Bill Ivey, the former head of the Country Music Hall of Fame who now chairs the National Endowment of the Arts, acknowledged that his ambitious declaration might never enjoy the force of law, but described it nonetheless as “a series of moral claims on the public conscience.”
In a significant but little noted address to the National Press Club, Mr. Ivey spoke of “the right of Americans to make art, to become artist-citizens” and “to choose among a broad range of experiences and services that can only be provided by a strong, well-supported community of cultural organizations.”
In this politically correct era, it goes without saying that such organizations must embody the noble principles of multi-culturalism, to guarantee the sacred “right of Americans to engage art and art making…that auditions the unique character of diverse nations and communities.” In other words, if – heaven forbid! – your local museum or concert hall has unduly emphasized the artistic production of DWEMs (Dead White European Males), then you should protest the denial of a precious human right.
Most significant of all those “cultural rights” enumerated by Mr. Ivey is the God-given, inalienable entitlement to federal money to support your artistic endeavors, even if (especially if) no one likes what you do or chooses to back it with their own funds. As the NEA head proudly announced to the world, the government should do everything in its power to secure “the right of Americans to engage a healthy and valued community of creative artists, and our artist-citizens who have dedicated their lives to expressive work, including those artists who challenge our imaginations and whose efforts cannot be sustained by the marketplace alone.” (Italics added)
In this ringing affirmation, Mr. Ivey reveals the dangerous logic behind the current policy of federal funding for selected artistic expression. Even if the NEA achieved massive (and unlikely) increases in its current budget of $105 million per year, it would be utterly unable to fund all “artist-citizens who have dedicated their lives to expressive work.”
Nearly every family contains some eccentric Uncle Marvin who believes with all his heart that his paintings or poems or love songs or hubcap sculptures deserve the support of some federal grant. If we establish a new obligation to fund those creative individuals who “cannot be sustained by the marketplace alone,” then on what basis would we turn down such individuals? Obviously, Mr. Ivey envisions the exercise of some governmental judgment in determining which “artist-citizens” among the multitudes deserve admission into the “valued community of creative artists” receiving federal funds. In short, bureaucrats, rather than the marketplace, will determine what constitutes worthy art.
This pernicious assumption represents the vile notion behind the whole federal arts endowment – and the reason that the program still deserves to die, whatever its success in avoiding controversial content. Too many past debates about the NEA centered on obscene or anti-religious excesses, rather than focusing on the idiotic idea at the core of the program: that this great, vibrant and varied culture requires a federal bureaucracy to create and reward a special status of federally sanctioned art.
The discredited dictatorships of the twentieth century, each with their all-powerful Culture Commissars to guarantee “cultural rights,” showed the folly in such efforts. In fact, the record of the NEA itself demonstrates the distinctly limited utility of federal funding for the arts. Would anyone suggest that this woebegone agency, since its ill-considered creation in 1967, has sparked a dazzling efflorescence of American creativity? If so, through which tax-payer supported efforts did this great American Renaissance occur? Did we suffer from cultural impoverishment before the beneficent NEA emerged, full-blown, from the godlike brow of Lyndon Johnson? Would we suffer such impoverishment again if the NEA suddenly — mercifully — disappeared? How could this be when the agency currently covers less than 1.5% of total arts spending in the nation — most of which comes from corporate support and consumer choice?
Defenders of the beleaguered boondoggle invariably point to those aspects of its endeavors that remain unexceptionable — such as the support for selected museums, ballet companies, and arts programs in the schools. This argument, however, serves to defend an appallingly illogical routing of money for laudable public purposes. Does it make sense to take money from the good citizens of Des Moines, and send it to Washington. D.C., so that the all-knowing “experts” at the NEA can then decide to send some of that money back home to support the Des Moines Institute of Arts? Would it not make more sense to distribute available funds directly to state Arts Commissions and Arts Councils to allow such local bodies to determine the allocation of support?
This approach actually presents a precious opportunity to the Bush administration. The new team in Washington emphasizes state and local control, and generally favors sending federal tax money back home to the communities that earned it. With this priority in mind, the President could help realize the conservative dream of cutting off the NEA as we know it, without in any way lessening the overall level of financial support for the arts. In fact, the elimination of a layer of federal bureaucracy at the NEA would actually provide more funds, not less, to send out to the states.
Of course, we’d have to learn to live without an ambitious federal “Arts Czar” in the mold of Bill Ivey — and to relinquish his dream of a “Cultural Bill of Rights.” That sacrifice would, however, prove far more consistent with our original Bill of Rights, which memorably promises free expression — free, one would hope, of federal sanction or supervision, censorship or subsidy.
(e3mil columnist Michael Medved hosts a nationally syndicated daily radio talk show that focuses on the intersection of pop culture and politics. You can contact him at www.michaelmedved.com.)
