mammalian species, including human beings.
They have experimented with these cells. They have tried to freeze
them; they have tried to cook them. They have frozen them at minus 21
degrees. They have left them at 187 degrees for 30 minutes. They have
starved them of oxygen. They have lived and replicated. They have used
them now in experiments going as far as rebuilding the spinal cords of
lab rats, and in months these lab rats are walking again.
This is without stem cell research. This is without embryonic stem
cell research. This is without therapeutic cloning.
What this article says is there are amazing breakthroughs in the
tissues, the cells of our human bodies, without us going as far as some
would have us go in playing with the recreation of human life just to
take cells for research purposes. We do not have to go

[[Page H4911]]

that far. The Weldon bill will say, stop this cloning business, just
stop it, and use these remarkable breakthroughs, instead.
In fact, let me tell the Members what they did in one case, quickly.
They used these cells taken from a pancreas that was diabetic, and then
they grew insulin-producing islets inside that pancreas using these
cells, not stem cells, but these cells that exist already in the body.
Mr. Speaker, there are ways for us to get these answers without
messing with cloning. These cells are human beings. We ought to pass
this bill today.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from
Massachusetts (Mr. Capuano).
Mr. CAPUANO. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding time
to me.
Mr. Speaker, I just want to read a list of people who are interested
in this bill, more for the people who may be watching this than for the
people in this room. Most of us know who is on which side.
The Juvenile Diabetes Foundation, the American Association of Medical
Colleges, the Alliance for Aging Research, the American College of
Obstetricians and Gynecologists, the American Academy of Optometry, the
American Association of Cancer Research, the American Association of
Anatomists, and on and on and on.
Most of these organizations, all of these organizations, are
populated by people who, for the most part, are much more knowledgeable
about the details than any of us.
I know there are many people on this floor today who know more about
this issue on specifics than I do, and I respect that; but it is really
not about the details, it is really about the future. That is what it
is all about.
I cannot, and most of us are totally incapable of knowing everything
we want to know about science, especially in the short period of time
we have to learn it. But when I see a list of people like this, all of
whom want to continue research unfettered by government, many of whom
are not engaged in stem cell research; they may be at some future
point, but many of them are not. Most genetic research right now is not
related to stem cell research, not yet. It may never be. Stem cells is
just another potential. That is all it is at the moment.
For us to sit here today and tell the scientists of America, and
particularly the scientists of the world, because it will not stop, it
will simply move offshore, that this Congress, most of whom are
generalists on different areas or specialists in other areas, that this
Congress is going to tell them stop, really puts us in the exact same
position as legislators and clergy in the Middle Ages when they said,
Do not do autopsies. It is immoral; it is unethical. We do not like it.
Do not cut those bodies open. Yet men and women did it, to our great
benefit today.
It is an old story; it is not a new story. It is not just isolated;
it has happened throughout the ages. Not very long ago, in my lifetime,
we had people in this country who said, The polio vaccine might cause
trouble because it is really dead polio stuff. Yet in my family we lost
a young girl to polio, and we saved my brother based on research that
some people in those days condemned.
X-rays, we take them as common today. There were many people when x-
rays were first in invented who said, Oh, my God, we cannot do that. It
was not meant for man to see through someone's body. We do it today
with impunity. These same issues are arising again today. We should not
substitute our general opinion that we are not even sure about for the
future of science and for the health of our children and grandchildren.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
Iowa (Mr. Ganske).
Mr. GANSKE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding time to
me.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to enter into a colloquy with my colleague,
the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon).
I would ask the gentleman to correct me if I am wrong, but it seems
to me the gentleman's bill makes illegal the creation of a blastocyst
for either reproductive or therapeutic cloning. Is that correct?
Mr. WELDON of Florida. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. GANSKE. I yield to the gentleman from Florida.
Mr. WELDON of Florida. I would say to the gentleman, yes, that is
correct.
Mr. GANSKE. Mr. Speaker, I want to ask the gentleman another
question. I wrote an op ed piece that said, ``Let me make my position
absolutely clear. I oppose the cloning of human beings. I favor Federal
funding of stem cell research. The potential this research has to cure
disease and alleviate human suffering leads me to believe this is a
pro-life position.''
My question to the gentleman from Florida is this: What about those
fertilized eggs that are not created for research purposes, that are in
fertility clinics that are not being used? Does the gentleman's bill
make it illegal to use those blastocysts for stem cell research?
Mr. WELDON of Florida. If the gentleman will yield further, no, it
does not.
Mr. GANSKE. I thank the gentleman. I want to be absolutely clear on
this.
I ask the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon), does he think one can
be consistent in being for Federal funding for stem cell research and
also being in favor of the gentleman's bill?
Mr. WELDON of Florida. Yes.

