[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 83 (Thursday, June 20, 2002)]
[House]
[Pages H3760-H3766]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
HUMAN CLONING
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Kennedy of Minnesota). Under the
Speaker's announced policy of January 3, 2001, the gentleman from
Indiana (Mr. Pence) is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the
majority leader.
Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, I and several of my colleagues, including the
distinguished physician and Congressman from Florida by the name of
David Weldon, wanted to rise in this Chamber to discuss an issue that,
while it has fallen to some extent, to use a colloquialism, below the
radar screen here in our Nation's Capital, it is without a doubt the
most significant moral question that the institution of the Congress
will contend with in this session of Congress and perhaps, Mr. Speaker,
for many sessions of Congress to come.
As we debate the restructuring of agencies of the Federal Government,
the new Department of Homeland Security, as we debate in memorable
terms, as my colleagues just did, the extension of benefits under
Medicare, all of these issues pale in comparison to the potential
cultural impact and the impact on our system of legal ethics that the
legalization of human cloning would represent to our society and even
to our civilization.
Yet even though this body has acted and awaits action in the balance
of the Congress, I believe it is incumbent upon the Members of this
institution who cherish the dignity of human life to rise and to remind
our colleagues, as I will do so in the moments ahead, and any of those
that are looking in about the profound moral questions that we wrestle
with when we argue in favor of a ban of human cloning.
It is my hope that as the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon) joins
us later, he will speak to the medical questions and myths that
surround the promise of embryonic stem cell research. The gentleman
from Florida will no doubt point out, as many of us did during the
debates, that every single breakthrough in the area of stem cell
research has taken place using adult stem cells, Mr. Speaker. Not a
single breakthrough in medical science has ever occurred using
embryonic stem cell research. Yet we are being sold a bill of goods by
a technical medical industry that would have us move the line of
thousands of years of medical ethics to permit what they, in almost
Orwellian terms, refer to as therapeutic cloning, the cloning of human
beings, of nascent human life, for the express purpose of testing that
tissue.
I rise today, Mr. Speaker, to say we must prevent human life from
becoming a wholesale commodity that is created and consumed. Let me say
again, my theme today, my purpose for rising in this Chamber with the
colleagues that will join me, is very simple. We must prevent in this
Congress, before the close of this year, this session of Congress, we
must prevent, by law, human life from becoming a commodity that is
created and consumed in a marketplace of science.
I say that knowing that there will be those listening in in offices
here on Capitol Hill, there will be those listening in around the
United States, who think that this is something of a strange science
fiction assertion. But let me suggest to you as a family man, as the
father of three small children, a
[[Page H3761]]
husband of 17 years, let me say that it is precisely about that that I
believe this debate over human cloning emanates.
{time} 1700
I come to the floor this afternoon to speak about really the failure
of the Congress to adopt a ban on human cloning. It is, Mr. Speaker,
without a doubt, human cloning, perhaps the most anticipated and even
feared development in the history of science. The promise that opening
up this Pandora's box seems to hold for some pales in comparison to the
backdrop of that great Biblical adage that reads in the book of Isaiah
that, I am God, and there is no other. Human cloning is about the
creation of human life for utilitarian ends. It is anticipated, and it
is rightly feared.
For decades, truthfully, humans have been probing the darkest regions
of their imagination to craft stories in science fiction where the
duplication of human life is acceptable, but we always run in, it
seems, to the old prophet, and he says, I am God, and there is no
other.
Over the last several years, advances in the understanding of
cellular biology have made it apparent that this brave new world
described by science fiction writers was not actually that far off. We
have since learned that cloning is, in fact, a possibility and could
be, or may, Mr. Speaker, I say with hesitation, may already be, a
reality.
Somewhere in the world today, somewhere in America today, while
Congress fails to act on a ban of human cloning, amoral scientists may
be in the process of duplicating human life and thereby, perhaps,
laying the foundation for duplicating a human being, created always, up
until that point, Mr. Speaker, in the image of God, the first human
being in history created in the image of another human being.
Several of my colleagues tonight and I want to examine precisely
these questions, these large moral and ethical questions, that seem to
get left in the dust behind the promise of somatic cell nuclear
transfer and embryonic stem cell research.
We hear about the promise. We see people rising out of wheelchairs,
we see quadriplegics able to walk, and we want to reach for that, Mr.
Speaker, but we, to do so, must reach across a line that mankind has
never and should never cross.
Cloning involves the making of an exact genetic copy of a human being
through a process called somatic cell nuclear transfer. In the process,
the DNA is removed from the cell of a human, and it is transferred to
an egg cell. The result is the formation of a human embryo, the
beginning of human life. Theoretically, if this embryo were implanted
in a womb, it would have the ability to follow the normal stages of
development until a human being is born.
