Date: Fri, 18 Aug 1995 10:34:49 -0400
From: Allan Metcalf AAllan[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]AOL.COM
Subject: NEH funding update (another long one)
Here follows another thorough report from our associates at the National
Humanities Alliance in Washington. For our field, in the US, the NEH is of
high importance; but I don't like loading ADS-L mailboxes every week with
material that not everyone finds relevant.
So - I propose the following:
If you would like to continue getting all the NEH Washington news, send me a
message to that effect. I'll construct an NEH mailing list, and send future
news items just to those on that list. OK? - Allan Metcalf AAllan[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]aol.com
********************************
18 August 1995
TO: NHA Members and Friends
FR: John Hammer and Cuc Vu
RE: Washington News Memo - 1) Senate votes $110 million for NEH
2) Appropriations Conference next
3) Hutchison-Bennett Bill Calls for
Restructured Single Endowment
1) Senate votes parity for endowments at $110 million - On August
9, by voice vote, the Senate amended its Appropriation Committee
recommendation for the FY-96 Interior Appropriations bill by
increasing the arts endowment by $10.5 million and decreasing the
humanities endowment by $4.5 million, leaving both agencies at
$110 million (approximately 35% below the current year
appropriations). The Institute of Museum Services was left
unchanged at $21 million . The amendment was initiated by
Senators James Jeffords (R-VT) with cosponsorship by Senators
Daniel Akaka (D-HI), Dale Bumpers (D-AR), Christopher Dodd
(D-CT), Edward Kennedy (D-MA), Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), Patrick
Leahy (D-VT), Carol Moseley-Braun (D-IL), Claiborne Pell (D-RI),
and Alan Simpson (R-WY). Importantly, the Senate bill does not
include language phasing out the endowments.
The outcome of lowering NEH's allocation to accommodate NEA, as
far as one can tell, was not anti-NEH but rather reflected the
great difficulty in finding offsets (i.e., other Interior budget
lines to raid). Senator Jeffords, who authored the amendment,
initially sought to bring both agencies to $115 million but could
not find offsets that would be acceptable to other members whose
votes he needed. Some Senate staffers suggest that a factor in
arriving at parity but at the lower number was the dismay of the
Subcommittee chair and floor manager, Sen. Slade Gorton (R-WA),
who had only reluctantly agreed to bring the endowments in at the
$99.5 million figure voted by the House. Mr. Gorton said in the
subcommittee markup that he did not see NEH and NEA as having the
importance among federal cultural agencies as the Smithsonian,
National Gallery, and Holocaust Museum -- The latter agencies were
marked for very close to even funding, whereas the endowments were
marked for cuts in the 40% range. As part of the deal on the
amendment, Mr. Gorton pledged on the Senate floor to vigorously
uphold the budget levels contained in the amendment during the
conference with the House.
One troublesome aspect of the amendment passed by the Senate is
the inclusion of language restricting content of arts endowment
grants (but not NEH grants) brought forward by Senator Jesse Helms
(R-NC). The restrictive language, which is vintage Helms,
prohibits "support for projects to promote, disseminate, sponsor
or produce materials or performances" which a) "denigrate the
objects or beliefs of adherents of a particular religion"; and b)
"depict or describe, in a patently offensive way, sexual or
excretory activities or organs." Senate staffers indicate that
Senator Jeffords and his co-sponsors accepted the language out of
concern that they lacked the votes to pass the amendment without
Helms. The effect of adding the Helms language on the votes of
conservatives was clear (i.e., there were no nays spoken). The
decision to pass the amendment on a voice vote rather than by roll
call is likely to simplify the work of conferees in September as
the Helms language will be easier to alter or set aside with no
record of how individual Senators voted.
While many believe the restrictive language eventually would be
found unconstitutional should it become law, a major concern is
that the issue will deflect conferees from resolving the far more
pressing issue of the House-passed provision that terminates the
NEA in two years and NEH in three. As noted above, the Senate
bill does not contain language phasing out the agencies (although
Senator John McCain [R-AZ] mentioned on the floor the night before
the endowments came under discussion, that he was going to propose
a provision that NEA could not use FY-96 funds without formal
reauthorization -- McCain however, did not offer the amendment
when the time came). Some have suggested that the Helms language
could be used as a bargaining chip in the effort to delete the
phasing out language.
2) Interior Appropriations Conference Likely in September - A
conference to iron out differences between the House and Senate
Interior appropriations bills will be held in September although
neither chamber has appointed conferees. Since conferences on
appropriations (and most other legislative areas) are composed of
the members of the relevant subcommittee plus full committee
leaders, the Interior conference is likely to have the following
makeup:
HOUSE - The Key players: Ralph Regula (R-OH) subcommittee chair,
Bob Livingston (R-LA) committee chair and ex officio member of the
subcommittee, Sidney Yates (D-IL) ranking minority member of the
subcommittee, and David Obey (D-WI) ranking minority member of the
full committee and ex officio member of the subcommittee.
