Out of Tune: Listening to the First Amendment

Forty-five words guarantee every U.S. citizen five essential freedoms - the right to free religious practice, free speech, free press, peaceable assembly, and freedom to petition the government for a redress of grievances. This important guarantee, as embodied in the First Amendment of the Constitution, complements the Declaration of Independence, that revolutionary document which remains to this day the fundamental moral and ethical document upon which we base our daily lives. However, author John Frohnmayer writes, as a nation, "...we have lost - or are losing - the common basis of agreement and understanding that we call the social contract". Are we so squeamish about giving offense because of race, religion, or gender that we would, instead, sacrifice vital freedoms? In this book of reflective essays on the meaning of the First Amendment, Frohnmayer provides a clear perspective on how we, as citizens in a free society must work to protect and enforce our democratic birthrig

Purchase at Powells.com
Purchase at Amazon.com

Leaving Town Alive: Confessions of an Arts Warrior

From Publishers Weekly
Appointed chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts in 1989 amid the uproar over Robert Mapplethorpe's photography, Frohnmayer entered the fray as a First Amendment moderate. By the time he was fired in February 1992, he had become a free-speech radical. In this cogent, detailed account of his stormy tenure, he eloquently defends the principle of artistic freedom as vital to democracy and warns against "cultural terrorists" who seek to emasculate the NEA with content restrictions. Criticizing ex-President Bush for lack of support for the arts, he faults moderates for ceding the moral high ground to the far right. Frohnmayer observes that art dealing with gender, religion or sexual frankness has sparked controversy through the ages. To reinforce his support for artistic diversity, he quotes an intolerant, narrow artist, Adolf Hitler, who in 1935 said, "Art must be the handmaiden of sublimity and beauty, and thus promote whatever is natural and healthy. If art does not do this, then any money spent on it is squandered." Photos. Author tour.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Purchase at Amazon.com