Moral status, human identity, and early embryos: a critique of the President's approach.

David DeGrazia On August 9, 2001, President George W. Bush delivered a statement that would have a great effect on bioethics policy in the United States.1 The President stated his belief that human life is a sacred gift from the Creator, expressed his strong opposition to any type of human cloning, and announced a policy of restricting federal funds for embryonic stem cell research to studies on stem cell lines already in existence at the time of his statement. He also announced his intention to create the President’s Council on Bioethics (PCB), headed by Leon Kass, “to monitor stem cell research, to recommend appropriate guidelines and regulations, and to consider all of the medical and ethical ramifications of biomedical innovation.” On November 28, 2001, President Bush formally created the PCB, which began its deliberations the following January. In discussing his newly announced policy on stem cell research, the President crisply stated two convictions at the heart of his moral thinking: “There is at least one bright line: we do not end some lives for the medical benefit of others. For me, this is a matter of conviction: a belief that life, including early life, is biologically human, genetically distinct and valuable.”2 The first conviction is classically deontological: we may not intentionally kill human beings even for the medical benefit of other human beings. The second conviction, on which I will focus, concerns when human life, in the biological sense, has moral status: as soon as it comes into being. More strongly, since Bush clearly means that the value of human life is precisely the value that prohibits killing some to benefit others, human life in the biological sense has full moral status – including a right to life – as soon as it comes into being. (By “a right to life” I will mean a very strong moral protection against being killed.) And when, exactly, does it come into being? In this view, “nascent human life” begins at conception when sperm and egg unite, producing a single-cell zygote. Importantly, the PCB, created after Bush determined his policy regarding stem cell research, did not author this policy in the form of a prior recommendation; it was a fait accompli. Nevertheless, in addition to providing an overview of the ethical and policy issues, and an update of scientific developments, the PCB’s report on stem cell research endeavors “to clarify and explain the current federal policy regarding stem cell research and to make clear the legal, ethical, and prudential foundations on which the policy rests....”3 To this extent, the PCB articulates Bush’s position on embry-