{time} 1400

Mr. GANSKE. And would the gentleman say that the reason for that is
that his bill is focusing primarily on the initial creation of this
blastocyst or the equivalent of a fertilized egg and the problems that
that would have because we would be basically creating an embryo for
research?
Mr. WELDON of Florida. If the gentleman would continue to yield, yes,
the threshold we are being asked to cross is no longer just using the
embryos that are in the IVF clinics but actually creating embryos for
destructive research service.
Mr. GANSKE. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I believe there are
ethical considerations that enter to the creation of an embryo for
research purposes, and that is why I will support the Weldon bill. And
I will vote against the Greenwood substitute, and I thank the
gentleman.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from
Florida (Mr. Deutsch).
Mr. DEUTSCH. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me
this time, and I am going to use this time really to respond to some of
the statements that my colleagues have made in support of the Weldon
bill as recently as the last speaker.
Let me again really focus this debate so Members know exactly what
they are voting on. It has been presented that the Weldon bill does not
stop stem cell research. Well, I do not believe that is true, and I
think the facts bear out that that is not true.
This issue is intricately intertwined with stem cell research, and
Members need to understand that is what we are voting on. Because just
like organ transplants, the organs that can be transplanted have no use
if the body is going to reject them. And what I want each of us as
Members to think about, and I think my colleague, the gentleman from
Pennsylvania (Mr. Greenwood), did this as well as I have heard anyone
ever do on this floor, think about some of the most awful stories of
the human condition, of real people, and each of us have heard these
stories, whether on a personal basis or whether as a Member of
Congress.
I have the numbers here: 24 million people with diabetes, 15 million
with cancer, 6 million with Alzheimer's, 1 million people with
Parkinson's. Those are obviously large numbers. But I ask each of my
colleagues to think of one person, maybe a grandmother or a
grandfather, a father, a mother, a friend who had one of these
diseases. And what we would be doing today if we passed the Weldon bill
would be taking away their hope of stopping their pain and their
suffering. That is the choice in front of us. That truly is the choice
in front of us.
We do not have that cure yet. But we all know, all of us have heard
and read the specifics of where the research is, and it is there. It
might not be there tomorrow, but it is there. We would stop all this
research. All of it. All of it. Not Federal funding, but all of it.
Private funding, Federal funding. Criminalize it, and all of this
research would stop under the Weldon bill.

[[Page H4912]]

And let us kind of weigh what we have here. Let us weigh what we
have. We have the potentiality in terms of the human condition that I
think is as monumental as anything we can possibly contemplate. Again,
we can talk about tens of millions and hundreds of millions, but I ask
each of my colleagues to focus on one, someone who they know. But then
what are we weighing that against? We are weighing that against
stopping somatic cell nuclear transfer. That is what it is, somatic
cell nuclear transfer. It is not an embryo. It is not the creation of
life.
There are issues, and I think very serious ethical, moral issues,
about using embryos for stem cell research, and we can talk about them.
And I think we take this issue seriously. I think all Members take it
seriously. We do not take it lightly at all. The gentleman from
Pennsylvania (Mr. Greenwood), I think, spoke as well as I have ever
heard anyone speak about this on this floor, that by any concept of
what we have talked about, a sperm and an egg joining for the
potentiality of the creation of a unique human being. That is not what
somatic cell nuclear transfer is about.
Somatic cell nuclear transfer is the taking an egg that is not
fertilized, taking out the 23 chromosomes and literally, literally
taking one of the several trillion, several trillion cells in a body,
whether it is the gentleman from Pennsylvania's cheek cell, one of the
several trillion, or the cell on his skin or another cell, a cell of
several trillion in a person's body, taking that one cell and taking
out the 46 chromosomes and putting it in this egg.
And why are we doing it? Again, there is not a Member in this Chamber
that wants to allow it to be done for the potentiality of creating a
human being. Absolutely not. Illegal under both bills. But what we do
want is the potentiality of literally saving tens of millions of lives
with that. That reality is there. And if we pass the Weldon bill, we
prevent that.
We will not prevent it in some other countries, but what we do, as
amazing as it sounds, is we prevent that research from coming into the
United States. Which again, as I said previously, I cannot conceive
that one of my colleagues in this Chamber would ever have the ability
to look a family member or any person, for that matter, in the eye, a
quadriplegic, someone suffering from Parkinson's, and say they could
not take the benefit of the research.
Mr. Speaker, I urge the defeat of the rule.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume
to remind my colleagues that everybody who came before the Committee on
Rules with any kind of an amendment got their amendment, so I urge them
not to defeat the rule. Yes, this is a complex issue; but we need to
have a substantive debate on it.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr.
Ferguson).
Mr. FERGUSON. Mr. Speaker, I rise in favor of the rule on House
Resolution 2505, the Human Cloning Prohibition Act. It is a good and
fair rule, and it allows for a full debate on this important issue at
hand.
In light of recent scientific advances in genetic research, our
society is faced with some difficult decisions, foremost among these is
what value we place on human life. At first glance, human cloning
appears to respect life because it mimics the creation of life.
However, when we look closely at the manner in which this life is
created, in a laboratory, and for what purpose, out of utility, one
cannot help but see that cloning is actually the degradation of human
life to a scientific curiosity.
Designing a life to serve our curiosity, timing its creation to fit
our schedules, manipulating its genetic makeup to suit our desires, is
the treatment of life as an object, not as an individual with its own
identity and rights.
H.R. 2505, the Human Cloning Prohibition Act is a brave step in the
right direction. This legislation amends U.S. law to ban human cloning
by prohibiting the use of somatic cell nuclear transfer techniques to
create human embryos. This act bans reproductive cloning and so-called
therapeutic cloning.
Therapeutic cloning, as my colleagues know, is performed solely for
the purpose of research. There is no intention in this process to allow
the living organism to survive. While this bill does not restrict the
use of cloning technology to produce DNA, cells other than human
embryos, tissue or organs, it makes it unlawful for any person or
entity, public or private, to perform cloning or to transport, receive,
or import the results of such a procedure.
As my colleagues know, the high risk of failure, even in the most
advanced cloning technologies, gives us pause. Even the so-called
successful clones are highly likely to suffer crippling deformities and
abnormalities after birth. Again, the push for scientific knowledge
must not supercede our basic belief that human life is sacred.
Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to join the majority of Americans
in support of this rule, to oppose the Greenwood substitute, and to
support the carefully crafted bill of the gentleman from Florida (Mr.
Weldon) to prevent human cloning and to keep us from going down this
dangerous road.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield such time as she may consume to
the gentlewoman from California (Ms. Lofgren).
(Ms. LOFGREN asked and was given permission to revise and extend her
remarks, and include extraneous material.)
Ms. LOFGREN. I include for the Record two articles that outline the
research by Johns Hopkins University about the cure of paralysis that
was reported last week at the annual meeting of the Society for
Neuroscience in New Orleans.

