[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 49 (Wednesday, April 23, 1997)]
[Senate]
[Page S3546]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




RETIREMENT OF DR. SHELDON HACKNEY AS CHAIRMAN OF THE NATIONAL ENDOWMENT 
                           FOR THE HUMANITIES

  Mr. KENNEDY. Mr. President, earlier this week Sheldon Hackney, 
chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities, announced that 
he would be leaving office and returning to teaching at the end of his 
term of office in August. Dr. Hackney came to the endowment in 1993, 
following a brilliant academic and administrative career, including 
service as president of the University of Pennsylvania.
  News of his retirement saddens all of us who know what a superb job 
he has done at the endowment for the past 4 years. Perhaps his most 
notable achievement has been in taming the intense political 
controversies that were swirling around the endowment when he arrived. 
The controversies persist, but fortunately, they are muted because of 
his leadership. The endowment has earned new bipartisan support because 
of the effective way he has explained its important mission to liberals 
and conservatives alike. He will be greatly missed, but I wish him 
well.
  Asked about his views on eliminating the endowment, Dr. Hackney 
responded with characteristic eloquence,

       The only legitimate argument against continuing it is from 
     someone who believes in a minimalist government, that 
     government shouldn't be in culture at all. The endowment does 
     things that no one else would do but need to be done if we 
     are to remember who we are and what the heritage of our 
     nation is.

  I ask unanimous consent that an article from the New York Times about 
Dr. Hackney may be printed at this point in the Record. The humanity of 
the man shines through, and through him the humanities endowment has 
shone through as well.
  There being no objection, the article was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                [From the New York Times, Apr. 21, 1997]

                 Chairman To Leave Humanities Endowment

                          (By Irvin Molotsky)

       Washington, April 21.--Sheldon Hackney, who has led the 
     National Endowment for the Humanities during a period of 
     reduced budgets, told the White House today that he would not 
     seek another term as chairman and would return to the 
     University of Pennsylvania to teach history.
       Mr. Hackney, who stepped down as president of Penn to come 
     to Washington four years ago, said today that he had planned 
     all along to step down when his four-year term expired in 
     August.
       ``I never discussed it with the White House,'' he said, 
     ``but I'm sure I could have stayed.''
       The endowment, which provides Federal money for research 
     and exhibitions on history and other scholarly pursuits, has 
     been less of a lightning rod for fiscal conservatives than 
     its counterpart, the National Endowment for the Arts. But it 
     has been bracketed with the arts endowment as the target of 
     spending cuts and its budget has been reduced in recent 
     years.
       When asked about his disappointments as chairman, Mr. 
     Hackney said: ``The political situation changed, and I had to 
     spend more time than I wanted telling the public and Congress 
     what we do. I could have spent that time on programs.''
       The change in the political situation that Mr. Hackney 
     spoke of was the Republican takeover of Congress in 1994, 
     when many opponents of Federal spending for the arts and 
     humanities were elected to the House and Senate.
       Spending for the humanities endowment has fallen from a 
     high of $172 million in 1993 to $110 million in the current 
     budget. President Clinton has asked for $136 million for next 
     year, but Congress is unlikely to approve that much.
       ``Despite the turbulence of the times,'' Mr. Hackney said, 
     ``I feel very good. We've accomplished a lot.''
       Besides keeping the endowment alive, Mr. Hackney said, his 
     accomplishments include making the endowment nonpolitical and 
     nonideological, reversing a pattern that he said took hold 
     during the Reagan and Bush Administrations.
       Asked to provide a defense for continuing the endowment, 
     Mr. Hackney said: ``The only legitimate argument against 
     continuing it is from someone who believes in minimalist 
     government, that government shouldn't be in culture at all. 
     The endowment does things that no one else would do but need 
     to be done if we are to remember who we are and what the 
     heritage of our nation is.
       ``One of the purposes of government is to create good 
     citizens. That's what we do at the N.E.H. We are a 
     democratizing force in American culture.''
       Representative Sidney R. Yates, Democrat of Illinois, an 
     advocate of both endowments who was chairman of the House 
     committee that approved their financing when the Democrats 
     were in the majority, said he thought Mr. Hackney has 
     succeeded in removing the endowment from partisan politics.
       ``We'll miss him,'' Mr. Yates said. ``I think he's been 
     very good. He's been a very good administrator of the 
     humanities endowment at a difficult time with less money.''
       Representative Ralph Regula, Republican of Ohio, who is 
     chairman of the appropriations panel Mr. Yates once led, said 
     of Mr. Hackney, ``I think he's worked hard at giving the 
     N.E.H. good leadership, especially in the field of 
     libraries.''
       Asked whether Mr. Hackney had kept politics and ideology 
     out of the endowment, Representative Regula said, ``He has 
     been very successful in that regard.'' He added, however, 
     that he thought Mr. Hackney's Republican predecessors had 
     also kept partisanship out.
       A Republican critic of the endowment, Representative John 
     T. Doolittle, a Californian, said it spent money on unneeded 
     programs, money that could be better used ``to save Medicare 
     from bankruptcy and balance the budget.''
       ``If there were ever a Federal agency or program that 
     deserves a trip to the chopping block, it is this sandbox for 
     the cultural elite,'' Mr. Doolittle said.
       Mr. Regula did not agree with his Republican colleague. ``I 
     think it will survive in some form or another,'' he said. ``I 
     think the preservation of the culture of society is 
     important.''
       Mr. Hackney said the endowment had supported many good 
     projects without getting much credit for it, like providing 
     some of the money for public television programs on Theodore 
     Roosevelt and the American West.
       ``The public doesn't normally notice who is funding 
     projects,'' he said. ``People say: `Oh, my goodness. Did you 
     do that?'''
       Mr. Hackney, an Alabamian, said that at Penn he would 
     return to one his great interests by teaching a course on the 
     history of the South.
       When he was named chairman of the endowment, Mr. Hackney 
     was succeeded by Judith S. Rodin as university president.
       ``I'm going to teach history and stay out of her way,'' Mr. 
     Hackney said.

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