HOW HE SEES IT Nancy Reagan's ambitious pursuit

By MARTIN SCHRAM
SCRIPPS HOWARD NEWS SERVICE
America's most unlikely crusader in the challenge of conservative mantra has issued her most poignant and powerful call to undo President Bush's most wrongheaded domestic policy.
"Ronnie's long journey has finally taken him to a distant place where I can no longer reach him," former first lady Nancy Reagan told a Beverly Hills galaxy of stars and celebs at the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation dinner May 8. "Because of this, I'm determined to do whatever I can to save other families from this pain. I just don't see how we can turn our backs on this. ... Science has presented us with a hope called stem cell research, which may provide our scientists with many answers that for so long have been beyond our grasp. ... We have lost so much time already. I just really can't bear to lose any more."
The setback
For three years, scientific research on embryonic stem cells has slowed drastically because of a policy forged by President Bush as a political contrivance -- a compromise shaped to placate his conservative and anti-abortion voters, even as it ignored scientific warnings and defied common sense. The research is the key to finding cures for Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and many other dreaded diseases and spinal cord injuries. But Bush's compromise created a mind-bending, generation-leaping concept: grandfathered embryos. He ruled that any embryonic stem cell lines in existence before his Aug. 9, 2001, announcement could be used for federally funded research. But from then on, all human embryos that are not used in fertility procedures cannot be used for lifesaving scientific research -- even if they are destined to be destroyed. In other words, just toss these potential lifesaving resources in the garbage. In the name of right to life.
Reagan's quiet leap into the forefront of a challenge to a conservative president's policies may surprise some; after all, her husband is the modern symbol of the conservative movement. But it is no surprise to anyone who has read the wonderfully warm book, "Nancy: A Portrait of My Years with Nancy Reagan," by Michael Deaver, the former president's longtime adviser and master of media strategy, and Nancy Reagan's close confidant. Deaver is so close to the Reagans that he is comfortable with straight-talk candor, including how his friend was regarded inside the staffs of governor and President Reagan. "If you crossed her, you paid for it," Deaver writes. "If you tried to cross her husband, you paid worse. ... Nancy is no cardboard cutout. She's pure flesh and blood, with all the human strengths and frailties that entails."
The last decade put that to the test, after former President Reagan was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. Interestingly, her first efforts to promote stem-cell research came not because of her husband's disease, but when Doug Wick, the son of the Reagans' dear friends Charles and Mary Jane Wick, told Nancy Reagan that his daughter, Tessa, had juvenile diabetes. Wick's research had shown the widespread scientific uses of stem cells harvested from discarded 5-day-old human embryos -- a practice strongly opposed by many conservatives.
"Nancy was well aware that the pre-Alzheimer's Ronald Reagan would quite likely have held the same reservations about stem cells," Deaver wrote, "but the more she learned, the more she became convinced that this was one area where her husband's legacy would best be served by going beyond what might be thought of as original intent."
After asking Deaver's advice, Nancy Reagan wrote President Bush on April 11, 2001, asking him to support stem-cell research. Four months later, Bush announced his ruling. It was a compromise, but a lame one. When the president issued his ruling, his advisers told reporters they believed there were perhaps 60 stem cell lines in existence -- enough to build productive stem-cell lines for ongoing research. But many scientists said the figure was much lower, perhaps as low as 10. Later, the government figured there were just 30.
Seeing progress
Privately, Nancy Reagan's lobbying of Republicans in positions of power and/or influence has harvested results. Today, former President Gerald Ford, Senate Republican leader Bill Frist of Tennessee and a number of Senate Republicans are strong supporters of increased stem cell research. Now 206 members of Congress have signed a letter urging Bush to liberalize his stem cell ruling that has crippled science research.
It is the right thing to do -- a right to life reform for the sake of all who now or someday may be forced to live with illnesses and injuries that are devastating but can hopefully be cured.
XMartin Schram writes political analysis for Scripps Howard News Service.