The vote was remarkably bipartisan. Fifty Republicans voted for the bill. U-M President Mary Sue Coleman joined thirty-eight other Association of American Universities (AAU) Presidents on a letter to Congress in support of the bill.

The Senate is expected to consider its version of H.R. 810 by the end of July. This is also a somewhat remarkable turn of events since early indications were that the Senate Leadership were not inclined to move the bill. It is also expected that there will be several amendments offered to the bill in an attempt to thwart its intent.

Unfortunately, the President has already indicated that he will veto the bill should the Senate approve the measure. The University of Michigan will continue to support the legislation.

Appropriations Updates
This year's appropriations process has gotten off to a somewhat bumpy beginning for the federal research agencies. The Appropriations Subcommittees have generally provided National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Science Foundation (NSF), Dept. of Defense (DOD), National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA slight increases for the research budgets. Yet there have been repeated attempts by other Members of Congress to use the funding that would support such increases to pay for other priorities.

Perhaps in one of the clearest signs that the budgets are getting tight across the federal government, Members of Congress see even inflationary increases as ripe sources of funds to pay for programs which had otherwise been eliminated. There have been amendments offered to move money from nearly every federal science budget, including the core research funds at NSF to pay for community policing and other local concerns.

Thankfully, most of those amendments have been rejected by the full House of Representatives, including the amendments to cut NSF and NASA research. However, this interest in raiding one program to pay for another is a trend that will continue to occur.

In the case of the House Labor-Health & Human Services-Education appropriations bill, the Health Professions accounts were decimated. Instead, funds were allocated to provide funding to continue several education programs slated for termination by the Administration, a minor increase for NIH and an increase for the Centers for Disease Control.

Stem Redux
Meanwhile, thorny moral and political issues continue to arise.

During consideration of the Labor-Health Human Services-Education appropriations bill in the full Appropriations Committee, an amendment was offered to ban all NIH funding for any entity (especially a university) that funds, develops or researches any Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer (SCNT) cell lines. Supporters of the amendment want to "ban all cloning of humans at any stage of development." The amendment was defeated in committee, but only by a vote of 29-36.

As we went to press, a reappearance of this amendment was expected the week of June 20 when the full House considered the bill

Thus far, the vast majority of the appropriations activity has been in the House. The House leadership hopes to have all ten appropriations bills completed by July 4.

The Senate is now beginning to move their bills. The Senate Commerce, Justice and Science Appropriations Subcommittee was to meet last week (June 20) to consider the funding levels for NSF, NASA, NOAA and National Institute of Standards and Technology. Early indications are that funding levels for the science agencies in this bill likely will be somewhat below those in the House bill.

Mark Burnham is the Director of Federal Relations for Research, and Assistant Director of the UM Washington Office. He can be reached in Washington at (202) 554-0578. His e-mail address is: mburnham@umich.edu