One Decision, More to Go

President Bush tried to glide onto a safe political middle ground in his speech on embryonic stem cell research Thursday, acknowledging that “rapid progress in this research will only come with federal funds” but limiting those funds to “existing stem cell lines”--cell colonies grown from previously “harvested” embryos. Did Bush give a big nod to anti-abortion forces who object to the use of the embryonic “potential life”? Yes, he did. But most important, he kept the door open to this vital research.

The restrictions he imposed, if taken strictly and literally, would be bad news for research and for Americans dependent on its breakthroughs. Scientists unhappy about the restrictions know that in the end, what matters most is what is yet to come.

First, how will Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy G. Thompson write the rules? If he is absolute about using only already harvested cell lines, scientists rightly fear a lack of raw materials. Most existing cell lines are believed to be owned by private biotech companies, and many publicly funded scientists are unsure they will have access to them.

The second point of uncertainty concerns Bush’s decision to name University of Chicago bioethicist Leon Kass as the head of a newly created president’s council to monitor stem cell research. Kass favors government restrictions tighter than those supported by most genetics researchers and has urged Congress to “pour our resources into adult stem cell research ... [to] avoid the morally and legally vexing issues in embryo research.”

Yet as the president himself acknowledged in his speech, “most scientists, at least today, believe that research on embryonic stem cells offers” more promise than research on adult cells.

Kass Friday promised to avoid stacking the council with “his own people” and to “allow the debate to be developed and heard.” Congress should see that he does.

Neither of these scientific doubts, however, should take away from the overall accomplishment of Bush’s speech, which Carl Feldbaum, president of the Biotechnology Industry Organization, called “good, clear and balanced.”

Bush actually embraced the idea of stem cell research more straightforwardly than did the Clinton administration, which in 1999 said federal funding was unnecessary “because it appears that human embryonic stem cells will be available from the private sector” and eventually issued only the most tentative funding guidelines.

In a letter to The Times earlier this week, Caltech biologist Stephen Speicher said citizens can best help scientists by “getting out of our way and letting us do our work.” But as the president’s speech in its best moments pointed out, Americans have a right, even a duty, to participate in ethical debates about new scientific technologies that challenge age-old values.