Lawmakers in both chambers of the Alabama legislature have filed bills that would clarify state law related to embryos created via in vitro fertilization after significant backlash from the state Supreme Court’s ruling on the matter last week.
Draft legislation from Republican state Sen. Tim Melson, the chairman of the Alabama Senate’s Healthcare Committee, states that “any human egg that is fertilized in vitro shall be considered a potential life but shall not for any purposes be considered a human life … unless the fertilized egg is implanted into a woman’s uterus and a viable pregnancy can be medically detected.”
Democrats in the state House have also filed a bill stating that “any fertilized human egg or embryo existing outside of a human uterus is not considered an unborn child or human being for any purpose under state law.”
Last week, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that the state’s Wrongful Death of a Minor Act, which applies to unborn children, also applies to frozen embryos that are the products of IVF. Justice Jay Mitchell, writing for the majority, called frozen embryos “extrauterine children” and clarified that both parties in the lawsuit recognized the embryos as human life.
Mitchell added in his opinion that the policy complications as a result of the decision were not the concern of the court.
“[T]hese types of policy-focused arguments belong before the Legislature, not this Court,” Mitchell wrote. “It is not the role of this Court to craft a new limitation based on our own view of what is or is not wise public policy.”
Melson told the Alabama Reflector, a local news outlet, that life beginning at conception “is a big argument,” but it did not influence his drafting of the new legislation.
“I won’t argue that point, but it’s not going to form into a life until it’s put into the uterus,” the Healthcare Committee chairman said.
During the course of IVF treatment, multiple eggs are extracted from a woman to create embryos outside of the womb. If the embryos are not implanted into the patient, they are cryogenically frozen until the patient pursues another pregnancy.
Melson argued that a woman should be able to determine what is done with the remaining embryos if one of them is successfully implanted in the uterus and results in a viable pregnancy.
“When a lady is two or three successful pregnancies and these are left over, it’s just time to make sure that they aren’t penalized for success,” he said.
Anti-abortion organizations have praised the court’s decision for recognizing that embryos must be treated with human dignity.
“The Alabama Court recognized what is obvious and a scientific fact — life begins at conception,” SBA Pro-Life America State Policy Director Katie Daniel told the Washington Examiner. “That does not mean fertility treatment is prohibited. Rather it means fertility treatments need not carelessly or intentionally destroy the new life created.”
“This isn’t a game,” state Rep. Philip Ensler, a Democrat from Montgomery, Alabama, said. “This isn’t just politics and ‘let’s score some points to be able to put in a campaign ad’ — these are real people’s lives that are very, very affected and in a very intimate way.”