I say to you today that while most of us recognize the problems of
using cloning for procreation and are prepared to outlaw the practice
of it, Mr. Speaker, there are some who would have us talk about somatic
cell nuclear transfer as though what was created was not human life,
and there is great confusion on this point.
I say, not in an effort to crowd the upcoming remarks of the
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon), but I say, Mr. Speaker, with deep
humility, that there are many in this debate who want to refer in
cavalier ways to that embryonic tissue and say it is something other
than human life. Mr. Speaker, if it is not nascent human life, what is
it?
I was provoked to come to the floor of this Congress by the words of
some of the advocates of so-called therapeutic cloning, who are now
about the business of sharing a new slogan with America, and it is a
slogan that in effect says a single cell can feel no pain. A single
cell can feel no pain, as though the moral and ethical line would not
be crossed in the absence of pain. It is an absurd anti-intellectual
and antihistorical assertion, and I call it as such, regardless of who
may use it.
Many in the scientific community, Mr. Speaker, believe that nascent
embryonic life should be used for medical research through this
procedure known as therapeutic cloning. They have come up with this
innocuous term. It is very misleading. In this procedure the cloned
embryo is created solely for the use of its parts. The human is given
life, only to be destroyed a few days later for specialized stem cells.
I go back to the thesis of my remarks today. We must prevent human
life from becoming a wholesale commodity that is created and consumed
and destroyed, which is precisely what therapeutic cloning is, Mr.
Speaker. It is the creation of embryonic human life to be destroyed for
its parts.
Despite the fact that research on embryonic stem cells has yet to
produce any treatment for any medical condition, as I said before,
researchers are calling the cloning and harvesting of embryonic stem
cells ``therapeutic.'' Humanity is contemplating the creation of a
subclass of human life that is created and killed for the benefit of
other humans.
Mr. Speaker, I come from south of Highway 40 in Indiana. I am not the
brightest bulb in the box. But, for crying out loud, how can we suggest
that this is anything other than the creation of a form of human life
that we have never recognized before, the creation of a class of human
life that exists to benefit other humans who are farther along in their
physiological development?
I often say to my children, it is not sufficient to think once about
hard issues, you have to think twice. Mr. Speaker, this is one of those
issues where you have to think twice, and the moral and ethical issues
raised even by experimental and so-called therapeutic cloning become
obvious.
I fear we are turning life literally into a wholesale commodity to be
created and destroyed. Make no mistake, if we proceed down this course,
millions of human embryos, nascent human life, will be created and then
destroyed, and even then we may not attain the scientific achievements
that have been promised to us.
Now, some may be willing to say that, well, there will not be that
much destruction of nascent human life, but, Mr. Speaker, less than 3
percent of cloned embryos in animal studies are successfully implanted
to go to term. Birth defects occur in legion numbers. Literally, Dolly
the Sheep was the product of thousands of failed aberrations in the
attempt to clone a single mammal.
And to think of this kind of experimentation, as we go not just from
the therapeutic cloning, the cellular level, stem cell research, but we
know in our hearts there will be those media-hound scientists who will
want to show up with the first cloned baby. Think of the children who
will go before the first baby. Think of the birth defects. Think of the
spontaneous abortions. If Dolly the Sheep is to be the instructor, if
the experience of cloning experimentation on mammals teaches us
anything, it teaches us that there will be a nightmare of destruction
leading to that one fully cloned human being.
I do not know about the rest of my colleagues, but it is my firm
conviction that scientific advancement is not worth the price of human
embryo factories. It is also not worth the price of one innocent unborn
human life that attempts to make it to term, but, because the
scientific technology is not sufficiently advanced, it dies in utero or
after delivery.
Human cloning must be stopped in every form. Unfortunately, those who
support cloning are attempting, I would argue, in some cases to twist
the facts to fit their agenda. Recent statements by supporters of
cloning suggest that cloning actually is not cloning, that it is
medical research on a cluster of cells stripped of their humanity. Mr.
Speaker, I fear that this utilitarian logic has caused us to overlook
deep ethical and moral implications involved in cloning.
But also I would say humbly, as I prepare to recognize my colleague
and friend from Florida, that not only are they wrong on the ethics and
the morality, but, Mr. Speaker, I say with real humility, they are
wrong on the science. They are wrong on the medicine. They are wrong on
the potential advances that this research affords.
As this Congress moves forward in this debate, it is absolutely
essential that we do not let the weird science and the unsubstantiated
promises dominate this debate, but that we look with the cold eye of
science as we evaluate the promise here.
[[Page H3762]]
I would add, Mr. Speaker, it would be sufficient for this
Congressman, even if the science held all the promise in the world, it
would be sufficient for me to oppose human cloning, even cellular human
cloning and research, on moral and ethical grounds. And yet, inasmuch
as it is helpful to our argument, I have called upon my colleague and
friend, the author of the House bill of banning human cloning, to join
me in this Special Order today to talk about the science.
The gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon), before he came to this
institution, was an established physician with a background in
microbiology. He is a man who speaks with unique authority on these
issues in this institution. It was the reason why we were able to
develop legislation here and develop strong bipartisan support behind a
human cloning ban. Part of the argument that the gentleman from Florida
made, and I trust will make again today, is that while certainly
morality and medical ethics for thousands of years are on the side of
banning human cloning in all its forms, for all of its purposes,
happily, the science is on our side as well.
With that, I yield to the author of the ban on human cloning in the
House, the distinguished gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon).
Mr. WELDON of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for
yielding. I want to thank him for the support and assistance provided
me and all of the others involved in passing the ban on human cloning
out of the House of Representatives. The gentleman's involvement was
extremely helpful. I also want to thank the gentleman for making
arrangements for this Special Order.
We continue to await action from the other body on this issue. As we
all know, the bill to ban human cloning, which I had authored along
with my colleague the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Stupak), a Democrat,
passed the House of Representatives now almost a year ago. It was July
of 2001 that it passed. I just want to point out that that bill passed
the House of Representatives by a 100-vote margin, I think it was 63
Democrats voting for it, and about 20 Republicans voting against it, so
this is clearly not a Republican versus Democrat issue. It passed
overwhelmingly, with a very, very clear bipartisan vote.
I just want to underscore that the bill as it passed the House does
not ban stem cell research. There are a lot of people that confuse
these issues. I will admit they are complicated.
{time} 1715
I have a background in medicine and science, and it is easy for me to
follow these things; but for lay people, it is very, very hard to sort
out when are we talking about stem cell research and when we are
talking about human cloning.
Also, the bill does not ban cloning tissues; it does not ban animal
cloning. It specifically bans human cloning. And for the sake of
discussion tonight, I do want to review exactly what that is. It is
what is called asexual reproduction. I have a chart here to my left.
The top row here shows the normal fertilization where the sperm unites
with the egg, it forms a single cell, a fertilized egg, or single cell
embryo; and this next picture here shows a 3-day-old embryo and then a
5- to 7-day-old embryo.
In human beings, humans have 46 chromosomes, 23 are resident in the
sperm, 23 are resident in the nucleus of the egg. They come together,
23 plus 23 equals 46, creating a new human being. This is how we all
begin our path through eternity here on Earth and beyond, as a uniting
of 23 chromosomes from the sperm and the egg.
In cloning, what is done is we take the egg and we either inactivate
the nucleus with 23 chromosomes in it or, as shown in this particular
diagram, we have removed it, so we create an egg that has no nucleus in
it, no genetic material, no chromosomes. Then we take a donor cell, and
in this diagram it is depicted like the skin cell, and we take the
nucleus out of it. We call these somatic cells, and that is where the
term ``somatic cell nuclear transfer'' comes from. The cells in our
body, the skin cells, the cells in our heart, in our muscles, we call
them somatic cells. Somatic means body.
The process involves taking the nucleus out of that and putting the
nucleus into the egg. When that is done, that is called somatic cell
nuclear transfer. If the process works, 3 days later we have an embryo
that is essentially indistinguishable from this embryo here, except
this embryo here is a unique individual created by the combination of
the chromosomes here. This embryo is actually the identical twin of the
person who donated this cell. So if I were to donate my cell and
somebody were to go through this procedure, this embryo developing
would be my twin brother, my identical twin brother. That is why we
call it cloning.
This is the exact procedure that was used to create Dolly the sheep.
What they did in that particular instance is they took an egg from one
sheep, they deactivated the nucleus, they took an udder cell, which is
essentially a breast duct cell, and extracted the nucleus from that,
and they created a new sheep which was a clone of this one. And then
once it grows in culture, we have to put it inside the womb of a
surrogate mother and, ultimately, Dolly the sheep was to be produced.
The reason I am going through all of this in exquisite detail is some
people are trying to say this is not really cloning, that you are not
really creating a human if you do this; and in humans they like to call
it things like ``nuclear transfer.'' When we start playing language
games like that, we are essentially trying to tell us all that Dolly is
not a sheep. I mean if we do this with a person, we will get a person.
It will start out like we all do as a baby and then grow up to become
an adolescent.
Now, what are some of the problems with this? Well, the number of
problems are huge. They are absolutely gigantic. It took 270 tries to
create Dolly the sheep. Many lambs were born with very, very severe
birth defects. Many of the offspring amongst the five species that have
been cloned so far emerged very, very large, very large placentas and
umbilical chords. A woman might look 9 months pregnant when she is only
4\1/2\ months along. Also, very defective fetuses. Indeed, there was
one research study that showed that all offspring from the procedure of
cloning so far have genetic abnormalities. So this is human
experimentation, and it is human experimentation of the absolute worst
kind.