[From the Yale Bulletin & Calendar, Dec. 1, 2000]

Team Uses Primate's Own Cells to Repair Spinal Cord Injury

(By Jacqueline Weaver)

A Yale research team has transplanted stem cells from a
primate to repair the protective sheath around the spinal
cord in the same animal, an accomplishment that some day
could help people with spinal cord injuries and multiple
sclerosis.
``The concept is not ready for people, but the fact that it
can be achieved in a primate is significant,'' says Jeffrey
Kocsis, professor of neurology and neurobiology at the School
of Medicine. ``Cells were taken from the same animal, with
minimal neurological damage, and then injected to rebuild the
myelin.''
In multiple sclerosis, the immune system goes awry and
attacks the myelin. Damage to the myelin builds up over
years, causing muscle weakness or paralysis, fatigue, dim or
blurred vision and memory loss.
Using the primate's own cells to repair the myelin, which
is a fatty sheath that surrounds and insulates some nerve
cells, sidesteps a common problem in transplanting organs,
explains the researcher. Patients generally have to take
drugs to suppress their immune systems so that their bodies
do not reject an organ obtained from a donor.
``We didn't even need to immunosuppress the primate,'' says
Kocsis, who presented his findings last week at the annual
meeting of the Society for Neuroscience in New Orleans.
The experiment involved collecting small amounts of tissue
from the subventricular area of the primate brain using
ultrasonography. The neural precursor cells, or stem cells,
then were isolated and expanded in vitro using mitogen, an
agent that promotes cell division.
At the same time, myelin was removed from the primate's
spinal cord. the stem cells were then injected in the same
spot to form new myelin to cover the nerve fibers.
``The lesions were examined three weeks after
transplantation and we found the demyelinated axons were
remyelinated,'' Kocsis says. ``These results demonstrate that
autologous transplantation of neutral precursor cells in the
adult non-human primate can remyelinate demyelinated axons,
thus suggesting the potential utility of such an approach in
remyelinating lesions in humans.''
____

[From the Times (London), July 26, 2001]

Stem Cell Injection Helps Mice To Walk Again as Scientists Fight for
Funding

(Katty Kay in Washington and Mark Henderson, Science Correspondent)

A video showing mice that have been partially cured of
paralysis by injections of human stem cells was released last
night by American scientists. They are seeking to head off a
ban on government funding of similar research.
Researchers at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore broke
with standard scientific practice to screen the tape before
details of their research have been formally published, in
the hope that it will convince President Bush of the value of
stem cell technology.
The U.S. Government is considering whether to outlaw all
federal funding of studies using stem cells taken from human
embryos, which promise to provide new treatments for many
conditions, including paralysis and Parkinson's disease.

[[Page H4913]]

