[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 11]
[House]
[Pages 15189-15199]
[From the U.S. 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.
  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

[[Page 15190]]

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 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

[[Page 15191]]

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 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).

[[Page 15192]]


  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 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

[[Page 15193]]

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. 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. 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 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.

[[Page 15194]]

  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.
  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

[[Page 15195]]

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. 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.
       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

[[Page 15196]]

     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 motor atrophy 
     (SMA),'' says researcher Jeffrey Rothstein, M.D., Ph.D.

[[Page 15197]]

       ``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

[[Page 15198]]

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.
  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

[[Page 15199]]


     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
     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.

                          ____________________