Now, a lot of people feel that the solution to all of this is to just
ban reproductive cloning, make it illegal to produce a baby, but allow
researchers in the lab to produce these embryos unrestricted for
research purposes. They even hold out that somehow this could be used
in clinical medicine someday.
I am a physician. I take care of patients with Alzheimer's disease,
diabetes. I still see patients once a month. My father had diabetes,
died of complications of diabetes. This is very, very fanciful science,
to make claims that we must allow this research to proceed because it
is going to lead to all of these ``cures.'' In my opinion, that is
patently absurd.
Indeed, what they really are talking about is extracting some of
these cells out of these so-called cloned embryos and doing what they
call therapeutic cloning where they claim they can grow replacement
tissues for people that have diseases.
One of the things that I have been arguing for, for well over a year
now is that the arena of adult stem cells actually shows much more
promise. Embryonic stem cells, there have been some problems in
research studies where they tend to grow too much and actually can
become tumor-like in their growth. We have been using adult stem cells
in clinical research now for years, actually 20 years. There are some
50 clinical trials using adult stem cells. Indeed, just today, there
was an article published in Nature, the most recent issue of Nature,
and I think this came out of the University of Minnesota, that showed
that they could get adult stem cells to become any tissue type, and
they could get them to reproduce over and over and over again,
essentially validating what people like myself have been saying for
quite some time. The study is entitled ``Pluripotency of Mesenchymal,
Stem Cells Derived From Adult Marrow.''
What they did in the study is they clearly showed that adult stem
cells can reproduce and reproduce and reproduce as embryonic stem cells
can, and that they can become any tissue type, essentially laying the
debate to rest
[[Page H3763]]
that one has to have embryonic stem cells.
Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield, I wondered if it
might be a good opportunity to take just 2 minutes to recognize the
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Pitts), because I am very interested,
Mr. Speaker, in eliciting more information about the promise of adult
stem cell research from the gentleman from Florida, which seems to me
is the most deafening, in addition to the moral and ethical arguments
against somatic cell transfer, therapeutic cloning for research, the
most deafening argument beyond the morality is the promise of adult
stem cell research.
So with that, with the gentleman's permission, I will yield to the
gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Pitts), the leader of the Values
Action Team in the United States House of Representatives for the
majority. He is without a doubt the strongest pro-family voice in the
United States Congress.
Mr. PITTS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his leadership on
this issue and for setting up this Special Order on their very timely
issue.
A syndicated columnist, Charles Krauthammer, says that cloning is ``a
nightmare and an abomination.'' I would concur with that. Cloning is
like something from a bad science fiction movie. The only difference is
that now, some scientists are actually on the verge of doing it. Now,
these scientists try to deflect our criticism by claiming that they
have no intention of cloning a person. They say they just want to clone
human embryos so that they can take their stem cells, and they promise
that they will kill the embryos before they grow to adulthood. So some
have characterized them as cloning to kill.
Well, no one has said it better than The Washington Post. The Post
said a few years ago: ``The creation of human embryos specifically for
research that will destroy them is unconscionable.'' There is no
difference between what they want to call ``research cloning'' and what
they want to call ``reproductive cloning.'' The only difference is when
they kill the human life that they have created.
Mr. Speaker, these unscrupulous scientists claim that the research
they want to do could cure diseases one day. But the truth is, there is
no evidence for that. Stem cells, as has been noted by the gentleman
from Florida (Mr. Weldon), taken from adults have shown much more
promise in research than stem cells taken from embryos. Besides, these
same people insisted a few years ago that we had to let them do fetal
tissue research, despite people's moral objections to taking tissue of
aborted fetuses for research, because they said they might cure
diseases.
Well, Mr. Speaker, where are those cures?
These people are like the boy who cried wolf. There is no reason we
should believe them. Cloning human beings is wrong, simply wrong. Even
if they could cure diseases through cloning, it would still be wrong.
The vast majority of the American people want it banned, the House of
Representatives has voted to ban it, the President of the United States
wants to ban it, and we are all just waiting for the other body to do
the right thing. I just hope we do not have to wait too long.
Mr. Speaker, I hope all of my colleagues will remember, if we do
nothing, if the other body never acts and if there is no bill to send
to the President, cloning, any kind of cloning, will be completely
legal, and there be nothing we can do to stop it.
Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his profound moral
clarity and for his continued leadership on issues related to the
sanctity of human life.
