This post at CNSNews.com suggests federal funding of human life-destroying embryonic stem-cell research might not proceed — despite President Barack Obama’s greenlighting of such research on Monday.

But according to Douglas Johnson, legislative director of National Right to Life Committee, there has been no weakening of Obama’s commitment to anti-life stem-cell research, including the authorization of “clone-and-kill” research.

The CNSNews.com report notes that on Wednesday Obama signed into law an appropriations bill that contains an obscure provision, known as the Dickey-Wicker Amendment, that appears to ban funding for embryo-killing research.

The Daily Blog today asked Johnson to clarify the current state of the law regarding federal funding of life-destroying embryonic research. Here’s what he told Register readers via e-mail about the situation:

“The omnibus appropriations bill signed by President Obama continues the Dickey-Wicker law, which since 1995 has been a provision of the annual appropriations bills that funds most federal health programs. This law prohibits federal funding of ‘the creation of a human embryo or embryos for research purposes; OR research in which a human embryo or embryos are destroyed, discarded or knowingly subjected to risk of injury or death . . .’

“This law has been interpreted in different ways by different interpreters. We believe that the phrase ‘research in which’ should properly be understood to prohibit federal funding of any aspect of any research project if that project involves or requires harm to human embryos.

“The Obama administration has not taken a public position on what they think the Dickey-Wicker Amendment means. But Democratic congressional leaders say they will try to move legislation, no later than early April, that would explicitly authorize federal funding of embryonic stem-cell research. This legislation has not yet been made public. At a minimum, it will authorize federal funding for research that will require the killing of so-called ‘leftover’ embryos, donated by in vitro fertilization clinics, in order to harvest their stem cells. (President Bush successful vetoed such bills in 2006 and 2007.) But there are troubling indications, in the president’s statements and in recent statements by Democratic congressional leaders, that they may quickly try to go even further — that they may also attempt to establish federal funding for human cloning research.

“President Obama’s March 9 statement, ‘we will ensure that our government never opens the door to the use of cloning for human reproduction,’ was a deliberate exercise in misdirection. Obama supports human cloning to create human embryos for the purpose of using them in research that will kill them. When he says ‘for human reproduction,’ he means that he wants legislation to ensure that no human clone is actually allowed to be born. He is opening the door to federal support for a ‘clone-and-kill’ policy on human cloning, which is the same position he took when he was in the U.S. Senate.

“We anticipate, later in the spring, that Democratic congressional leaders may attempt to repeal the Dickey-Wicker law outright, during consideration of the Fiscal Year 2010 appropriations bill for the Department of Health and Human Services. If they succeed in that goal, it would entirely open the floodgates to federal funding of projects in which human embryos would be mass produced — by human cloning or other methods — specifically to be used in research that will kill them. This is the specter of “human embryo farms” that President Bush warned against in 2002, when he called upon Congress to pass legislation to ban the creation of human embryos by cloning. Any member of Congress who votes for legislation to authorize a ‘clone-and-kill’ policy, or who votes to repeal the Dickey-Wicker law, is effectively voting for the establishment of human embryo farms.

“National Right to Life will oppose all of these forthcoming pro-death legislative proposals, and those who wish to communicate with their federal representatives in opposition to them can do so here:
http://www.capwiz.com/nrlc/issues/alert/?alertid=12900506&type=CO

“(The legislation that President Bush pushed for, to prohibit the creation of human embryos by cloning, was twice approved by the House of Representatives when the Republicans had majority control. But such legislation was never enacted because it was blocked in the Senate by senators such as Barack Obama. Therefore human cloning research remains legal under federal law, and if Obama gets his way, federal tax dollars will start funding it.)”