Opponents argue that the research is immoral as the cells
are taken from viable human embryos. President Bush has
suspended federal funding of such work and has announced a
review of its future. He was urged this week by the Pope to
outlaw the practice.
John Gearhart and Douglas Kerr, who led the privately
funded research, hope that the tape will have a decisive
impact on the debate by showing the potential of the
technique. It shows mice paralyzed by motor neuron disease
once again able to move their limbs, bear their own weight
and even more around after injections of human embryonic stem
cells in their spinal cords.
Dr. Kerr said that the team hopes to start human clinical
trials within three years but that a federal funding ban
would deal a ``potentially fatal blow'' to its efforts.
Details of its research were first revealed in November
last year, though it has yet to be published in a
peerreviewed journal. In this case, however, the team took
the decision to show the tape to Tommy Thompson, the U.S.
Health and Human Services Secretary, who is conducting a
review of stem cell funding for President Bush, and to Pete
Domenici, a Republican senator. It is now to be released to
the public as well.
Medical research charities said the video would have a
major impact. ``I wish the President would see this tape,''
said Michael Manganiello, vice-president of the Christopher
Reeve Paralysis Foundation, named after the Superman actor
who was paralyzed in a riding accident.
``When you see a rat going from dragging his hind legs to
walking, it's not that big a leap to look at Christopher
Reeve, and think how this might help him,'' he said.
In the experiment, 120 mice and rats were infected with a
virus that caused spinal damage similar to that from motor
neuron disease, the debilitating condition that affects
Professor Stephen Hawking. The disease is generally incurable
and sufferers usually die from it within two to six years.
When fluid containing human embryonic stem cells was
infused into the spinal fluid of the paralyzed rodents, every
one of the animals regained at least some movement. In
previous tests stem cells have been transplanted directly
into the spinal cord. Infusing the fluid if far less invasive
and would make eventual treatment in humans much easier.
Dr. Kerr said the limited movement seen was a reflection of
the limited research, not of the limits to stem cells
themselves.
``I would be a fool to say that the ceiling we have now is
the same ceiling we'll see in two years,'' he said. ``We will
be smarter and the stem cell research even more developed.''
However, the prospect of human trials in three years
depends on the outcome of a political and ethical debate over
whether the US Government will allow federal funding for stem
cell research. If President Bush decides not to approve
government funds for research, that would set the timetable
back 10 to 12 years for tests in humans, Dr. Kerr said.
The controversy stems from the fact that human embryos must
be destroyed in order to retrieve the stem cells. Mr. Bush is
under pressure from conservative Republicans and Roman
Catholics not to back the research on moral grounds.
Some top American scientists, who are becoming increasingly
frustrated with the funding limitations, have left for
Britain where government funding is available. The British
Government has approved stem cell research on the ground that
it could help to cure intractable disease.
The research on rodents at Johns Hopkins took stem cells
from five to nine-week-old human fetuses that had been
electively aborted.

therapies

There is no cure for ALS, and more research needs to be
done in order for there to be one.
Currently, there is only one drug on the market that has
been approved by the FDA for the treatment of ALS: Riluzole.
It was originally developed as an anti-convulsant, but it has
also been shown to have anti-glutamate effects. In a French
trial, it was found that those taking the drug had an
enhanced survival rate of 74% as compared to only 58% in the
placebo group. [1] But, the drug has gotten mixed reviews,
with divergent results occurring throughout the trials.
Creatine has also been shown to help motor neurons produce
needed energy for longer survival and is currently being
tested in clinical ALS trials. Creatine is an over-the-
counter supplement that is popular as a muscle builder among
athletes. Creatine is a natural body substance involved in
the transport of energy. Studies using SOD1 mice found that
animals given a diet high in creatine had the same amount of
healthy muscle-controlling nerve cells as mice in the normal,
or control, group. Creatine can be found in a variety of
health food stores.
Sanofi, still in clinical trial, is a nonpeptide compound
which possesses neurotrophin-like activity at nanomolar
concentrations in vitro, and after administration of low oral
doses in vivo. The compound reduces the histological,
neurochemical and functional deficits produced in widely
divergent models of experimental neurodegeneration. The
ability of sanofi to increase the innervation of human muscle
by spinal cord explants and to prolong the survival of mice
suffering from progressive motor neuronopathy suggest the
compound might be an effective therapy for the treatment of
ALS.
The mechanism by which sanofi elicits its neurotrophic and
neuroprotective effects, although not fully elucidated, is
probably related to the compound's ability to mimic the
activity of, or stimulate the biosynthesis of, a number of
endogenous neurotrophins such as nerve growth factor (NGF)
and brain-derived, neurotrophic factor (BDNF). While sanofi
has high affinity for serotonin 5-HT1A receptors and some
affinity for sigma sites, its affinity for these targets
appears to be unrelated to its neurotrophic or
neuroprotective activity.

stem cell therapy

Therapeutic efforts are underway to prevent diseases or
prevent their progress, but more is going to be needed in
order to repair the damage that has been done in ALS. Neurons
are dead and muscles have atrophied; these must be
regenerated to get back what has been lost. Stem cell therapy
is going to be key.
The definition of a stem cell is under debate, but most
researchers agree with the properties of multipotency, high
proliferative potential and self-renewal.[2]
Embryonic and fetal stem cells differ in their isolation
periods, and thus their potentials. Embryonic stem cells are
derived very early in development, either at or before the
blastocyst stage, and are defined as pluripotent, with the
ability to differentiate into multiple cell types. When a
sperm fertilizes an egg, that cell will then go on to further
divide and differentiate into cells that will make up the
entire body. If cells are captured before they differentiate,
those cells then have the ability to become many types of
desired cells. Fetal stem cells, which can be isolated at a
later stage (from aborted fetuses, for example), are more
differentiated and thus more restricted in the lineage they
can become. Research has shown that the beauty of the
embryonic stem cell is in its ability to become all types of
cells, migrate, and respond to cues in the transplanted
environment.
Adult stem cells can be isolated from certain areas in the
adult body, including neurogenic areas of the brain (the
dentate gyrus and olfactory bulb), and bone marrow. Recent
research has shown bone marrow derived stem cells are very
versatile, differentiating into muscle blood, and neural cell
fates. [3] While adult stem cells hold promising hope, they
are not abundant, are difficult to isolate and propagate, and
may decline with increasing age. Some evidence suggests that
they may not have the differential potential and migratory
ability as embryonic stem cells. Also, there is concern that
adult stem cells may harbor more DNA mutations, since free
radical damage and declination of DNA repair systems are
known to occur more with age. [4] Any attempt to treat
patients with their own stem cells, which from an immunologic
standpoint would be great, would require those stem cells to
be isolated and grown in culture to promote sufficient
numbers. For many patients, including ALS patients, there may
not be enough time to do this. For other diseases, such as
those caused by genetic defects, it might not be wise to use
one's own cells since that genetic defect is likely to be in
those cells as well. Adult stem cells are less controversial,
due to no isolation from embryonic or fetal tissue, but they
may not have the same therapeutic potential.
Dr. Evan Snyder and his lab at the Boston Children's
Hospital have transplanted embryonic mouse stem cells (C17.2)
into the spinal cords of onset SODI mice. These cells were
found to integrate into the system, with some found to have
differentiated into immature neurons. Rotorod analysis, which
measures functional behavior, indicated that those animals
that had received a transplant, had improved fucntional
recovery as compared to those that had not received cells.
(This data is in press and will be presented at the
Neuroscience Conference in San Diego, Fall 2001.)
Dr. Snyder and his team are also involved in embryonic stem
cell transplant in primate models that resemble ALS. This is
exciting work that may help push stem cell therapy to clincal
trial. This research is being funded by Project A.L.S. (go to
www.projectals.org)
Recently, it was reported that researchers at Johns Hopkins
had made an exciting finding with stem cell therapy in
regards to ALS. The following report is taken directly from
the Johns Hopkins press.

