James A. Leach: “Mr. Chairman, the debate about public funding of the arts is about democracy, about the type of society we aspire to be…”

“Mr. Chairman, the debate about public funding of the arts is about democracy, about the type of society we aspire to be and become. It is about opportunity: the opportunity to witness artistic expression and to create for oneself. America today is a prosperous country. Poignantly, 70 years ago, when we became enmeshed in the deepest depression in our history, the Federal Government created a jobs program called the Works Project Administration. My grandfather headed the WPA in Iowa and, as required by statute, hired a Cedar Rapids native by the name of Grant Wood to lead Iowa's WPA arts division. Because of the WPA, artists in Iowa and across the Nation were given an opportunity to work in their chosen fields and to advance their own and society's creative impulse. I refer back to the WPA era because when our country dissolved into social chaos, the arts brought a perspective of unity and courage. Ironically, perhaps, to some, an American solidarity of spirit was enhanced by artists who frequently highlighted social programs and who just as frequently lampooned institutions of the State, including political leaders. These are more prosperous times, but just as with the WPA in the 1930s, government involvement in the arts today is designed to take the arts from the grand citadel of the privileged and bring it to the public at large. This democratization of the arts ennobles the American experience.”