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Embryonic stem cell research -- another (non-)constitutional right
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Today President Obama signed an executive order lifting the ban on federal funding of embryonic stem cell research ostensibly to further the search for treatments and cures for serious diseases and disabilities. Under the prior administration, President Bush instituted the ban, insisting that the ban was necessary to protect the sanctity of human life. From a Libertarian perspective, both administrations are wrong and for two different reasons.
President Bush instituted the ban largely under religious pretexts. More succinctly, as an anti-abortion measure, Bush’s ban on the funding at least put the administration’s seal of disapproval on utilizing undeveloped human embryos as research tools in advanced fields of medical science. Bush utilized the issue of embryonic stem cell research funding as a means to propagate his pro-life agenda. Worse still, in direct violation of the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause, he utilized his Christian beliefs as an excuse for his actions. The good that came out of it though is that the public coffers were not raided for the project.
Then along comes Barack Obama and the ban is lifted.
Under the new executive order, millions (if not billions) of taxpayer dollars will stream into funding embryonic stem cell research. The new publicly funded research, like so many of Barack Obama’s programs, are direct affronts to the United States Constitution. Indeed, even without drawing liberal inferences from Federal case law, it would be difficult if not impossible to realize where in the Constitution this sort of federal meddling is authorized. From Obama’s perspective, perhaps it is written into the Constitution right before or right after the language entitling people to free healthcare, free housing, and free gas in their cars.
What Presidents Bush and Obama (and all of the Demicans and Republicrats) fail to understand is that stem cell research – among numerous other subjects - is not the business of the federal government. Indeed it is not the government’s place to dictate the propriety of, nor the funding for, any type of research that is not related to the military or infrastructure. Instead, embryonic stem cell research is best funded by private grants and research, and the propriety of the research can only be delineated by the immediate viability of the embryonic material. If these two do not coalesce, then the research will fail. Ultimately, private research funded by private citizens making private decisions will further the cause of science far more than the intrusive and obstructive meddling of an overblown and largely inept and incompetent federal government.
In the end, the entire argument may be moot. Recent research and developments in medical science have shown that adult stem cells (i.e. those not taken from embryos) may be just as, if not more useful in the development of treatments and cures. Also, some studies reveal that embryonic cells tend to create tumors and cancers more often than adult cells. Nonetheless, the issue certainly presents a vivid snapshot of a government obsessed with meddling in the lives of its citizens with no regard, or even a callous disregard, of the Constitution that governs them.
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