WASHINGTON (January 5, 2004) -- Yesterday, New Jersey Governor James McGreevey signed a bill (S909/A2840) that legally sanctions not only research requiring the destruction of human embryos, but even lethal experimentation on cloned human babies throughout pregnancy.

"The New Jersey law is designed to encourage government-sanctioned 'human fetus farms'," said Cathy Cleaver Ruse, Esq., Director of Planning and Information for the Pro-Life Secretariat of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB).

The law, lobbied for by the politically powerful Biotechnology Industry Organization ("BIO"), takes fatal research on cloned human beings to a new and alarming level. It promotes the cloning of human embryos and their development up through late fetal stages, so they can be aborted for supposedly useful cells and tissues up to the time of birth. "This is the most extreme, inhumane pro-cloning legislation in the country," said Ruse. "It should be scorned by every American who believes in common decency and basic human rights for all."

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