Senate - The Key players: Slade Gorton (R-WA) subcommittee chair,
Mark Hatfield (R-OR) committee chair who is also a member of the
subcommittee, Robert Byrd (D-WV) ranking minority member of both
the subcommittee and full committee.
Other members of the conference (in order of seniority on the
subcommittees) - House/MAJORITY: Joseph McDade (R-PA), Jim Kolbe
(R-AZ), Joe Skeen (R-NM), Barbara Vucanovich (R-NV), Charles
Taylor (R-NC), George Nethercutt (R-WA), Jim Bunn (R-OR) /MINORITY
Norm Dicks (D-WA), Tom Bevill (D-AL), David Skaggs (D-CO) -
Senate/MAJORITY: Ted Stevens (R-AK), Thad Cochran (R-MS), Pete
Domenici (R-NM), Connie Mack (R-FL), Conrad Burns (R-MT), Robert
Bennett (R-UT), /MINORITY Ernest Hollings (D-SC), J. Bennett
Johnston (D-LA), Patrick J. Leahy (D-VT), Dale Bumpers (D-AR),
Harry Reid (D-NV), and Patty Murray (D-WA). An address and
contact list of the probable House-Senate conferees is attached.
The agenda for conferences such as the FY-96 interior bills are
generally restricted to points of difference between the two
chambers' bills. The key conference issues affecting NEH will
include:
o Appropriation levels for NEH and NEA -- Both received $99.5
million in the House and $110 million in the Senate. There is a
long tradition of simply splitting the difference but other
outcomes are very possible. (Since IMS is the same in both bills,
it will not be "conferenced" as we say in Washington.)
o "Authorization" - Both appropriations committee acted upon
committee-passed authorization bills that lacked the weight of a
full floor vote. In the case of the Senate (where there never was
much enthusiasm for the claim that funds cannot be appropriated
without formal authorization), the appropriation is nowhere near
the authorized funding levels of the Jeffords bill, which are $160
for NEH and $152 for NEA).
The House is more complicated since the authorizing committee bill
calls for the phasing out of both endowments in three years. In
the fight over the protective rule governing House debate (i.e.,
the rule that said agencies or programs could not be removed from
the budget simply because they were not authorized), NEA ended up
with a special provision requiring that the House must pass a
reauthorization bill before the arts agency can spend FY-96 funds.
This provision may well dominate the conference negotiations on
the cultural agencies; perhaps it will dominate the whole
conference. Mr. Regula must negotiate on the basis of
rather frenetic House debate in which the House conferees were
instructed to closely adhere to the provisions as passed by the
House. Some in the Senate delegation were quite annoyed at the
House presumption on what the Senate must accept.
o Content restrictions - Although the Helms language applies
only to NEA, it could prove to be a stumbling block to agreement
on the other cultural agency issues. Some hill staffers are
predicting that, unlike the recent past, the Helms language will
be set aside with little fanfare.
3) Hutchison-Bennett Bill Would Create a Single Endowment from
NEH, NEA, and IMS - Senators Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) and
Robert Bennett (R-UT) have proposed a National Endowment
Restructuring Act of 1995 (S. 1071) which would collapse the
National Endowment for the Humanities, National Endowment for the
Arts, and the Institute of Museum Services into a single agency
called the National Endowment for Arts, Humanities, and Museum
Services. Features proposed for the new entity that differ
markedly from the current legislation and/or the Jeffords bill (S.
856) that was approved by committee in June include:
o National grants would be restricted to "nationally
prominent groups, institutions, scholars to carry out nationally
significant projects and workshops in humanities, publications,
literacy, research a) providing fellowships, scholarships, and
stipends to carry out programs of national significance in
humanities; and b) producing significant publications in
humanities."
o Support would go to "local groups of clearly recognized
value to support locally significant humanities projects
identified by [the national] council as being of state or
community importance."
o A director would be appointed by the President, with the
advice and consent of the Senate. Director makes final decisions
on awards with council advice but may not overrule a negative
council recommendation. (Note: Since 1990, this constraint has
been in affect for the NEA but not the NEH).
o Deputy directors for arts, humanities, and museum services
would direct processing of applications and presentation to the
council (i.e., unless the director comes from the humanities,
final decisions in humanities areas would rest with a director who
may have little or no experience with scholarship and other
humanities programming).
o Federal share requirements - In general, endowment share is
25%; for groups with annual budgets $3 million or more, the
federal share would be 16.67%; Director may increase the federal
share to 50% with the approval of the council.
o State grants - Although the legislation does not mention
this, a cover letter from Hutchison and Bennett call for sending
60% of the funds to the states. The legislation maintains a
framework for state councils but, curiously, only provides for
such agencies if they are components of state government. (State
arts councils are state agencies, while state humanities councils
are private 501(c)(3) organizations.)
o A National Council on Arts, Humanities, and Museum Services
would be composed of the director and 18 members appointed by the
President with advice and consent of the Senate. Six would be
nominated by the House, six nominated by the Senate, and six
nominated by the President. The qualifications to serve are
similar to present requirements.
o The annual authorized appropriation would be $370 million
for each of fiscal years 1996 through 2000.
