St. Louis Post-Dispatch: McCaskill Backs Stem Cell Ballot Issue
St. Louis Post-Dispatch: McCaskill Backs Stem Cell Ballot Issue
January 25, 2006
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
By Tim O'Neil
State Auditor Claire McCaskill said Tuesday that she supported the proposed Missouri stem cell ballot issue - and that U.S. Sen. Jim Talent wanted to "slam the door" on some types of stem cell research.
McCaskill is a candidate for the Democratic nomination to oppose Talent, R-Mo., who is seeking re-election this year. McCaskill made her announcement outside the office of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation in Clayton.
Marie Davis of the foundation was among a dozen people, some from other medical research groups, who stood behind McCaskill at the news conference.
McCaskill said she supported an effort by the Missouri Coalition for Lifesaving Cures to place on the statewide ballot a proposed state constitutional amendment to protect stem cell research. A key point of controversy is that it would allow "somatic cell nuclear transfer," a form of cloning.
McCaskill noted that Talent had co-sponsored a U.S. Senate bill that would prohibit that kind of research. A poll of 800 likely Missouri voters, released Sunday by the Post-Dispatch and KMOV-TV, says 64 percent support the proposal and 32 percent oppose it.
"If Missourians will join me in voting for this initiative, we will put in our constitution protection for this research," McCaskill said. "Sen. Talent wants to slam the door on this research."
McCaskill, a convert to Catholicism, agreed that her stand put her in opposition to the Missouri Catholic Conference, which strongly opposes the initiative. Opponents say cloning for any purpose is wrong.
Said McCaskill: "Life doesn't begin in the petri dish. Life begins in the womb."
She said she believed that work involving adult stem cells does not offer the same potential as does research cloning.
Rich Chrismer, Talent's spokesman, said the senator "has always been opposed to human cloning and supports stem cell research." Chrismer said Talent would decide his position on the initiative if its promoters got enough petition signatures to put it on the ballot.
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