Because of Bush’s executive order, researchers are allowed to study only 78 existing stem cell lines. What allows the president, instead of Congress, to set this policy?
And–not trying to start a debate with this question–if the president can set scientific policy by executive order, what prevents him from using executive orders to do anything he wants?
The Executive Order, which can be found here, says nothing of the sort.
The effect of the order is that federal funding can only go to certain stem cell lines. Private money can and has been used elsewhere. Private funding is usually harder to get, which is why there was such an outcry, but it is not banned.
There is a fight between the President and Congress over control of federal funding for scientific research, but there is almost always a fight between the branches over funding for everything. As long as they both are controlled by the same party it is unlikely that Congress will take any direct action against the President’s wishes, but it is not prohibited from doing so.
And then there is the Supreme Court, which can and has declared Executive Orders invalid. See YOUNGSTOWN CO. v. SAWYER, 343 U.S. 579 (1952).
As to the second part of your question, the sheer size of the executive branch means that, yes, executive orders can have a major impact on many, many people.
An executive order is an instruction to an agency or bureau to do something or behave a certain way. They have the force of law on these agencies, and are far harder to overturn.
Remember, a government large enough and broad enough to address every problem can sometimes do so in a way that you can disagree with. Not a debate, just an observation.
Just one more thing:
Threre are actually only 19 stem cell lines that can be used with federal funding. The others, simply did not exist.
Oops. Next time I’ll read the primary source. The media has been presenting it as a ban on stem cell research.
It’s not that they didn’t exist, it’s that their usefulness for research is limited because of contamination with mouse feeder cells.
This cite indicates that out of 78 lines which supposedly existed at the time of Bush’s executive order, 23 of them are either available now or will be in the near future.
Otto, you are indeed correct, in that there are more than 19 lines. There are, in fact, 26 lines identified by the NIH right now. However, only 19 are usable. This is a far cry from the 78 as claimed by the President when declaring this Executive Order. I was using a bit of hyperbole out of pure frustration.
carterba, I don’t believe that the media has at all portrayed it as a ban, but the subtly can often be missed if you don’t work in research.
Federal funding is vital to research, especially to Universities and Hospitals, as it is nearly impossible to separate your funding from private and public, and you can not mingle equipment. In other words, if I do stem cell research, using a non-approved cell line, and the public research I am currently doing using my Islet cells, I can not use my publicly funded plate reader to read my privately funded cell plates. This can go as far as denying laboratory space in Universities because power and water are paid with public funds.
These shenanigans can, and have, seriously hampered research in the US, with many of our best researchers going over-seas to continue their research. Also remember that products and procedures developed by private industry is…well…private. That means that they can if they chose to share developments, but they probably won’t. Moreover, if they are generous enough to share discoveries this can raise the costs of these procedures/products considerably as the US still allows the patent of genes, which means that other laboratories are not free to develop therapies on these genes/gene products.
It’s hard to underestimate how important Federal funding to the advancement of science in this country, and throughout the world.
As a matter of fact, I do work in research (not biological, but scientific), and I’m now somewhat embarrassed for having asked in the first place. But, in my defense, the CNN.com article I had just finished reading repeatedly referred to the “ban” on stem cell research, and a New York Times article I read also referred to a “ban”. I just didn’t read as much as I should have. :o
The media has indeed referred to Bush’s order as a “ban on stem-cell research” many times. In fact, this is the first time I’ve heard that it’s only a ban on funding.