The Principle’s the Thing
On George Bush and embryonic stem-cell research.

Mr. Novak is the George F. Jewett scholar at the American Enterprise Institute
August 10, 2001 7:30 a.m.

wish I could say that the president's speech to the nation on stem cells was as good as I had hoped. It was in many ways a wonderful speech, deeper and more philosophical than I have ever heard a president deliver, unusually balanced and fair in presenting opposing arguments, and clear in delineating both his own decision and the reasons for it. It was, in addition, heartfelt and compassionate — toward Nancy Reagan and to all families who have members suffering from awful diseases or disabilities. That includes virtually all our families.

I can even see how the president convinced himself, at the end, that he had found a ray of daylight through the opposing arguments, and arrived at a moral decision that seemed to him sound and seemed also to be politically defensible before the country.

During the last months, I have heard many persons who think they are very smart lay out their arguments on this question. Not one of them did so thorough, many-sided, fair, and clear a job as the president of the United States tonight.

At the end, though, my heart sank. The president tried to maintain a position of principle but what he ended up doing, despite his best effort, was giving away the principle and trying to limit its application to the smallest universe he could. He put the Full Faith and Credit of the United States Government behind the principle of using human beings as a means to noble ends. He offered a reason for doing this. The stem cells for whose use in experimentation he commits federal resources come from embryos already destroyed. Why not bring good out of evil, he argues, by now using these stem cells, which will otherwise be wasted, to search for cures for awful diseases? The outcome is not certain, but at least it's noble to try. This is a lovely and tempting thought. The problem is that when this source of stem cells runs out--soon--then those on the other side will demand more stem cells from more embryos. The demand for usable stem cells will swell enormously. This is particularly true if good experimental results are obtained. But it will even be true if they aren't — See, partisans will say, you were too stingy, too narrow. You have ceded the principle, so now throw open the whole range. The glittering utopia of science beckons just ahead. Be alert to the beginnings of evil. It never comes under the appearance of evil, but always under the appearance of the beautiful, the promising, the idealistic, the pleasant. Stop it in its beginnings, the ancient principle runs. The sooner, the easier the battle.

Politically, the decision may play very well among a substantial majority. It is already clear that those on the Left whom you want to attack it are attacking it, which will only reinforce those among right-to-lifers who accept the president's obvious good will, often deeply moving words, clearly articulated argument and patent depth of feeling. The president's chief professional role, after all, is to act as the chief political leader of our nation (and the free world).

But I deeply fear the immense battles that lie ahead, and the gathering of heartened foes, who will very quickly sniff out the weak point and pry its own inner logic with all their force. It will take almost superhuman strength now for the president to hold the new position he has moved into, having surrendered the strongest ground.

That ground was a philosophical one, not a theological one, a ground born of reason rather than of faith. One of its classic articulators was Immanuel Kant. The president himself alluded to it in his speech, in the line about not using human beings as means for even the noblest of ends. You must never use a human being as a means. You must treat them only as ends. To use stem cells obtained by killing living human beings in their embryonic stage is still using them as a means. It is not enough to say that the wicked deed had already been done; that the embryos had already been killed. The purpose of the killing was to obtain the stem cells. One ought not to implicate oneself in that process, not even for the noblest and most beautiful ends.

One especially ought not to implicate the United States of America, which Hannah Arendt once called humankind's noblest experiment. For this nation began its embryonic existence by declaring that it held to a fundamental truth about a right to life endowed in us by our Creator. The whole world depends on our upholding that principle.

Human beings very easily reason ourselves into taking positions that end up having the most tragic of consequences, positions of which we would never have approved had we seen those consequences at that time. For the fruit of the tree of knowledge over yonder appears to be very sweet, and we feel sure that if we eat of it, then happy endings fit for a god will result. Those endings have always turned to sulfur in our cheeks.

President Bush will now have to fight off roaring dragons to hold on to the shrinking piece of ground he has left himself to defend. Last night he spoke more eloquently than any president before him in its defense. Maybe he can yet turn events around, and reclaim the full range and depth of the principle he has often before enunciated. Let us wish him the strength of arm of that uncommonly courageous warrior saint of old, whose name he bears. He will need every ounce of it.