Endowments for the Arts: Shrinking Legal and Economic Landscape of Federal Arts Funding

By Lauren Stein

Introduction

For decades, public funding for the arts has been hotly contested.^[1] The National Endowments for the Arts (NEA), established in 1965 has frequently been at the center of discussions concerning the scope of federal support for arts and culture. Critics of federal arts funding contend that government involvement may implicate First Amendment concerns, arguing that public funding can be perceived as state-sponsored or state-censored expression.^[2] Some opponents further assert “there is no robust argument on constitutional or economic grounds for the NEA to exist. Great art can be created without the NEA, which distorts and politicizes artistic endeavors . . . [and] forces taxpayers to fund projects they object to after diverting money to its bureaucracy . . . .”^[3]

Supporters of federal arts funding, by contrast, emphasize that the United States government has an interest in “fostering the nation’s culture” and it is in the interest of taxpayers to “protect accessibility and freedom of expression by supporting culture with their tax dollars.”^[4] This perspective frames federal support as a mechanism to expand cultural participation.