With that I would like to yield back to the gentleman from Florida
(Mr. Weldon). Specifically, if I may ask my colleague, as I said
earlier in this hour that we have, it would be sufficient for me if we
simply were arguing on the history and morality of Western
civilization. The truth that rings out of our best traditions that he
is God, and we are not, would be sufficient for me. But, Mr. Speaker,
as the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon) began to address, and I
would ask him to elaborate on, the promise of adult stem cell research
in itself argues against the expansion of or extension of science into
the so-called embryonic or therapeutic cloning research. I would be
grateful to have the gentleman elaborate on that.
Mr. WELDON of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for
yielding. Adult stem cells have been used in over 45 human clinical
trials to treat human beings. Embryo stem cells have never been used
successfully in any human clinical trial.
{time} 1730
Indeed, embryo stem cells have not really been used successfully in
any animal clinical trial up until recently. There was a study recently
published, and I need to give the advocates for embryo stem cell
research at least an honest appraisal, there was recently a research
article in an animal model of Parkinson's disease, I believe, in rats,
where they showed improvement in response to embryo stem cells in that
particular case.
But hold that up against the tremendous amount of research that has
been done with adult stem cells, and hold that up against this recent
article that was just published in Nature showing the pluripotency of
mesenchymal stem cells derived from adult marrow, suggesting none of
the ethical and moral issues associated with embryo stem cells.
Certainly cloning needs to be brought into play.
I will just point out, the advocates for embryo stem cell research
may start quoting this recent article reported in Nature, using embryo
stem cells to treat a rat model of Parkinson's disease as a reason they
need to rush ahead with all of this. As I understand it, and I do not
have the citation, there has been published, in abstract form at least,
a case where an adult brain stem cell was used successfully to treat
Parkinson's disease in a human being.
The point I am raising here is the adult stem cell research is way
ahead of the embryo stem cell research. The embryo stem cell research
is quite hypothetical. It is even more hypothetical to say that we have
to do cloning, that cloning is somehow necessary.
What I honestly think is going on here, if the gentleman will
continue to yield, is I think the research community and a lot of
people in the scientific and biotechnology community know that
therapeutic cloning is never likely to happen. What they really want to
do, and this is speculation on my part, is they want to create cloned
models of disease; in other words, taking somebody with a disease and
making a clone of them, and then allow that clone to be used and
manipulated in the lab so they can do research on that clone.
Indeed, I think the reason the biotechnology industry is so
interested in this is they see this as an opportunity to patent that,
and, in effect, one would be patenting a human being, and then exploit
that for monetary gain; basically be able to sell these clones as
models of disease so people could try to do genetic manipulations on
them, or pharmacologic manipulations on them in the lab.
I just want to point out that this is the slippery slope. It is a
big-time slippery slope. They talk about extracting stem cells from
these things here, these embryos, and then growing them into the
tissues that are needed. But there is excellent research that has been
done in creating artificial wombs, and they have a very, very nice
artificial womb that you can grow an embryo in up to 30 days, if I am
not mistaken. So why would we not just take the fertilized egg, it
would be much cheaper and quicker, put it in the artificial womb, grow
it into the fetal stage, and then extract the tissue that is needed?
We may say, well, they would never do that; that sounds so terrible.
But a year ago when we were debating embryo stem cell research, many of
the people advocating embryo stem cell research were saying they would
never sanction or approve the creation of embryos for scientific
exploitation and then destruction. But yet that is now the very thing
they are advocating for. So I think this is a very, very serious
slippery slope.
Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, I do not know if the gentleman is familiar
with the famous Nuremberg Code that was developed and emerged following
the doctors' trial at Nuremberg in the late 1940s.
Mr. WELDON of Florida. I am.
Mr. PENCE. Most physicians are.
[[Page H3764]]
One of the principal tenets of the Nuremberg Code was that human
subjects must consent to experiments; death or injury must not be
anticipated results of the experiment; and the researcher must obtain
the information they need by any other means possible before humans,
including adequate animal experimentation.
There are other pieces of the Nuremberg Code that require that the
researcher is admonished to test his disease first and foremost on
animals, and no experiment should be undertaken after all of those have
been followed and unless it can be foreseen to ``yield fruitful results
for the good of society unprocurable by other methods.''
Now, it seems to me that the lessons of Nuremberg, and I would ask
the gentleman to speak to that, the lessons of Nuremberg encapsulated
in the Nuremberg Code are violated in several significant ways from the
standpoint of medical ethics with regard to human experimentation, and
most profoundly with regard to the fact that, as the gentleman from
Florida (Mr. Weldon) has said here today, that these advances are
procurable by other means than experimentation on human beings.
I wondered, I would ask the gentleman, am I right in my
interpretation of the Nuremberg Code and its relevance to this?
Mr. WELDON of Florida. If the gentleman will continue to yield, yes,
the gentleman brings up an extremely important point. The Nuremberg
Code emerged in the aftermath of the atrocities committed by many
physicians who were acting complicitly with the Nazis.
