Cloning Should Not Be Banned
By David Holcberg (New York Press, February 26, 2003)

The House of Representatives should reject the legislation to ban human cloning that was approved last Wednesday by the U.S. House Judiciary Committee.

The proposed ban is based on the false premise that research on cloned embryos violates their rights. But embryos are not human beings and therefore have no rights.

Moreover, the proposed ban is unconstitutional: it simultaneously violates the right of scientists to pursue their research and the right of individuals to reproduce by any method they choose.

The ban would prevent scientists from finding cures to countless diseases and from creating replacement tissues and organs that could save millions of lives. In other words, the ban would sacrifice real human beings to protect collections of human cells.

What should be banned is not cloning, but the power of our legislators to violate our rights.