Stem Cells Graft In Spinal Cord, Restore Movement In Paralyzed Mice

Scientists at Johns Hopkins report they've restored
movement to newly paralyzed rodents by injecting stem cells
into the animals' spinal fluid. Results of their study were
presented in the annual meeting of The Society of
Neuroscience in New Orleans.
The researchers introduced neural stem cells into the
spinal fluid of mice and rats paralyzed by an animal virus
that specifically attacks motor neurons. Normally, animals
infected with Sindbis virus permanently lose the ability to
move their limbs, as neurons leading from the spinal cord to
muscles deteriorate. They drag legs and feet behind them.
Fifty percent of the stem-cell treated rodents, however,
recovered the ability to place the soles of one or both of
their hind feet on the ground. ``This research may lead most
immediately to improved treatments for patients with
paralyzing motor neuron disease, such as amyotrophic lateral
sclerosis (ALS) and another disorder, spinal

[[Page H4914]]

motor atrophy (SMA),'' says researcher Jeffrey Rothstein,
M.D., Ph.D.
``Under the best research circumstances,'' he adds, ``stem
cells could be used in early clinical trials within two
years.''
``The study is significant because it's one of the first
examples where stem cells may restore function over a broad
region of the central nervous system,'' says neurologist
Douglas Kerr, M.S., Ph.D., who led the research team. ``Most
use of neural stem cells so far has been for focused problems
such as stroke damage or Parkinson's disease, which affect a
small, specific area,'' Kerr explains.
In the rodent study, however, injected stem cells migrated
to broadly damaged areas of the spinal cord. ``something
about cell death is apparently a potent stimulus for stem
cell migration,'' says Kerr. ``Add these cells to a normal
rat or mouse, and nothing migrates to the spinal cord.'' In
the study of 18 rodents,the researchers injected stem cells
into the animals' cerebrospinal fluid via a hollow needle at
the base of the spinal cord--like a spinal tap in reverse.
Within several weeks, the cells migrated to the ventral horn,
a region of the spinal cord containing the bodies of motor
nerve cells.
``After 8 weeks, we saw a definite functional improvement
in half of the mice and rats,'' says Kerr. ``From 5 to 7
percent of the stem cells that migrated to the spinal cord
appeared to differentiate into nerve cells,'' he says. ``They
expressed mature neuronal markers on their cell surfaces. Now
we're working to explain how such an apparently small number
of nerve cells can make such a relatively large improvement
in function.
``It could be that fewer nerve cells are needed for
function than we suspect. The other explanation is that the
stem cells themselves haven't restored the nerve cell-to-
muscle units required for movement but that, instead, they
protect or stimulate the few undamaged nerve cells that still
remain. We're pursuing this question now in the lab.''
The rodents infected with the Sindbis virus are a tested
model for SMA, Kerr noted. SMA is the most common inherited
neurological disorder and the most common inherited cause of
infant death, affecting between 1 in 6,000 and 1 in 20,000
infants. In the disease, nerve cells leading from the spinal
cord to muscles deteriorate. Children are born weak and have
trouble swallowing, breathing and walking. most die in
infancy, though some live into young childhood.
With ALS, which affects as many as 20,000 in this country,
motor nerves leading from the brain to the spinal cord as
well as those from the cord to muscles deteriorate. The
disease eventually creates whole-body paralysis and death.
The research was funded by grants from the Muscular
Dystrophy Association and Project ALS.
Other scientists were Nicholas Maragakis, M.D., John D.
Gearhart, Ph.D., of Hopkins, and Evan Snyder, at Harvard.
Stem cell therapy offers much promise to people suffering
with ALS, as well as many other diseases, including
Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. The key to this work is going to
be support and funding. So many people will die without it.

