Billingsley Barbara, Caulfield Timothy
University of Alberta, Canada.
Queens Law J. 2004 Spring;29(2):647-79.
Non-Reproductive Human Cloning (NRHC) allows researchers to develop and clone cells, including non-reproductive cells, and to research the etiology and transmission of disease. The ability to clone specific stem cells may also allow researchers to clone cells with genetic defects and analyze those cells with more precisions. Despite those potential benefits, Parliament has banned such cloning due to a myriad of social and ethical concerns. In May 2002, the Canadian Government introduced Bill C-13 on assisted human reproductive technologies. Bill C-13 deals with both the scientific and the clinical use of human reproductive materials, and it prohibits a number of other activities, including NRHC. Although the Supreme Court of Canada has never ruled on whether scientific experiments area form of expression, academic support exists for this notion. The authors go through the legal analysis that would be required to find that scientific experiments are expression, focusing in part on whether NRHC could be considered violent and thus fall outside the protection of section 2(b). The latter question is complicated by the ongoing policy debate over whether an "embryonic cell" is property of human life. The authors then consider whether a ban on NRHC could be justified under section 1 of the Charter. They conclude that both the breadth of the legislative purpose and the proportionality of the measure are problematic. Proportionality is a specific concern because the ban could be viewed as an outright denial of scientific freedom of expression. Although consistent with current jurisprudence on freedom of expression, this paper runs against the flow of government policy in the areas of regulation and prohibition of non-reproductive human cloning. As there has been no Charter litigation to date on whether scientific research is a form of expression, the authors introduce a new way of looking at the legality of the regulation of new reproductive technologies.
非生殖性人类克隆（NRHC）使研究人员能够培育和克隆细胞，包括非生殖细胞，并研究疾病的病因和传播。克隆特定干细胞的能力还可能使研究人员能够克隆带有基因缺陷的细胞，并更精确地分析这些细胞。尽管有这些潜在益处，但由于众多社会和伦理问题，议会已禁止此类克隆。2002年5月，加拿大政府提出了关于人类辅助生殖技术的C-13法案。C-13法案涉及人类生殖材料的科学和临床应用，并禁止包括非生殖性人类克隆在内的一些其他活动。尽管加拿大最高法院从未就科学实验是否属于一种表达形式做出裁决，但这一观点存在学术支持。作者进行了若要认定科学实验为表达形式所需的法律分析，部分重点在于非生殖性人类克隆是否可被视为暴力行为从而不受第2(b)条的保护。后一个问题因关于“胚胎细胞”是否为人类生命财产的持续政策辩论而变得复杂。作者接着考虑根据《宪章》第1条禁止非生殖性人类克隆是否合理。他们得出结论，立法目的的广度和措施的相称性都存在问题。相称性是一个特别令人担忧的问题，因为该禁令可能被视为对科学表达自由的彻底否定。尽管与当前关于表达自由的判例法一致，但本文与政府在非生殖性人类克隆的监管和禁止领域的政策趋势背道而驰。由于迄今为止尚无关于科学研究是否为一种表达形式的宪章诉讼，作者引入了一种看待新生殖技术监管合法性的新方式。