A great deal of scientific information was obtained from some of that
research; for example, how long can a human survive in very, very cold
water. When I was in medical school, many physicians in training, and,
as well, many of our professors, felt so strongly what was done was
evil that we should not even use the information; that we should just
throw the information away, that it was so bad. The Code, of course,
emerged.
The critical issue here is some people do not consider the embryo
human because it does not have an organized central nervous system; it
cannot respond to stimulation. But the critical issue here is where do
we draw the line? It is human life; it is a developing human life. We
all began that way.
Just as a year ago, they were saying we would never create an embryo
to extract stem cells from, we only want to use the excess embryos from
the fertility lab. Now they are saying, oh, we have to create these
embryos to cure all these diseases. The next step will be, we have to
do continued research and allow these embryos to grow in the lab to the
point where they are developing a nervous system. So to me, the safest
thing and the best thing to do is to make it illegal to create a clone
at the very beginning.
I just want to point out, a lot of people who advocate cloning for
research purposes, they all say, but I would never want to see
reproductive cloning move ahead. I want to make a couple of points
about that. If we have labs all over America creating cloned embryos,
it will only be a matter of time before one of these embryos is
implanted in a woman, because the implantation process occurs within
the privacy of the doctor-patient relationship.
It would be impossible, and as a matter of fact, I have a letter from
the Justice Department saying it would be impossible for them to police
that. They would have to go into all these labs and keep track of all
the embryos. It would be impossible for them as police agencies to know
if a human embryo was replaced with an animal embryo and one was
surreptitiously implanted in a woman. So the only way to effectively
prevent this, in my opinion, is to ban it from the very, very
beginning.
Also, we took testimony in my committee where the representative from
the professional association of doctors who treat infertility kept
saying in his testimony, a Dr. Cowan, how they did not support
reproductive cloning at this time. He said it twice.
During the questioning period, I said to him, ``Why are you saying
`at this time?' '' And he made it very, very clear to me in his
response to my questioning that they would like embryo cloning to
proceed and research cloning to proceed so they could work through all
the technical problems in cloning, such as large fetuses, threat to the
health of the mother, and once all those problems were worked through,
they would like to be able to offer reproductive cloning to infertile
couples.
I thought that was a very, very significant statement, because it
made it very, very clear to me that if we do not ban cloning at its
very, very beginning, eventually we will have reproductive cloning.
Either it will be done surreptitiously from embryos that have been
spirited out of these labs and implanted in women, or it will be done
openly by fertility experts.
So if the American people do not want cloning, the best way to
prevent cloning from occurring is to ban it in its very beginning.
I want to just add one more thing, if the gentleman will continue to
yield.
Mr. PENCE. Certainly.
Mr. WELDON of Florida. Mr. Speaker, many liberals voted for the
cloning ban. I thought that was one of the unique features that emerged
from the debate on human cloning here in the House of Representatives.
We had people of very, very divergent opinion. We had some Christian
people, some Jewish people, Democrats, Republicans; we had liberals and
conservatives.
Why is that? Why did people unite around this ban on human cloning?
They came at it from different perspectives, and for many liberals it
was a woman's rights issue.
This is an incredibly important point. It is getting inadequate
discussion, in my opinion. If we are going to allow research cloning to
proceed, these labs are going to need hundreds and possibly thousands
of eggs. Where are they going to get these eggs? They are going to get
them from women. How do you get eggs from a woman? You have to expose
them to drugs. You have to give them drugs to cause something called
superovulation. One of these drugs that they use has a 30 percent
incidence of causing depression. Then you have to anesthetize the woman
to extract the eggs.
Who will do that? What woman would put themselves through that, or
submit themselves to exposure to a drug that has potential side effects
including depression, and then submit to a general anesthetic to
extract these eggs? We know who will do that: women who are desperate;
poor women, women who are desperately in need of money. It will
ultimately end up in exploitation of women.
I just want to read this quote from Judy Norsigian. She is the author
of a book, 2 million copies have been printed and sold, Our Bodies,
Ourselves. She is prochoice. But what does she say? ``Because embryo
cloning will compromise women's health, turn their eggs and wombs into
commodities, compromise their reproductive autonomy, and, with virtual
certainty, lead to the production of `experimental' human beings, we
are convinced that the line must be drawn here.''
She was not alone. She was not the only person on the left who rose
up. Stuart Newman and several others rose up and said, on this issue we
agree with the conservatives, that human cloning should be banned. It
is for that reason that we had such an extraordinary vote in the House
of Representatives.
I feel very, very strongly that if we cannot get the other body to
act on this issue, we minimally need to make it illegal to patent a
human clone. I feel also very, very strongly that this is not only
unethical, it is unnecessary.
