Senate Approves Embryo Stem Cell Bill

WASHINGTON -- The Senate voted Tuesday after two days of emotional debate to expand federal funding of embryonic stem cell research, sending the measure to President Bush for a promised veto that would be the first of his presidency.

The bill passed 63-37, four votes short of the two-thirds majority that would be needed to override Bush's veto. The president left little doubt he would reject the bill despite late appeals on its behalf from fellow Republicans Nancy Reagan and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

"The simple answer is he thinks murder's wrong," said White House spokesman Tony Snow. "The president is not going to get on the slippery slope of taking something living and making it dead for the purposes of scientific research."

Senate supporters of the bill likened that logic to opposition suffered by Galileo, Christopher Columbus and others who were rebuked in their time but vindicated later.

Polls show as much as 70 percent public support for embryonic stem cell research.

"There has been an upsurge of demand," said Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y. Support for the legislation "has crossed every line we could imagine, certainly partisan lines, ethnic, racial, geographic lines."

But in a surprise victory for embryonic stem cell supporters, the House defeated a second bill that would have encouraged stem cell research from sources other than embryos. Opponents of that bill, sponsored by Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., called it election-year cover that would allow Bush and other embryonic stem cell opponents to say they nonetheless support stem cell research.

While the Senate approved that measure unanimously, the House's 273-154 vote fell 12 votes short of the two-thirds majority required for passage under the rules. The House could try again to pass the bill Wednesday by a simple majority and send it to Bush for his signature.

Meanwhile, both the House and Senate unanimously approved a related bill, which Bush was expected to sign into law, to ban so-called "fetal farming," the prospect of raising and aborting fetuses for scientific research.

The embryonic research bill split the GOP. Nineteen Senate Republicans voted for the bill and against Bush and politically key social conservatives. One Democrat, Sen. Ben Nelson of Nebraska, voted against it.

It was the first time Bush was wielding the veto pen against legislation passed by the Republican-controlled Congress. Snow said the president had issued 141 veto threats during his five and a half years in the White House, often against spending increases for domestic programs. This was the first time no deal could be cut, Snow said.

California Gov. Schwarzenegger wrote to Bush, "Mr. President, I urge you not to make the first veto of your presidency one that turns America backwards on the path of scientific progress and limits the promise of medical miracles for generations to come."