After nearly a year of emotional arguments in Congress but no new federal laws, the national debate over the future of human cloning has shifted to the states. Six states have already banned cloning in one form or another, and this year alone 38 anticloning measures were introduced in 22 states. The resulting patchwork of laws, people on all sides of the issue say, complicates a nationwide picture already clouded by scientific and ethical questions over whether and how to restrict cloning or to ban it altogether. Since 1997, when scientists announced the birth of Dolly the sheep, the first cloned mammal, the specter of cloned babies, infants that are in essence genetic carbon copies of adults, has loomed large in the public psyche and in the minds of lawmakers. Today, there is widespread agreement that cloning for reproduction is unsafe and should be banned. Now, the debate has shifted away from the ethics of baby-making and toward the morality of cloning embryos for their cells and tissues, which might be used to treat diseases. The controversy pits religious conservatives and abortion opponents, who regard embryos as nascent human life, against patients groups, scientists and the biotechnology industry. 參考譯文： 一年來，國會對於克隆未來的爭論異常激烈，但卻未催生相應法律的誕生。現在，這一爭論已轉移到各州。其中，有6個州已經禁止任何形式的克隆。僅今年一年，就有22個州採取了高達38項的反克隆措施。 有關人士稱，對於是否以及如何限制克隆，或是全面禁止克隆，涉及諸多的科學和倫理問題。 所以，相應的立法修憲問題變得更加複雜。 1997年，科學家宣佈第一隻哺乳動物克隆羊多莉的誕生。從此，這就在公衆和立法者心裏蒙上陰影。這是因爲科隆生物實際上是成年生物的副本。 現在，人們達成共識的是，爲再生產而進行的克隆是不安全的，因此應該禁止。當前，人們爭論的焦點已不再侷限於克隆嬰兒的倫理問題。人們的注意已轉移到對胚胎的科隆上來，儘管由之產生的組織和細胞有助於治療很多疾病。因爲保守的宗教人士和墮胎反對者認爲胚胎是早期的生命形式，他們自然與患者、科學家和生物工業站在爭論的兩邊。