References

[1] 1999. Nerve Preserver. Prevention 47.
[2] Temple, S. & Alvarez-Buylla. A. 1999. Stem cells in the
Adult Mammalian Central Nervous System. Current Opinion in
Neurobiology, 9:135-41.
[3] Mezey, E. Chandross, K. 2000. Bone marrow: a possible
alternative source of cells in the adult nervous system.
European Journal of Pharmacology 405:297-302.
[4] Kirkwood, T., Austad, S. 2000. Why do we age? Nature
408:233-38.

The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Gibbons). The gentlewoman from New York
(Ms. Slaughter) has 2 minutes remaining, and the gentlewoman from North
Carolina (Mrs. Myrick) has 6 minutes remaining.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire if the gentlewoman from
North Carolina has more speakers?
Mrs. MYRICK. Yes, I do. I have several more speakers.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from
Indiana (Mr. Kerns).
Mr. KERNS. Mr. Speaker, I stand before you today to urge my
colleagues' support of the rule and H.R. 2505, the Human Cloning Act of
2001.
Today we take an important step in the process to ban human cloning
in the United States. With technologies advancing rapidly, the race to
clone a human being has become all too real. Simply put, H.R. 2505 will
ban the process of cloning another human being. It will not, however,
prohibit scientists from conducting responsible research.
Human cloning is not a Republican issue or a Democrat issue, it is an
issue for all of mankind. The prospect of cloning a human being raises
serious moral, ethical, and human health implications. As countries
around the globe look to the United States for leadership, it is our
responsibility to take a firm position and ban human cloning.
I spent, recently, many days traveling all throughout Indiana talking
to people about this issue; and I have received lots of calls from
across the country about this issue. I believe overwhelmingly that the
people of this country want to ban human cloning.
There are several important factors my colleagues should be aware of
when considering this legislation. H.R. 2550 does not restrict the
practice of in vitro fertilization. It does not deal with the separate
issue of whether the Federal Government should fund stem cell research
on human embryos. Furthermore, 2505 does not prohibit the use of
cloning methods to produce any molecules, DNA, organs, plants, or
animals other than humans.
I urge all my colleagues to vote in support of the rule today.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I continue to reserve the balance of my
time.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from
Indiana (Mr. Pence).
Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman for yielding me this
time.
Mr. Speaker, I rise in strong support of the rule and the anti-
cloning bill authored by my colleague, the gentleman from Florida (Mr.
Weldon). The House of Representatives must choose today whom it will
serve, whether it will support the Weldon cloning ban and protect
nascent human life or whether it will endorse an alternative that will
most certainly lead to the creation of a subclass of human life solely
for the purpose of experimentation and destruction.
Mr. Speaker, no ethical case can be made for cloning a human being.
The Weldon bill bans all human cloning. The alternative before us would
allow cloning as long as the cloned human is destroyed before it can
follow the natural progression of life.
Today, Mr. Speaker, this Congress has the ability to settle some of
the moral confusion of our time, to say that humanity will master
rather than be mastered by science. Humanity is once again on the verge
of a great moral decision. I pray we will not fall into the same type
of tragic reasoning that has led previous generations into slavery and
genocide through the devaluation of human life.
Let us reject the notion that exploitation of life is acceptable.
This institution must respect life, protect life, and choose life; and
I stand in strong support of the rule.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I continue to reserve the balance of my
time.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield 1 minute to the gentleman from
Nebraska (Mr. Terry).
Mr. TERRY. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this rule and H.R. 2505.
This bill prohibits cloning of human beings, and it also prohibits
another type of cloning which seriously endangers the sanctity of human
life, the so-called therapeutic cloning. In this process, scientists
would create embryos solely to experiment on them and eventually to
destroy them for stem cells or whatever purpose. Remember, however,
that the purpose is to destroy them.
Every argument in favor of therapeutic cloning assumes that the
smallest human lives, embryos typically days old, are not lives at all.
They are just clumps of cells to be manipulated and used for the
benefit of those who have already been born. No matter how good the
intention, this type of scientific rationalization endangers the very
fabric of our society, our respect for ourselves and others. Nothing, I
believe, can justify the taking of human life to improve the quality of
another.

{time} 1415

Mr. Speaker, I urge all of my colleagues to join me in supporting
this bill, a true ban on human cloning.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to just comment, it was said a while ago
that all the amendments that were brought up on this piece of
legislation were allowed. Three were rejected by the Committee on
Rules. One was by the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Jackson-Lee), which
made sure that this did not have anything to do with in vitro
fertilization that was not allowed. Two were by the gentleman from
Virginia (Mr. Scott), which would have also protected the rights of
human beings.

[[Page H4915]]

