Genetic Screening and Counseling: The Legal and Ethical Issues
![handle is hein.journals/illlr68 and id is 710 raw text is: Copyright 1974 by Northwestern University School of Law Printed in U.S.A.
Northwestern University Law Review Vol. 68, No. 4
GENETIC SCREENING AND COUNSELING: THE
LEGAL AND ETHICAL ISSUES
Jon R. Waltz*
Carol R. Thigpen**
INTRODUCTION
Biological engineering,1 the process of manipulating genes to
produce particular characteristics, can no longer be regarded merely
as material for science fiction.2 Scientific knowledge is expanding at
a rapid rate, raising possibilities once thought to be beyond human
reach,' and since the late 1960's, when geneticists first learned to
read the coding system that determines an individual's genetic make-
up,4 a new scientific frontier has been opened. There is general
* Professor of Law, Northwestern University School of Law; Lecturer in Medical
Jurisprudence, Northwestern University Medical School. Member, Ohio and Illinois
Bars. B.A., College of Wooster, 1951; J.D., Yale Law School, 1954.
** Member, Illinois Bar. B.A., Northwestern University, 1963; J.D., North-
western University School of Law, 1973.
This article grew out of a Senior Research project undertaken by Carol R.
Thigpen under Professor Waltz' supervision during the academic year 1972-73 at
the Northwestern University School of Law.
1 A physician described the state of this science late in 1970:
The power of modem biological science goes beyond the ability to control the
presence or absence of births to the ability to affect the genetic character of
future generations. Eugenics, the science of improving the genotype of man
by planned breeding, has been promulgated for a long time. . . . Genetic
engineering . . . is a field that is just opening up. . . . Although the direct
manipulation of genetic traits in a man or the production of a clone of identical
men are not likely in the near future, the possibilities are there.
Elkinton, The Literature of Ethical Problems in Medicine, 73 ANN. INTERN. MED.
662, 663-64 (1970).
2 In A. ROSENFELD, THu SncoND GENESIs-THB COMING CONTROL OF LIFE
(1969) [hereinafter cited as ROSENFELD], the author discussed the current state and
future possibilities of various aspects of biological science and engineering:
In sober scientific circles today, there is hardly a subject more commonly dis-
cussed than man's control of his own heredity and evolution. And the discus-
sions seldom leave much doubt that man will acquire this control. It is a
matter of when, not if.
Id. at 9-10.
3 Artificial gestation, genetic engineering, suspended animation-all of these
and others are on the human agenda, some to come up for consideration sooner
and some later. Taken together they constitute a new phase in human life in
which man takes over deliberate control of his own evolution.
Gorney, The New Biology and the Future of Man, 15 U.C.L.A.L. REv. 273, 274
(1968). For general information describing the potential of genetic engineering, see
D. Ro viK, BRAVE NEW BABY (1971); ROSENFELD, supra note 2; Tunney & Levine,
Genetic Engineering, SATURDAY REvIEw OF SCIENcE, Aug. 5, 1972, at 23; Chicago
Tribune, July 30, 1972, (Perspective) § IA, at 1, col. 1.
4 See J. FRmI, Tnn MYsrERY OF HEnEDriy (1971) [hereinafter cited as FaRD],](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/illlr68&div=39&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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Genetic Screening and Counseling: The Legal and Ethical Issues
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