Commonwealth Policy Center

Gov. Beshear has criticized the Alabama ruling that frozen embryos are children. He said, “I’m of the generation where numerous of my friends have amazing children that have grown up with mine and that I know so well–they wouldn’t be here without IVF.” We should celebrate all human life, regardless of how it was conceived. But Beshear’s answer displays a deep moral inconsistency. He celebrates the babies born through IVF, but he doesn’t recognize their frozen embryo siblings as human beings. He wants to protect the children born to his friends, but he rejects the personhood of the unborn. Governor Beshear may not have intended to recognize the personhood of human embryo’s but his statement implied a moral truth: children–regardless of where we find them–are persons made in God’s image.