President Bush cast the first veto of his presidency yesterday. He rejected a bill that would ease limits on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research.

He had promised a veto. The hope here was that he would have taken one more chance to listen to the arguments in favor of this bill. That he would listen to the arguments from people who, like Bush, consider themselves strong defenders of life.

The president has limited federal funding to research on a relative handful of embryonic stem cell lines in existence before August 2001. A bill approved last week by the Senate and passed last year by the House would have allowed federal funding of research on stem cells from thousands of embryos created in fertility clinics. It's important to note that these embryos would otherwise be discarded.

People of good conscience on both sides of the stem cell issue have struggled with it. Some still do. The stakes could hardly be higher: life and death, potential future cures or crushing disappointment. Stem cells could someday provide treatments or cures for cancer, heart disease, diabetes and other diseases.

For many Americans, the stem cell issue is agonizing because it touches on core beliefs of when life begins and how it must be protected. It cuts to the heart of society's moral duty to help the living, but within ethical boundaries.

In Congress, as in America, the stem cell debate doesn't divide neatly along partisan lines. Some conservative, anti-abortion Republicans have joined liberal Democrats in voting for the stem cell bill in the House and Senate.

Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, for instance, opposes abortion but has vigorously supported the stem cell bill. "I do not question that an embryo is a living cell," Hatch said. "But I do not believe that a frozen embryo in a fertility clinic freezer constitutes human life."

Hatch said in 2002: "... my belief (is) that human life requires and begins in a mother's nurturing womb." And Hatch has said: "A critical part of being pro-life is to support measures that help the living."

Sen. Bill Frist, R-Tenn., the Senate majority leader and a transplant surgeon, has said the current restrictions are too tight because there were not as many suitable stem cell lines in 2001 as the White House anticipated. "I believe that the progress of science and a pro-life position demand that Congress send a message," he wrote in a recent op-ed piece in the Washington Post. "I hope that we can redeem this loss of life in part by using these embryos to seed research that will save lives in the future."

An override of the Bush veto appears doubtful. The Senate fell short of a veto-proof margin in Tuesday's 63-37 vote; last year the House fell dozens of votes short when it passed the same bill by 238-194.

But it could still happen, if members carefully consider what Hatch, Frist and others have said.

There is a strong argument for this legislation, an argument that respects life.