Personal pleas ring at stem cell hearing
Legislators weigh views on science and morality
With arguments ranging from the highly personal to the highly technical, witnesses testified before state lawmakers yesterday about the pros and cons of human embryonic stem cell research, forcing legislators to weigh deep moral and scientific questions surrounding a bill intended to stimulate the state's biotechnology sector.
Paralyzed from the waist down by a spinal cord injury, Glenn Mangurian of Hingham rolled his wheelchair before the Legislature's Joint Economic Development Committee to argue in favor of a bill that encourages embryonic stem cell research, research that could lead to a cure for his condition. Mangurian's message was simple: Kill the bill, and his hope dies with it.
"Hope's the foundation of our society," Mangurian said. "Medical research offers hope to many and fear to a few. It's always been that way. Hope, however, always wins over fear."
Moments later, a frail and quaking Patricia Payne of Winsted, Conn., who has Parkinson's disease, came before the committee to say she would rather endure the fierce symptoms of her disease than be cured through the destruction and cloning of human embryos.
"How I want to relieve my suffering," said Payne, a former classical dancer. "But my suffering isn't the real issue. The real issue is what we are being asked to do in the hope of relieving our suffering."
Through eight hours of debate, the complicated contours of the stem cell issue unfolded before more than 100 people in the State House, where lawmakers are navigating a topic that not only involves powerful institutions such as Harvard University and the Roman Catholic Church, but also deeply personal pleas that in some cases touch upon their own experiences. Unlike many Beacon Hill hearings, yesterday's session featured intense dialogue between witnesses and lawmakers struggling with moral, scientific, and ethical considerations.
"We were not elected to be scientists, but we were elected to be custodians of the public trust," said Senator Mark C. Montigny, a New Bedford Democrat who supports embryonic stem cell research but is wrestling with how best to oversee and regulate the industry's controversial experiments.
The stakes in the debate are high. The Legislature appears to be moving toward passage of a bill sponsored by Senate President Robert E. Travaglini that supports the extraction of stem cells from embryos produced in a process called therapeutic cloning. Travaglini, whose East Boston home has been picketed this week by about a dozen Roman Catholic protesters because of the stem cell bill, said this week he is confident of the measure's passage.
But last week, Governor Mitt Romney announced he could not support therapeutic cloning, vowing to veto the measure. It is unclear whether Travaglini can assemble the two-thirds majorities that would be needed in both chambers to override a Romney veto.
The testimony, provided yesterday by scientific specialists, theologians, and those with chronic illnesses, could make a difference for many undecided lawmakers. The issue had not sparked large-scale debate on Beacon Hill when it arose in the past. Until recently in the State House, staunch opposition by former House speaker Thomas M. Finneran made it common knowledge that any bill on the issue was probably doomed.
Yesterday, the discussion largely centered on one moral and scientific question: When does human life begin?
Marjorie Clay, a medical ethicist at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, told lawmakers that the embryos are not human beings, and she disputed whether the cell groups being experimented on are embryos.
As Clay sees it, only fertilized eggs that have developed to the blastocyst stage, about five days after an egg is fertilized, and implanted in a woman's uterus can be described as embryos.
"I think it is the scientific way to think about it," Clay said.
But the Rev. Tad Pacholczyk, a molecular biologist educated at Yale University who serves as director of education for the National Catholic
"The question that really matters is whether or not each of us exists in a direct continuity with those humble embryonic origins or not, and it is a biological affirmation that we do," Pacholczyk told lawmakers. "If any intervention had been done against you or me at the time that we were embryos, we wouldn't be able to be here today having this discussion."
At several points during yesterday's hearings, lawmakers peppered witnesses with questions and comments that reflected on their own lives.
Representative Deborah D. Blumer, Democrat of Framingham, took the stand to express her support for stem cell research. Blumer's mother and sister died from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, commonly known as Lou Gehrig's disease.
"These are two women who were Massachusetts residents . . . and lost their lives because there is no cure for ALS," she said. "Stem cell research is one hope for these people. It is one avenue we can pursue. . . . The emotional loss to your family and the price everybody pays for not doing this research is too much."
Yet, time and again, when lawmakers heard from those voicing praise for the promises of embryonic stem cell research, others with equally compelling tales countered them.
Maria C. Parker -- associate director for public policy of the Massachusetts Catholic Conference, the lobbying arm of the Catholic Church -- told of her father dying after spending a week in a diabetic coma. Yet, she insisted, her father would have resisted treatments founded on research that required the destruction of human embryos. She likened the research work to experiments that took place in Nazi Germany.
"Science does not have to kill in order to cure," Parker said.
Globe correspondent Janette Neuwahl contributed to this report.
