The Buck Stops Here
Lucey, Patrick J.
Patrick J. Lucey THE BUCK STOPS HERE Feingold's bottom line he election of November third is history. No one got it right. The prognosticators and the partisans all called it wrong. The...
...In my own case, I ran for governor three times (twice successfully...
...he chose not to...
...But suffice it to say that the re-election of Russ Feingold gives this body of reform a chance to fight again...
...What makes this race more significant than several others we could talk about...
...This is so for two reasons: First, the cells in this entity have the capacity to become some (pluripotent) or any (totipotent) part of the body--and therefore the preimplantation embryo cannot be understood to be a single individual...
...While I do not agree with them, the group working on embryonic germ cells (the ones from aborted fetuses) claims that the use of these cells presents no particular problem because such cells could not be the precursor of a fetus...
...even so, they too recognize the special status of the human tissue...
...It is from these undifferientated cells that the entire embryo and fetus will develop...
...He was willing to put principle above winning...
...We have been especially concerned about campaign finance...
...He managed to adhere pretty closely to that target, spending $3.8 million (the estimated number of eligible Wisconsin voters in 1996 was 3.78 million...
...A few of the many provisions of the McCain-Feingold bill that Feingold pledged to follow in his re-election campaign included the following: _9 No franked mass mailings during the campaign year...
...The reporter followed up with the thought that the decision might have cost Feingold the election...
...These cells are the precursors of the entire human body...
...That spread of only 46,282 votes represented a margin of about four or five votes per precinct...
...Wisconsin has a long tradition of progressive reform government...
...The important thing is that Feingold survived and with his victory the prospects for campaign-finance reform is greatly enhanced...
...9 Will not participate in the raising of soft money...
...When asked in an interview on election night whether he had any regrets about refusing the help of soft money, Feingold assured the reporter that he did not...
...Since not all have the courage of a Russ Feingold they need to be pushed in the right direction...
...Patrick J. Lucey is a former governor of Wisconsin (1971-77) and former U.S...
...In endorsing Russ Feingold in the Democratic primary of 1992, I paraphrased Adlai Stevenson to the effect that as "important as is winning, deserving victory is even of greater import...
...was as much his opponent as Congressman Neumann...
...In both lines of research, the teams of scientists recognize that the cells do have moral status since they come from human embryonic material...
...Second, the cells of the preimplantation embryo can be separated without harm to the organism (for example, in preimplantation diagnosis, one or two cells can be removed and examined for genetic disease...
...While I agree totally, I see a distinction between those cells drawn from the human preimplantation embryo and those obtained from aborted fetuses...
...Thomas A. Shannon REMAKING OURSELVES...
...In the Feingold campaign it was obvious that Senator Mitch McConnell (R-Ky...
...I would argue that because the process of what biologists call differentiation has not yet occurred in the preimplantation embryo, such an entity is not individualized...
...These particular blastocyst cells were taken from preimplantation embryos left over from fertility treatments that were not going to be used in further in vitro fertilization attempts...
...My expenditures never exceeded $600,000...
...Further, the cells can be divided artificially to form twins...
...The candidate answered that he would rather lose than win with the help of what he described as "legal bribery...
...Russ Feingold could have won big...
...His opponent spent in excess of $11 million...
...In the 1998 campaign, Commonweal 8 December4,1998 Feingold, and I believe Senator McCain as well, led by example...
...His concept may help us get a handle on how to think about this entity in order to come to some ethical resolution about the development and use of embryonic stem cells...
...Much as he resisted any independent expenditures on his behalf, total expenditures intended to advance his cause exceeded $5 million...
...This strategy carried a high risk...
...As chairman of the Republican Senate Campaign Committee, McConnell has opposed any substantive campaign-finance reform legislation...
...Every thoughtful citizen, irrespective of party affiliation, ought to join in giving the nation the full benefit of the re-election of Senators McCain and Feingold...
...9 No more than 10 percent of total dollars raised will come from political action committees...
