The Reagan Arts Legacy

Ronald Reagan “was a man of many paradoxes whose cultural legacy is colored in shades of gray,” says John Hayes. And while the left-leaning arts world, which is still fuming over Reagan’s deliberate ignoring of the AIDS epidemic that decimated the American cultural scene, is unlikely to remember Reagan as one of its favorite presidents, the fact is that under his leadership, public arts funding hit an all-time high. In fact, at a time when many Congressional conservatives were ready to launch an all-out assault on the National Endowment for the Arts, Reagan steered a gentle course between warring parties, and may have saved the NEA in the process.