I want to say to all my colleagues, because all of us have said it
over and over again, that we are all opposed to the cloning of human
beings. I believe this House is already on record having said that. But
a lot of us believe that science is important, that taking care of the
human beings who live here, to provide better health, a chance to live,
a hope that paraplegics will walk, that diabetes will be done away
with, that cancer can be found a cure for, all the promises that stem
cells hold.
I want to say the same thing that my colleague, the gentleman from
Massachusetts (Mr. Capuano) said. I recall the first debate when the
first organ transplants took place, that that perhaps is not God's
will. Maybe God expects us to help ourselves and to take advantage of
the things he has given us here on Earth, to learn to do better and to
do better for our fellow human beings.
Underlying all of this, Mr. Speaker, is that this House is in no way
ready to debate this measure. There simply is not enough knowledge on
either side. People are not clear on what is happening here. I am
absolutely certain, as are many Members in this House, that this does
away with stem cell research despite the fact that the gentleman from
Florida (Mr. Weldon) believes it does not. There are far too many of us
that believe that it does.
There are far too many questions left unanswered. The underlying case
is, is the United States going to turn its back on science, and let
other countries do it and then prohibit, with this legislation, the
ability for us to even take advantage of breakthroughs, if they occur
in another country, because we cannot import the cure?
What a terrible thought that must be for people out there who are
waiting on a daily basis for something wonderful to happen to save the
life of someone who means the world to them, for people who sit by a
child's bedside and for people who pray every day for some deliverance
from some awful scourge. I think they expect from us to know what we
are doing here today.
I urge with all my heart a no vote on this rule to give us time in
this House to really understand what we are doing because of the far-
reaching implications of this legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Gibbons). The time of the gentlewoman
from New York has expired.
The gentlewoman from North Carolina has 2\1/2\ minutes remaining and
has the right to close.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, I would like to clarify a remark based on what the
gentlewoman from New York (Ms. Slaughter) said. I said that the
amendments of everybody who came before the Committee on Rules, who
came to testify, were accepted. The other amendments were rejected in
the Committee on the Judiciary.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from Florida (Mr.
Weldon).
Mr. WELDON of Florida. Mr. Speaker, let me in closing just say I
think this is a very fair and equitable rule. We allowed the gentleman
from Pennsylvania (Mr. Greenwood) a full hour to debate the merits of
his issue. I believe we will get a full airing of the essential debate.
I think the essential debate is, do we want to take the next step on
this embryo stem cell issue, and take the Nation to the place where we
are going to be creating embryos, no longer using so-called excess
embryos, but we are going to start creating embryos.
I am a physician. I saw patients just last week. I have treated
patients with Alzheimer's disease, Lou Gehrig's disease, diabetes. My
father had diabetes. To hold out reproductive cloning as a solution to
these problems is pie in the sky. It does not even exist.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. WELDON of Florida. I only have 2 minutes.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. We are not talking about reproductive cloning.
Mr. WELDON of Florida. I will not yield.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentlewoman will suspend. The gentleman
from Florida has the time.
Mr. WELDON of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I would be very pleased to
discuss the issue of reproductive cloning. It does not exist. It is a
theoretical construct.
I was just on the phone with a physician colleague from Chicago last
night, who spoke to the world's most eminent embryologist at Stanford
University, and I am quoting from him when he says, ``It is pie in the
sky.''
One other thing I just want to clarify: My colleague, the gentleman
from Florida (Mr. Deutsch), said the somatic cell nuclear transfer
creating a cloned embryo is not the creation of life. I think to put
forward that notion is totally absurd. That is like saying Dolly is not
alive.
We are talking about creating human embryos for destructive research
purposes, creating them. We are not talking about using the embryos in
the IVF clinics anymore, in the freezers, the so-called excess embryos;
we are talking about creating them for research purposes. I believe
that is a line we do not want to cross.
We will have that debate in a little while. I encourage everyone to
vote yes on this rule.
Mrs. MYRICK. Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote yes on this
rule so we can go ahead and have this debate, and discuss this complex
and substantive issue.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the
previous question on the resolution.
The previous question was ordered.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the resolution.
The question was taken; and the Speaker pro tempore announced that
the ayes appeared to have it.
Ms. SLAUGHTER. Mr. Speaker, I object to the vote on the ground that a
quorum is not present and make the point of order that a quorum is not
present.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Evidently a quorum is not present.
The Sergeant at Arms will notify absent Members.
Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, this 15-minute vote on House
Resolution 214 will be followed by a 5-minute vote on H.R. 2540.
The vote was taken by electronic device, and there were--yeas 239,
nays 188, not voting 7, as follows:

[Roll No. 300]