...My argument is that since the entity at this stage is not yet individualized, it lacks a critical, though not the only, criterion for personhood...
...That was an accurate assessment of the Feingold effort then, but it describes his 1998 effort even more dramatically...
...but he is probably best known for his work with Senator John McCain (R-Ariz...
...Was the election a referendum on campaign finance reform...
...The changes in congressional leadership at this juncture make this an ideal time to press for this reform...
...Feingold did not choose that course...
...Who would have guessed, a few months ago, that in January 1999, Newt Gingrich would be a private citizen and Bill Clinton would be polishing up his seventh State of the Union Address...
...He, in effect, engaged in unilateral disarmament...
...Senator from Wisconsin who, despite the national Democratic trend, managed to eke out the narrowest of victories...
...His opponent on election night rather ungraciously pointed out that if you subtract the margin by which Russ carried liberal Dane County (65,849) Neumann would have won...
...9 All Federal Elections Commission reports filed electronically...
...It would have been so easy and really quite understandable if he had reasoned that the McCain-Feingold bill ought to be the law of the land but since, despite his best efforts, it was not, it was legitimate to follow current campaign-spending rules in seeking re-election...
...With all that has happened, why should the readers of a thoughtful periodical like Commonweal be interested in reviewing the campaign of one U.S...
...In the second line of research, using aborted fetuses, the cells were taken from their embryonic germ cells that would not develop into specific body parts but into new eggs or sperm...
...He is a rare breed among our present crop of political office holders...
...It kept his loyal supporters up most of election night, but the final vote was Feingold 892,643, Republican challenger Mark Neumann 856,351...
...Though there was a majority in each house for reform in the last Congress, the leadership did everything it could to deny those sentiments effective expression...
...The aftermath has been equally surprising...
...During his nearly six years in office, he has co-sponsored on a bipartisan basis a number of significant bills...
...9 At least 75 percent of total dollars spent would come from Wisconsin individuals...
...This arguCommonweal 9 December4,1998...
...The ethics of stem-cell research n the first week of November, articles in both Science and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science reported the stunning news that human stem cells have been isolated and cultivated...
...One of the big barriers to campaign finance reform is that it has to be enacted by people who got elected under the existing corrupt system...
...Former Senator William Proxmire made a point of seeking repeated re-election with virtually no expenditures at all...
...on campaign-finance reform...
...it therefore lacks a core feature of personhood...
...This was at a time when the outcome was still in doubt...
...For by definition, an individual is an entity that cannot be divided or, if it is, it becomes two halves neither of which can survive on its own...
...ambassador to Mexico (1977-79...
...He apparently was convinced that if he could beat Feingold in Wisconsin the issue would go away...
...Finally, each of the cells has the potential to be another whole individual...
...In one line of research, the cells were taken from the inner cell mass of the blastocyst stage--one of the earliest stages in the development of the human preimplantation embryo...
...With inflation and more extensive use of television, even in Wisconsin campaigning has become more costly...
...Probably not in the view of most voters...
...9 He also suggested that he and his opponent withhold all television ads until August 8. Passage of the McCain-Feingold legislation would write these and like provisions into law...
...Herein lies the nub of the ethical issue: What is the moral status of the very early human embryo and of the tissue of an aborted fetus...
...The Republican sweep that could be expected both on an historical basis and according to early polls just didn't happen...
...So how might we think of such an entity...
...The capacity to isolate and cultivate them means that we have the potential ability to produce tissue in the laboratory for use in generating new tissue, in developing new organs for transplantations, as well as cells for use in gene therapy...
...Had Neumann won, this would no longer be a state where a candidate could hope to do well without a huge infusion of out-of-state money...
...Let me suggest an idea developed by the medieval philosopher Duns Scotus, though, of course, he had no clue about stem cells...
...Feingold pledged that he would limit his spending to one dollar per eligible voter in the state...
Vol. 125 • December 1998 • No. 21