Somewhat inconsistently with other provisions of the legislation,
the legislation would:
o Prohibit grants to individuals except to nationally
prominent scholars; and
o Prohibit subgrants (and seasonal support)
Comment: The Hutchison-Bennett bill was developed in good faith,
primarily by Senator Hutchison's staff, in order to provide an
alternative in the event that the Jeffords reauthorization bill
fails to win passage. The concept of a single unified endowment
with its support restricted to nationally, prominent groups with
more than half the funds going to the states is essentially
proposal advanced by Leonard Garment as a way out of the on-going
problems of the arts endowment. From a humanities point of view,
the entire proposal seems to have been developed with NEA and its
problems in mind. Consequently, in many areas (e.g., individual
fellowships, state humanities councils), the new arrangement would
be unresponsive to the needs in the humanities. On the other hand,
there would probably be unqualified support in the arts and
humanities community for grafting the authorized appropriation
level of $370 million for NEH, NEA, IMS onto the Jeffords
legislation.
_________________________
ATTACHMENT - ATTACHMENT - ATTACHMENT - ATTACHMENT - ATTACHMENT
NAME LOCATION TELEPHONE STAFF ON NEH ISSUES
House Interior Appropriations Subcommittee
___Majority Members_(9)___
Ralph Regula (OH-16), Chair 2309 RHOB 225-3876 Barbara Wainman
Chair
Joseph McDade (PA-10) 2107 RHOB 225-3731 Teresa Baker
Jim Kolbe (AZ-5) 205 CHOB 225-2542 Steve Bloch
Joe Skeen (NM-2) 2367 RHOB 225-2365 John Ryan
Barbara Vucanovich (NV-2) 2202 RHOB 225-6155 Mort Rolleston
Charles Taylor (NC-11) 231 CHOB 225-6401 Caroline Choi
George Nethercutt (WA-5) 1527 LHOB 225-2006 Amy Flachbart
Jim Bunn (OR-5) 1517 LHOB 225-5711 David Reinhardt
Bob Livingston (LA-1) 2406 RHOB 225-3015 Stan Skocki
ex officio
___Minority Members_(5)___
Sidney Yates (IL-9), RM 2109 RHOB 225-2111 Mary Bain
Jason Alderman
Norm Dicks (WA-6) 2467 RHOB 225-5916 Mike Bagley
Tom Bevill (AL-4) 2302 RHOB 225-4876 Olivia Barton
David Skaggs (CO-2) 1124 LHOB 225-2161 Brooke Anderson
David Obey (WI-7) 2462 RHOB 225-3365 Christina Hamilton
ex officio
Senate Interior Appropriations Subcommittee
___Majority Members_(8)___
Slade Gorton (WA), Chair 730 HSOB 224-3441 Elaine Wells Harmer
Mark Hatfield (OR)* 711 HSOB 224-3753 Heather Sack
Ted Stevens (AK) 522 HSOB 224-3004 Jane Rosenquist
Thad Cochran (MS) 326 RSOB 224-5054 Greg McGinity
Pete Domenici (NM) 328 DSOB 224-6621 Brian Jones
Connie Mack (FL) 517 HSOB 224-5274 Jamie Brown
Conrad Burns (MT) 183 DSOB 224-2644 Patty Deutsche
Robert Bennett (UT) 427 DSOB 224-5444 Corine Larson
___Minority Members_(7)___
Robert Byrd (WV), RM* 311 HSOB 224-3954 Sue Masica
Ernest Hollings (SC) 125 RSOB 224-6121 Pinara Black
J. Bennett Johnston (LA) 136 HSOB 224-5824 Donna Denison
Patrick J. Leahy (VT) 433 RSOB 224-4242 Maggie Whitney
Dale Bumpers (AR) 229 DSOB 224-4843 Kira Finkler
Harry Reid (NV) 324 HSOB 224-3542 Sue Maybry
Patty Murray (WA) 111 RSOB 224-2621 Helen Howell
RHOB=Rayburn House Office Building
LHOB=Longworth House Office Building
CHOB=Cannon House Office Building
RSOB=Russell Senate Office Building
DSOB=Dirksen Senate Office Building
HSOB=Hart Senate Office Building
RM=Ranking Minority
All phone numbers are in the (202) area code
All House zip codes are 20515
All Senate zip codes are 20510
*Mr. Hatfield is the Chair and Mr. Byrd is the Ranking Minority of the full
Senate Appropriations Committee.
--
National Humanities Alliance
21 Dupont Circle, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20036
(202) 296-2994
Internet: nhainfo[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]cni.org