The research data is showing more and more the huge, tremendous
potential of adult stem cells, and that the embryo stem cells indeed
may actually prove to be less advantageous to use. I honestly think as
the science progresses on this that therapeutic cloning and
reproductive cloning by the scientific community will ultimately be
abandoned, and that the ultimate place that many of these advocates of
cloning want to go to is creating cloned models of human disease that
can be manipulated in the lab for the development of genetic treatments
and for the development of pharmacological agents, and that they
ultimately want to patent these things so they can make money off of
them. I think that is what is ultimately going to end up driving this
whole debate in the United States.
Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Florida for his
extraordinary remarks about not only unnecessary, but unethical
therapeutic cloning.
[[Page H3765]]
I am very humbled, Mr. Speaker, not only to be joined by the
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon), the author of what we were able to
do in the House in the area of banning reproductive cloning, but also
to have been joined by the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith), one
of the leading members of the Pro-Family Alliance.
But perhaps more than anyone in this institution, with the possible
exception of the gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Hyde), the gentleman from
New Jersey (Mr. Smith) is and has been for many, many years the leading
voice for the sanctity of human life in the United States Congress. He
holds the powerful chairmanship of the Committee on Veterans' Affairs,
but he speaks with enormous moral authority on issues related to life.
I yield to the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith).
{time} 1745
Mr. SMITH of New Jersey. Mr. Speaker, I thank my good friend, the
gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Pence), for yielding me this time, for
taking out this time on this very important Special Order to look at
the issue of cloning.
The gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon) certainly has been the leader
of this historic legislation. He is the prime sponsor of the bill that
passed in the House. It ought to be acted on in the other body as soon
as possible for the sake of humanity, and for the sake of so many who
would be injured irreparably by delay. Delay is denial, and I hope that
Mr. Daschle and the leadership on the Senate side will rethink the
dilatory tactics they have engaged in to preclude consideration of this
important human rights legislation.
In the 21st century, bioethical issues, Mr. Speaker, really are the
human rights issues, especially in Western democracies like the United
States. I have spent 22 years working on human rights issues, including
religious freedom and trafficking in persons. I was the prime sponsor
of the antitrafficking legislation. Yesterday we had a day-long hearing
on this scourge of human trafficking, which injures, hurts and ends in
the rape of women; but in countries like the United States, where we
have a sophisticated medical capability and a scientific capability,
bioethical issues are really a human rights issue.
What we do for those prior to birth, those who are fragile, whether
it be the issue of abortion or euthanasia or infanticide or, in this
case cloning, we need to step up to the plate and not become enablers
by inaction. We have become enablers of atrocities and human rights
abuses. We cannot stand on the sidelines.
The gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon), our leadership especially,
including Speaker Hastert and the rest of our leadership team, and a
bipartisan, real healthy majority stepped up to the plate to pass this
legislation, and the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Pence) has been a real
leader in this Congress on these human rights issues, especially as it
relates to the sanctity of human life.
Mr. Speaker, just let me say that promoting human cloning for
research is indeed shockingly shortsighted, and it lacks a moral basis.
I understand the drive to cure debilitating diseases and to improve
health care for those who are suffering, because I have been fighting
for funding for disease cures for 22 years as a Member of Congress.
I would just note parenthetically, I am the co-chairman of the Autism
Caucus, I am co-chairman of the Alzheimer's Caucus. As my good friend
indicated earlier, I am chairman of the full Committee on Veterans'
Affairs. Half of our budget, approximately, is dedicated to health
care. We have a significant research budget that we try to use as
wisely as possible to help our spinal cord-injured veterans and a whole
host of other problems from post-traumatic stress disorder right on
through.
Let me just say, having fought like the gentleman from Florida (Mr.
Weldon) and so many others trying to find cures for Alzheimer's,
Parkinson's, cancer, lung disease, asthma, spina bifida, autism and a
host of other debilitating diseases, it is cruel, I would respectfully
submit, it is utterly cruel to tell those who suffer from these
diseases that somehow they will be cured through the making of a clone
of themselves to cannibalize for parts.
It is also cruel to divert limited resources from promising, ethical
adult and umbilical stem cell research to unethical, impractical human
cloning research. There is only so much money available; and as the
gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon) pointed out a moment ago, in the
area of regenerative medicine, adult stem cells, embryonic, cord blood,
these hold enormous promise that goes underutilized when we go on this
fantasy of creating clones.
Again, embryonic stem cell research derived from clones is unethical.
On the other hand, we have the promise of real breakthroughs and then
real application, as we are already doing with adult stem cells and
umbilical cord stem cells. This research has no ethical baggage. These
provide cures, they provide hope, and they provide rehabilitation and
regenerative capabilities.
