Mitt Romney was accused of a sop to social conservatives when, in his last months as Massachusetts governor, he imposed a controversial limit on stem cell research that said scientists could not use stem cell lines from embryos created for the sole purpose of scientific exploration.
As his presidential campaign contended yesterday, he may have been vindicated by yesterday's announcement that scientists have created stem cells without having to make or destroy embryos. It pointed out that Romney has long called for a less ethically charged alternative, and it highlighted an opinion piece published online yesterday that praises Romney for his position.
"In the highly contentious political battle over federal funding for stem cell research, one cannot help but note that of all the current presidential candidates, only Governor Mitt Romney embraced an unambiguous and principled stance on the alternatives, incorporating them into his proposed domestic policy," the Rev. Thomas Berg, a Roman Catholic priest and executive director of the Westchester Institute for Ethics and the Human Person, wrote in National Review Online.
Romney has long said he is keenly aware that such research could lead to cures for diseases such as multiple sclerosis, with which his wife, Ann, was diagnosed in 1998. But his views on the ethics of such research have not always been so clear. When he ran for governor in 2002, he endorsed embryonic stem cell research in broad terms, saying at one campaign stop that he would lobby President Bush to embrace it.
Romney reversed his position in February 2005, when the Legislature was considering a bill to promote embryonic stem cell research. Romney met with researchers on both sides of the issue and concluded, he said, that it was ethical to experiment only on embryos left over from fertility treatments, not to clone human embryos for research. Those conversations, Romney has said, also changed him from a supporter of abortion rights to an opponent. When the stem-cell bill reached his desk in May 2005, he vetoed it.
"The common good at stake in this debate is the preservation of the dignity of human life, and the laying of the groundwork for advancements in the treatment of disease," Romney wrote in his veto message to the Legislature. "Sadly, we have sacrificed the former in our hasty pursuit of the latter."
Romney issued a regulation in August 2006 that said embryos could not be produced "with the sole intent of using the embryo for research."
Democrats said Romney, eyeing a presidential run, was trying to burnish his credentials as a social conservative. Last month, Governor Deval Patrick, a Democrat, had the Public Health Council rescind the rule, saying the state's leadership in life sciences and economic growth depended on eliminating the barrier.
Scientists in Japan and the United States announced yesterday, however, that they had turned human skin cells into what appear to be embryonic stem cells.
Dr. Leonard I. Zon, director of stem cell research at Children's Hospital Boston, said yesterday that he was not sure the new research would meet Romney's ethical standards because the embryonic-like cells could become brain cells, sperm, or eggs, raising their own moral concerns.
"One might wonder what the ethics are as you move forward in the research," said Zon, who met with Romney's aides to discuss the science in 2005.
But hours after the research was announced, Romney's campaign circulated Berg's op-ed and another from June in which Romney called on Congress to fund research into alternatives such as the skin cell reprogramming to "bring science and ethics together to promote life, protect life, and save lives."
Michael Levenson can be reached at mlevenson@globe.com.
