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Monitoring Stem Cell Research 
concerns the question of the inviolability of nascent human life, the 
abortion cases would have been unlikely to come to the Court for 
adjudication had the Court not declared in Roe v. Wade a 
constitutional right to an abortion. For the argument made by those 
who seek federally funded abortions is that by withholding funding, 
the government is seeking to frustrate the exercise of a 
constitutionally protected right. Absent such a right, there could be 
no plausible legal claim. Indeed, absent an entitlement to 
government sponsored health care benefits, there is no valid legal 
claim that Medicare must pay for cosmetic surgery, sex-change 
operations, contraceptive benefits, heart transplants, or any other 
procedure one wants for oneself and can find a doctor to do. Only if 
there were a constitutionally protected right not to be poor, not to be 
without resources to fully take advantage of all the things that we 
are legally entitled to pursue, could such a claim prevail as a matter 
of law. While there is no such right, this is just the kind of claim that 
dissenters in the Court’s cases concerning federal funding and 
abortion defend. In short, because the Constitution provides no 
special protection to biomedical research, the argument for legal 
entitlement to funding of stem cell research proceeds on dramatically 
weaker grounds than the rejected arguments in the abortion funding 
cases. 
Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 furnishes another example 
of how government may vvhthhold funds from practices it does not 
outlaw. It provides that, “No person in the United States shall, on the 
ground of race, color, or national origin, be excluded from 
participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to 
discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal 
financial assistance.” It is this provision that requires private 
universities to avoid those racial classification in admissions and 
hiring that would violate the prohibitions imposed on state action by 
the equal protection clause of the 14*^ Amendment. Title VI is far 
reaching, because most private universities rely heavily on 
government funding for the support of basic research. And it 
provides a way for the federal government to shape the moral 
contours of what is largely private conduct, and bring that conduct in 
line with fundamental constitutional principles. Of course private 
institutions are free to continue to practice activities that disqualify 
them for federal funding. All they have to do is refuse to take federal 
funds. 
Close in form to federal policy on stem cell research are social 
security regulations regarding marriage and survivor benefits. For 
example, although cohabitation without matrimony is not illeged, 
indeed it is quite common, the federal government refuses to pay 
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