text: As a firm believer that human life begins the moment an egg is fertilized, and that from that moment has a right to life that government is charged with protecting, Paul has also been challenged for simultaneously holding the apparently contradictory position of supporting access to emergency contraception, such as the morning-after pill, in cases of "honest rape."  He wrote, in Liberty Defined, published in 2011, "Very early pregnancies and victims of rape can be treated with the day after pill, which is nothing more than using birth control pills in a special manner. These very early pregnancies could never be policed, regardless. Such circumstances would be dealt with by each individual making his or her own moral choice."
  Stem-cell research
  Paul supports stem-cell research generically, as evidenced by his authoring the Cures Can Be Found Act of 2007 (H.R. 457; H.R. 3444 in 2005), a bill "to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to provide credits against income tax for qualified stem cell research, the storage of qualified stem cells, and the donation of umbilical cord blood". However, Paul believes the debate over the embryonic category of stem-cell research is another divisive issue over which the federal government has no jurisdiction.
  Human cloning
  Paul joined with conservative colleagues in voting "no" on HR 2560, the Democrats' version of a federal ban on human cloning.  The Bush White House had opposed HR 2560, saying "The Administration is strongly opposed to any legislation that would prohibit human cloning for reproductive purposes but permit the creation of cloned embryos or development of human embryo farms for research, which would require the destruction of nascent human life."
  Capital punishment
  Paul stated in August 2007 that at the state level "capital punishment is a deserving penalty for those who commit crime", but he does not believe that the federal government should use it as a penalty.
  In September 2007, he elaborated: