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ANNUAL REPORT 1977 COLD SPRING HARBOR, NEW YORK COLD SPRING HARBOR LABORATORY COLD SPRING HARBOR, LONG ISLAND, NEW YORK OFFICERS OF THE CORPORATION Dr. Harry Eagle, Chairman Edward Pulling, Vice-Chairman Dr. Bayard Clarkson, Secretary Clarence E. Galston, Treasurer William R. Udry, Assistant Secretary-Treasurer Dr. James D. Watson, Laboratory Director William R. Udry, Administrative Director BOARD OF TRUSTEES Institutional Trustees State University of New York at Stony Brook Albert Einstein College of Medicine Dr. Joseph R. Kates Dr. Harry Eagle University of Wisconsin Columbia University Dr. Julian Davies Dr. Charles R. Cantor Wawepex Society Duke University Bache Bleecker Dr. Walter Guild Harvard University Individual Trustees School of Public Health Dr. Howard Hiatt Emilio G. Collado Long Island Biological Association Robert L. Cummings Norris Darrell Edward Pulling Walter N. Frank, Jr. Massachusetts Institute of Technology Clarence E. Galston Dr. Herman Eisen William R. Grant New York University Medical Center Mrs. Robert H. P. Olney Dr. Vittorio Defendi Walter H. Page William S. Robertson Princeton University Mrs. Franz Schneider Dr. Arnold J. Levine Dr. James D. Watson The Rockefeller University Dr. Rollin Hotchkiss Honorary trustees Sloan-Kettering Institute Dr. Alexander Hollaender Dr. Bayard Clarkson Dr. H. Bentley Glass Officers and trustees listed are as of December 31,1977. DIRECTOR'S REPORT When I was a boy in Chicago, the scientist was a poorlyabout that we are closet big businessmen who need to paid, absent-minded dreamer, very bright,if not abe kept in check by massive regulations, if not the threat genius, and culturally destined never to lead the masses, of jail. And all because the word has been spread that much less have anything to say to any public officialDNA, the stuff that makes up our genes, might do us all more important than a high school principal. Then in.I find this total nonsense and cannot think of any came Oppenheimer and the atomic bomb, and physi-potential environmental pollutant that worries me less. cists became men of affairs whom we and the GeneralsEveryone I know who now works with DNA feels the could not live without. Biologists were another matter.same, and mere mention of "NIH Guidelines" or No one thought they posed a threat to anyone; they"Memorandums of Understanding" makes our mouths would grow better hybrid corn or even someday curefroth. Under ordinary circumstances our response cancer, if they stayed by themselves and did not take onwould be obvious-head down to Washington and tell roles where they would only get in someone else's way. Congress that these scaremongers are an odd coalition I became one of them, and for twenty years it seemed Iof environmentalists wanting to block anything new and had entered the best of all possible worlds. Lots ofmiddle-class leftists who view the new genetics as a money was dug up by Mary Lasker and her crowd, withplausible tool for further "enslaving the masses." scarcely any accountability save for the quality of our The heart of our trouble, however, does not lie with science. Even better, no one got mad at us when wethe far-out doomsday scenarios these pathetic souls didn't soon hit lots of practical medical jackpots. And sopeddle. It was we presumably responsible molecular it went until Vietnam. Then came the teach-ins at whichbiologists who first gave the DNA scare its legitimacy. our students were told that the White House collectivelyTo be sure we never said we were deeply worried, for had the brains of a goose, a belief soon reinforced bynone of us were. I don't remember experiencing even Lyndon Johnson when he went out to NIH to give the five seconds of mild anxiety prior to signing the call for a word that we troublemakers had better start being usefulmoratorium. This document, a semiofficial response to or the gravy train would end. fears of genetic engineering at the service of CIA types, Being a brand-new Salk, however, is not that easy. It isurged restraints on the making of certain recombinant not that we do not want to be do-gooders, but if it was agenomes until we convened a gathering of international cinch to come up with a new vitamin that would makebigwigs at Asilomar on the Monterey Peninsula. There everyone live to 100 years of age without Social Securitywe were to discuss whether the 1973 breakthrough that it would have happened long ago. Invariably, greatgave us recombinant DNA was likely to generate challenges mean we don't know what to do next. Con- dangerous new bugs. I didn't know how we could solve sequently, most of our research efforts are holding oper-this dilemma but saw no harm in calling