Move to Kill Arts Agency Fails in House

The National Endowment for the Arts, mired in controversy only six months ago, survived attempts in the House Tuesday to abolish it outright or trim its funds by about 4%.

The effort to kill the entire $178-million program was crushed by a vote of 361 to 66. A follow-up proposal to slice $7.4 million from the agency was defeated by a narrower margin, 228 to 196.

However, funds for the NEA face an uncertain fate in the Senate, where arch-critic Jesse Helms (R-N.C.) is expected to renew his efforts to cut its budget. Helms contends that the agency’s funds often have been used to pay for sacrilegious or pornographic art.

Despite the closeness of the House vote on reducing the NEA’s budget, there was virtually none of the contentious and emotional debate that marked last fall’s congressional controversy over NEA funding. Last year’s furor ended with a bipartisan compromise that restricted arts grants.

Both friends and foes of the agency said that allocation of more federal funds to state or local governments for arts projects and a new emphasis on arts education in the schools have cooled ardent opposition to the NEA.

“The House exhausted itself with this issue last year,” said Rep. Pat Williams (D-Mont.), a co-author of last year’s compromise. “After significant consideration, tumult and shouting, it decided it wanted to keep the NEA around.”

Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Long Beach), who led the charge against the NEA last year on grounds that it was spending taxpayers’ money for smut, took no part in Tuesday’s debate. “There are other fish to fry,” Rohrabacher told a reporter.

Still, considerable unhappiness with the NEA in the House was indicated by the 32-vote margin that defeated a proposal by Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-Fla.) to cut the agency’s funds by 4.1%--an unexpected maneuver designed to generate the maximum anti-NEA vote.

In arguing for his amendment, Stearns referred to NEA funding for a gay-oriented film, “Poison.” He said, “Some (NEA) funding has made a lot of us uneasy.”

Rep. H. Martin Lancaster (D-N.C.), a former chairman of the North Carolina Arts Council, supported the funding cut, saying, “NEA has continued to disappoint me . . . and disregarded the wishes of the American people.”

But, unlike last year, discussion of the NEA was conducted without heavy emphasis on the exhibition of photographs by the late Robert Mapplethorpe or Andres Serrano that were considered homoerotic or sacrilegious by many members of Congress.

In dealing with another controversial issue, the House voted 232 to 192 for a sharp increase in grazing fees on public lands administered by the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management. Those lands are primarily in the West.

Under a proposal offered by Rep. Mike Synar (D-Okla.), the fees--presently $1.97 a month--would rise to at least $8.70 in 1995 for grazing rights for a horse, or a cow and a calf, or five sheep. Eventually, the grazing fees would rise to the “fair market value” paid by ranchers who do not have access to public lands.

The measure’s advocates said it would remove a hidden subsidy now enjoyed by wealthy corporations and rich ranchers that is not available to most cattle ranchers. Opponents argued that raising the fees so rapidly would be a hardship for many small and middle-sized cattle and sheep ranchers.

The House passed a similar amendment last year, but it died in a conference with the Senate, where opposition to increasing grazing fees is strong.

The NEA and grazing fee proposals were included in a catchall $12.7-billion Interior Department appropriations bill that was passed by a vote of 345 to 76.

Times staff writer Alan Parachini contributed to this story.