YEAS--239

Aderholt
Akin
Armey
Bachus
Baker
Ballenger
Barcia
Barr
Bartlett
Barton
Bereuter
Berry
Biggert
Bilirakis
Blunt
Boehlert
Boehner
Bonilla
Brady (TX)
Brown (SC)
Bryant
Burr
Burton
Buyer
Callahan
Calvert
Camp
Cannon
Cantor
Capito
Carson (OK)
Chabot
Chambliss
Coble
Collins
Combest
Cooksey
Costello
Cox
Crane
Crenshaw
Cubin
Culberson
Cunningham
Davis, Jo Ann
Davis, Tom
Deal
DeLay
DeMint
Diaz-Balart
Doolittle
Doyle
Dreier
Duncan
Dunn
Ehlers
Ehrlich
Emerson
English
Everett
Ferguson
Flake
Fletcher
Foley
Forbes
Fossella
Frelinghuysen
Gallegly
Ganske
Gekas
Gibbons
Gilchrest
Gillmor
Goode
Goodlatte
Goss
Graham
Graves
Green (WI)
Greenwood
Grucci
Gutknecht
Hall (OH)
Hall (TX)
Hansen
Hart
Hastert
Hastings (WA)
Hayes
Hayworth
Hefley
Herger
Hilleary
Hobson
Hoekstra
Holden
Hostettler
Houghton
Hulshof
Hunter
Hyde
Isakson
Issa
Istook
Jenkins
John
Johnson (IL)
Johnson, Sam
Jones (NC)
Keller
Kelly
Kennedy (MN)
Kerns
Kildee
King (NY)
Kingston
Kirk
Knollenberg
Kucinich
Langevin
Largent
Latham
LaTourette
Leach
Lewis (CA)
Lewis (KY)
Linder
LoBiondo
Lucas (KY)
Lucas (OK)
Manzullo
Mascara
Matheson
McCarthy (NY)
McCrery
McHugh
McInnis
McIntyre
McKeon
McNulty
Mica
Miller, Gary
Mollohan
Moran (KS)
Morella
Myrick
Nethercutt
Ney
Northup
Norwood
Nussle
Oberstar
Ortiz
Osborne
Ose
Otter
Oxley
Paul
Pence
Peterson (MN)
Peterson (PA)
Petri
Phelps
Pickering
Pitts
Platts
Pombo
Pomeroy
Portman
Pryce (OH)
Putnam
Quinn
Radanovich
Rahall
Regula
Rehberg
Reynolds
Riley
Roemer
Rogers (KY)
Rogers (MI)
Rohrabacher
Ros-Lehtinen
Ryan (WI)
Ryun (KS)
Saxton
Scarborough
Schaffer
Schrock
Sensenbrenner
Sessions
Shadegg
Sherwood
Shimkus
Shows
Shuster
Simmons
Simpson
Skeen
Skelton
Smith (MI)
Smith (NJ)
Smith (TX)
Souder
Stearns
Stenholm
Stump
Stupak
Sununu
Sweeney
Tancredo
Tauzin
Taylor (MS)
Taylor (NC)
Terry
Thomas
Thornberry
Thune
Tiahrt
Tiberi
Toomey
Traficant
Turner
Vitter
Walden

[[Page H4916]]

Walsh
Wamp
Watkins (OK)
Watts (OK)
Weldon (FL)
Weldon (PA)
Weller
Whitfield
Wicker
Wilson
Wolf
Wu
Young (AK)
Young (FL)

NAYS--188

Abercrombie
Ackerman
Allen
Andrews
Baca
Baird
Baldacci
Baldwin
Barrett
Bass
Becerra
Bentsen
Berkley
Berman
Bishop
Blagojevich
Blumenauer
Bonior
Bono
Borski
Boswell
Boucher
Boyd
Brady (PA)
Brown (FL)
Brown (OH)
Capps
Capuano
Cardin
Carson (IN)
Castle
Clay
Clayton
Clement
Clyburn
Condit
Conyers
Coyne
Cramer
Crowley
Cummings
Davis (CA)
Davis (FL)
Davis (IL)
DeFazio
DeGette
Delahunt
DeLauro
Deutsch
Dicks
Dingell
Doggett
Dooley
Edwards
Engel
Eshoo
Etheridge
Evans
Farr
Fattah
Filner
Ford
Frank
Frost
Gephardt
Gilman
Gonzalez
Gordon
Granger
Green (TX)
Gutierrez
Harman
Hill
Hilliard
Hinchey
Hinojosa
Hoeffel
Holt
Honda
Hooley
Horn
Hoyer
Inslee
Israel
Jackson (IL)
Jackson-Lee (TX)
Jefferson
Johnson (CT)
Johnson, E. B.
Kanjorski
Kaptur
Kennedy (RI)
Kilpatrick
Kind (WI)
Kleczka
Kolbe
LaFalce
Lampson
Lantos
Larsen (WA)
Larson (CT)
Lee
Levin
Lewis (GA)
Lofgren
Lowey
Luther
Maloney (CT)
Maloney (NY)
Markey
Matsui
McCarthy (MO)
McCollum
McDermott
McGovern
McKinney
Meehan
Meek (FL)
Meeks (NY)
Menendez
Millender-McDonald
Miller (FL)
Miller, George
Mink
Moore
Moran (VA)
Murtha
Nadler
Napolitano
Neal
Obey
Olver
Owens
Pallone
Pascrell
Pastor
Payne
Pelosi
Price (NC)
Ramstad
Rangel
Reyes
Rivers
Rodriguez
Ross
Rothman
Roukema
Roybal-Allard
Royce
Rush
Sabo
Sanchez
Sanders
Sandlin
Sawyer
Schakowsky
Schiff
Scott
Serrano
Shaw
Shays
Sherman
Slaughter
Smith (WA)
Snyder
Solis
Spratt
Strickland
Tanner
Tauscher
Thompson (CA)
Thompson (MS)
Thurman
Tierney
Towns
Udall (CO)
Udall (NM)
Upton
Velazquez
Visclosky
Waters
Watson (CA)
Watt (NC)
Waxman
Weiner
Wexler
Woolsey
Wynn

NOT VOTING--7

Hastings (FL)
Hutchinson
Jones (OH)
LaHood
Lipinski
Spence
Stark

{time} 1442

Ms. BALDWIN and Mr. PASTOR changed their vote from ``yea'' to
``nay.''
Mr. GARY G. MILLER of California and Mr. RADANOVICH changed their
vote from ``nay'' to ``yea.''
So the resolution was agreed to.
The result of the vote was announced as above recorded.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.

____________________