for a little ations which, given time, hopefully will generate unex-scientific restraint in the then post-Watergate mood of pected observations. With further luck we may gain a self-confession. Most of us were liberal-left types from fresh outlook on some pressing human problem such as birth, and our fellow McGovernites would now see that too many mosquitos or god-awful arthritis. So whilewe were not always out for quick fame and could place generally we don't go to work thinking about what wethe general good ahead of our immediate scientific can do next for our fellowman, we never lost any sleep goals. worrying about whether we were in cahoots with the Here we were terribly naive-the real world never idle rich who preach the virtues of hard work to othersstops anything it wants unless it has already smelled and then live off more pollution. Far better to be thoughtsmoke. Though everyone at Asilomar kept saying "po- unworldly and of conscience clean. tential risk," experienced newspaper addicts thought Now, however, we are in a strange mess. The word is differently. No one would invent phrases like P3 or EK2 5 unless they could measure the monster's size. The very cannot be dishonest. This is a point about which Con- act of setting up committees to pinpoint the "most risky" gress needs no education, and once the issue was raised experiments could only magnify the public fear that we on Capitol Hill it became very likely that some form of biologists now had our own diabolical form of the punitive legislation would be enacted to ensure strict bomb. compliance with the guidelines. By this stage I knew we were in way over our heads If, instead, the recombinant DNA community had been divided as to whether we needed any guidelines, and felt that this senseless hysteria should somehow be the final outcome would have been less clear and might nipped in the bud. So I argued, to the surprise of most at have been decided by whether the Senate and the Asilomar, against the forming of any official guidelines House had the gumption for still another regulatory that spelled out how we should work with recombinant commission. But with virtually every first-class molecu- DNA. I thought any regulations by necessity had to be lar geneticist then arguing that we needed protection capricious, and in the absence of even the slightest reason for being afraid, we were very silly to be making from ourselves. Congress would have been accused of shirking its duty if it did not seize the initiative. It then all this fuss. O nly Joshua Lederberg and Stanley Cohen were publicly on my side, and those who privately became a question of how to get a law where we, not the agreed with me thought I was risking my hide by appear- professional demonstrators, would control the action. ing so indifferent to the general good. Almost everyone Up through today the final outcome is still unclear, reasoned that the publ ic would not dump the matter and and that three years have passed since Asilomar without so went along with Sidney Brenn^s.eloquent plea thal legislation reflects more the inherent chaos of Congress we must make a show of seff: restraint or the lawyers and than the skill with which we lobby. Though there have ethicists would take over and give us stupid laws that been moments of panic, the situation is now less out of could really shut us down. control. The most chilling early proposal from Senator Kennedy's bailiwick was that final power should reside Unfortunately, the high hopes of many that A|ijbmar in a committee so constituted by law that scientists who might defuse the public concern, were soon dashed. know what D N A is must be in the minority. The vision of Within weeks Congress got into the act, and the guys a "Friend of the Earth" bearing a large wig righteously who gave us the guidelines soon found Themselves in telling us what not to do could be a scene from MASH. front of Senator Kennedy. Given the importance as- And Representative Rogers' Health Subcommittee dal- cribed to the topic, ,he saw no reason to accept the lied briefly with the thought that the way to keep us argument that a matter which, might affect the life or ,day fines־a־B e a n was the taint of a felony and $50,000 death of our society should be left jp. the scientists' penalties which most certainly would make docile pup- hands. Just the opposite— it seemed the perfect occa- pets even of our nation's bankers, much less our scieti- sion for the public to be Risked whether they were to be tists. the next guinea pigs for our experiments. Here the Through these ups and downs we occasionally h^ve molecular biologists quickly found they had little room had the hope that recombinant DN A would finally so to maneuver.