[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 91 (Wednesday, June 19, 1996)]
[House]
[Page H6514]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            THE NEA MUST GO

  (Mr. FUNDERBURK asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. FUNDERBURK. Mr. Speaker, here we go again. The NEA insists on 
offending American families. Freshman Republicans tried to eliminate 
taxpayer funding for the National Endowment for the Arts, in part 
because taxpayers should not have to subsidize art which blatantly 
offends the religious beliefs and family values of most Americans. As 
Bob Dole puts it, most people know the difference between Mapplethorpe 
and Michelangelo.
  Now the NEA has crossed the lines again with a debut this Sunday of 
the ``Watermelon Woman'' film at the New York Lesbian and Gay Video and 
Film Festival. The film is described in the Washington Times as ``black 
lesbian quirky, steamy, and taxpayer funded.'' The Times goes on to 
quote Edmond Peterson, chairman of Project 21, an organization of 
conservative blacks, saying: ``This is a classic example of the Clinton 
administration being in bed with the gay-lesbian movement and funding a 
project through tax dollars that cannot get funded any other way.''
  Mr. Speaker, it is a free country and people can make any kind of 
trash they want, but taxpayers should not have to pay for it. It is 
time we cut off funding for the NEA.

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