NEBRASKA LEGISLATURE TO TAKE UP BAN ON USE OF ABORTED BABIES FOR RESEARCH IN 2001

By Julie Schmit-Albin
Nebraska RTL Executive Director

Despite intense lobbying by Nebraska pro-life organizations, a ban that would prevent the use of aborted babies for research fell victim to a flip-flop by a pro-life state senator and lobbying by a powerful medical institution. Although the ban is dead for this legislative session, pro-life state Sen. Dwite Pedersen (R-Omaha) vowed to bring another ban before the Nebraska Legislature in the 2001 session.

Sen. John Hilgert (D-Omaha) introduced the measure, LB 1405, this session in response to the revelation in late 1999 that the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC) has been conducting research using aborted babies' brains since 1993.
A fleeting victory was achieved on March 14 when the bill was pulled from the Judiciary Committee and sent to the floor. The bill had been deadlocked after the defection of state Sen. Jennie Robak (D-Columbus), who had been endorsed in the past by Nebraska Right to Life Political Action Committee.
The bill's fate was sealed for this session with Robak's turn- about and when UNMC's lobbyists were able to sway several other pro-life senators to oppose the ban.
A coalition of pro-life organizations banded together to lobby for LB 1405. They were: Nebraska Right to Life, Nebraska Catholic Conference, Metro Right to Life of Omaha, and Nebraska Family Council.
Pro-life efforts centered on dispelling the vast amounts of misinformation put out by UNMC. UNMC falsely claimed, for example, that if the use of aborted fetal body parts were halted, all neurodegenerative research at UNMC would cease. UNMC was also successful in spreading the myth that the pro-life groups were opposed to all medical research. Of course, nothing could be further from the truth.

BACKGROUND
Last November a firestorm of controversy erupted when the Omaha World-Herald broke the story that UNMC in Omaha has been conducting research that utilized tissue taken from babies aborted by the state's most notorious abortionist, LeRoy Carhart. (Carhart is a party to a legal challenge to the state's ban on partial-birth abortions. The Supreme Court will hear oral arguments April 25. See story, page 5.)
Only in the last few months has it been revealed that these research protocols were put into place in 1993, using money provided by the National Institutes of Health. Not even elected officials, let alone the general public, knew about the research.
Once the truth surfaced, local right to life chapters circulated petitions opposing research using the bodies of aborted babies.
Pro-lifers also met with the University of Nebraska board of regents but were given no satisfactory answers.No one denied that Carhart is supplying the tissue to UNMC. UNMC asserts that Carhart receives no monetary remuneration. But the fact that he was appointed in 1997 to an unpaid, volunteer faculty post in the Department of Pathology - - and thus able to tout the title of adjunct professor to promote his abortion business - - doesn't seem to faze UNMC.
On March 28 LB 1405 was scheduled for four hours of debate. However, because state Sen. Ernie Chambers threatened to filibuster, 33 votes were necessary to reach cloture (end the filibuster) and take an up-or-down vote on the bill.
After three hours of debate, Senator Hilgert pulled the bill from the agenda, saying that the 33 votes were not attainable. This allowed legislators to avoid showing what they would have done on a final vote to break the filibuster.
Efforts to study the issue during the interim may be introduced before the legislature adjourns in mid-April. Until next session, pro-life groups will be taking our message directly to Nebraskans. Over 9,000 Nebraskans had already signed petitions demanding a halt to the use of aborted babies for experimentation.