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Jason Rosenbaum of the Columbia Tribune wrote about Missouri’s Stem Cell battle and an initiative to alter the Missouri Constitution as follows:

Ballot language

A constitutional amendment pushed by opponents of embryonic stem cell research would add the following language to the Missouri Constitution:

Section 38(e) 1. It shall be unlawful to clone or attempt to clone a human being. Researchers may conduct stem cell research to discover cures for disease and develop stem cell therapies and cures, provided that the research complies with the limitations of this section and, in addition, the limitations of Section 38(d).

2. For all purposes within this constitution:(1) “Clone or attempt to clone a human being” includes the creation of or the attempt to create, by means other than fertilization of a human egg with human sperm, a new human organism that is virtually identical genetically to an existing or previously existing human organism or human organisms.

(2) “Human organism” means human life in any stage. Human life begins with an initial stage, when a single human egg cell receives a complete set of forty-six chromosomes, and continues through any subsequent stages of embryonic, fetal, postnatal, and later development.

3. No taxpayer dollars shall be expended: (1) to clone or attempt to clone a human being; or (2) to research or experiment using a human organism, or any part of a human organism, derived from cloning or attempting to clone a human being.

On the Columbia Tribune Blog Rosenbaum quotes Senator Chuck Graham D-Columbia calling for an all out war. Of course, the war was and has been on for the last year.

Senator Matt Bartle R-Lee Summit has been at war all session starting with a filibuster on a gubernatorial appointment to the University of Kansas City Missouri (UMKC) due to his support of stem cell research. (The first of many through the year)