Mr. Speaker, human cloning is not just a slippery slope. It is indeed
stepping off a moral cliff. If our government approved human cloning
for research, it would be the first time we would sanction the special
creation of human life for the sole purpose of destroying it. Not only
would we be sanctioning human cloning, we would also have a law that
would require the death of those human clones, whether it be at 5 days
or 14 days or whatever new arbitrary line would be drawn.
Human cloning represents the commodification and eventual
commercialization of human life, and it would create a class of human
beings who exist not as ends in themselves, like all of us, but as a
means to achieve the ends of others. A law that promotes human cloning
for research is worse, far worse than no bill at all.
Once stockpiles of cloned human embryos are created for research, how
realistic will it be really to have an implementation ban? Not only is
allowing research cloning immoral, it would also not work. We do not
fight the war on drugs by telling the public to manufacture as much
cocaine as possible, pile it up in warehouses, but make sure to destroy
it before anyone can smoke it or inhale it. If anyone suggested that
strategy on the floor of the House, they would be criticized from here
to breakfast; but that is exactly what the proponents of human cloning
for research are advocating, and with a straight face. In addition,
they are not talking about how these human embryo forms would be
created.
Human embryos, if my colleagues read ``Brave New World'' and can look
at the Orwellian visions we have had in the past, they can happen and
will happen if the gentleman from Florida's (Mr. Weldon) historic
legislation is not enacted and enacted soon.
The clock is running out on this, and I just want to say and
reiterate what the good doc said a moment ago about the negative impact
that this will have on women. If, as the proponents of research cloning
claim happens, they will someday be able to cure human beings, which we
do not think will happen, but say it does happen, we will see more
drugs being used, super-ovulating drugs, to promote this egg
harvesting.
I want to reiterate what the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon) has
on his plaque up there which was from, ``Our Bodies, Ourselves for the
New Century,'' and it was written by a woman who does not agree with me
or many of us on the pro-life issue of the right to life of the unborn,
but she points out, Judy Norsigian, ``Because embryo cleaning will
compromise women's health, turn their eggs and wombs into commodities,
compromise their reproductive autonomy and, with virtual certainty,
lead to the production of `experimental' human beings, we are convinced
that the line must be drawn here.''
She has joined us, as the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon) pointed
out, a number of other people who have never supported a pro-life piece
of legislation to cross the line and say, wait a minute, time out, we
are not going to go across that Orwellian line and manufacture human
beings for the sole purpose of destroying them and then cannibalizing
their remains.
This is important human rights legislation that the gentleman from
Florida (Mr. Weldon) has introduced, has gotten passed in the House
with a bipartisan majority of both sides. We have got to pass it soon;
and again, I call on the Senate, do not be enablers of
[[Page H3766]]
human rights abuses. We have got to find a way of getting this
legislation down to President Bush. He has already signaled clearly and
unmistakably, most recently in a White House ceremony, that he will
sign this in a heartbeat. We have got to do this for the next
generation and for the generations to come.
Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr.
Smith) for his passion and extraordinary complement of his
participation in this and would yield for a moment before we close this
Special Order to the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Weldon).
Mr. WELDON of Florida. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman; and I just
want to add, under President Clinton, he established the National
Bioethics Advisory Commission, and they said, The commission began its
discussions of cloning, fully recognizing that any efforts, any humans
to transfer a somatic cell nucleus into an enucleated egg involves the
creation of an embryo with the apparent potential to be implanted in
utero and developed to term, what they mean by that is a baby, and that
is really what this is all about.
Is it a human life? What is going to happen to it? Are we going to
create, exploit it and discard it? Are we going to allow them to be
manufactured into human beings, the first man-created human in the
history of the world?
I say we do not cross that Orwellian line; we draw the line here, the
line of morality and ethics and say, no, we do not want to go there.
Mr. PENCE. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Florida (Mr.
Weldon) for his thoughtful comments today and the gentleman from New
Jersey (Mr. Smith), the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Pitts). Mr.
Speaker, I am grateful for these men of colossal stature in this
institution and in this country to join us.
It seems to me, Mr. Speaker, as I close, we must decide whether we
will master science or be mastered by it. It is the fundamental moral
and ethical question of our time. As the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr.
Smith) said, we must prevent human life from becoming a wholesale
commodity that is created and consumed.
In closing, Mr. Speaker, we must be about the values of the American
people, people like Mike and Denice Dora, farmers in Rush County,
Indiana, of 15 years, our friends; but they are people who look and
open up that ancient book upon which our founders placed so much trust
that says, ``Remember this and consider, recall it to mind, you
transgressors, remember the former things of old; for I am God, and
there is no other; I am God, and there is none like me.''
This debate must center around that conviction, those values; and if
it does, we will prevent this moral horror of human cloning at any
level, for any purpose, from becoming a reality in American
civilization.
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