European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - August 26, 1989, Darmstadt, Hesse Page 10 columns the stars and stripes Anthony Lewis As artistic judges politicians would be a bust Mencken thou should St be living at this hour. With apologies to w. Wordsworth through inc 1920s and 1930s, savaged the follies of american life. His special targets were the narrow minds the intolerant certainties of what he called the he revealed scornfully in the trial of John scones for teaching evolution describing the on lookers who believed that god literally created the world in six Days As gaping Mencken is out of fashion now. His style of verbal assault seems slightly embarrassing in today s journalism which is so self consciously some would say self importantly concerned with bal besides we thought the country had outgrown the primitivism that Mencken deplored. This summer s congressional follies Over the National endowment for the ans have shown How wrong we were wrong in estimating the primitive Strain in our society wrong in regarding Mencken As an anachronism we need him More than Ever. The endowment for the arts got in trouble because it made two Grants total ing $45,000, that offended members of Congress. One was for a show of photo graphs by the late Robert Mapplethorpe a highly regarded photographer whose works included some explicit homoerotic pictures. The other show of works Yandres Serrano included a plastic Cruci fix submerged in what he said was his urine. The Senate reacted to those shows approximately As if they were the first shot sin an attack on fort Knox. Or rather the Senate approved by voice vote sen. Jesse Helms overreaction in the form of restrictions in an appropriation Bill. The Helms amendment would for bid Grants for the next five years to the two sponsoring arts organizations in Philadelphia and Winslon Salem . It forbids Aid to the obscene or indecent and to material that denigrates anyone Ellen Goodman Toster Federal Art gallery on the basis of belief race sex. Age or National serious theater could work under restrictions of that think about the visual arts. A great show of Goya s drawings and paintings began its tour this year at the museum of Fine arts in Boston. To see Goya s Terri ble devastating portrayals of War was to understand How provocative Art can be must be if it is not going to be a Academy of the familiar the Safe the the years the endowment has made thousands of Grants. Now. Because of outrage Over two its whole system of judgment by a qualified panel would essentially be junked. No real artist or critic would serve under restriction that make Congress the real judge of what is Art. The other Issue is the right to make mistakes. Any institution that makes decisions will get them wrong occasionally. Judges do. Even senators do. We prefer a process of natural correction to overthrowing the system. How would Jesse Helms fare if senators were punished for their mistakes for their racism say or their support of killers and tyrants by being deprived of a vote for five years punishment is of course Helios Pur pose. He docs not care what critics and commentators write about him indeed the More upset they Are the better he likes it. For he is leading the philistines in a War against the has been especially unhappy this summer to Sec some no constr alive critics join the attack on the endowment. In their Zeal to take on what they consider a misbegotten arts establishment they encouraged politicians to destroy a sys tem that has helped to broaden and enrich american culture culture makes politicians nervous. But somehow the germans the French and others manage to understand that National greatness is a thing of the spirit not just of weapons. What a people Gam by supporting the arts As non politically As possible is civilization. Trea Menf Nof a beef approach of drug use the poster on the Hospital Wall in Chicago does t waste any words. Over the picture of a baby it says some of the people who take cocaine during pregnancy never gel Over this is More than a Public service warning to preg Nant women. It s also the Bottom line from the re search done on the cocaine babies. Most never get Over it. On this summer morning in the clinic at Northwestern University s medical school Hospital Dan Griffith is seeing some children brought in for Long term Fol Low up. It is one piece of a multiparty project on preg Nant substance abusers and their babies under the umbrella of the National association for perinatal research and education headquartered in this City. Carefully the Burly and gentle psychologist places puzzles in front of year-old Stacy and watches As she uses blocks As she crayons and walks along the string on the floor. It takes a trained Eye to identify the symptoms in Stacy. She is among the Best of what Griffith Calls the Best of the in this treatment program they Sec inc mothers who came for treatment the babies who survived the toddlers who have had attention. But he knows Well the syndrome of those born addicted newborns who go from sleeping to screaming and cannot maintain the state of quiet alertness during which bonding and learning take place toddlers who can t tolerate stimulation school children who Are easily distracted and More easily frustrated. These would not be easy children for the strongest families. Even the Best of the worst have started a life permanently imprinted scarred with neurological damage. How Many such kids arc there cocaine babies crack babies last year the association found that a stagger ing 11 percent of babies born in 36 hospitals in 1988 had mothers who used illegal drugs White they were pregnant. That s some 375.000 mothers. The question i am asked most often said Griffith is How do you work with mothers who have done that to their kids it s less a question than a judgment that Springs up easily in an atmosphere of Public frustration at drugs and anger at the irresponsibility of a pregnant woman. Lately that anger has turned to a passion for punishment. Not far from Here a Rockford woman named Melanie Green was put on trial last May before a grand jury for manslaughter in the death of her addicted Newborn. This summer in Florida Jennifer Johnson was convicted of delivering drugs to the recipient in her womb. Other courts seeking to protect the fetus before birth have moved pregnant women to jail until delivery. In Washington . A judge sent Brenda Vaug Han to jail for the last three months of her pregnancy after a drug test revealed cocaine use. The Public debate Over pregnant drug abusers has turned frequently into an argument Over the rights of the fetus is. The rights of the pregnant woman. Those who hold a front Row seat at the devastation of these cocaine babies who know that drug abuse is the Pri Mary cause of infant mortality who literally see the damage have the greatest right to judge these pregnant women. Yet they arc More Likely to View the argument Over rights and the passion to lock pm up As a great diversion. If you jail one woman the Only lesson you teach women is to stay out of the prenatal health care sys says or. Ira Chasnoff head of the perinatal association As we talk Over lunch. The lesson he wants to deliver to these mothers is quite the opposite come in for health care. Now. Or. Chasnoff believes there is no shortcut for the kinds of prenatal identification and treatment that his group has been developing. So the texan born Pedia Tricia Calls the argument Over rights a smokescreen. It s hard to Sec through it. As for jailing pregnant women he runs through the real life scenario. If we jail women until delivery m a mythical drug free prison do we then Send them and their babies Back to the same streets do we on the other hand take the children away from their mothers and put them into the beleaguered Foster care system and will we jail those children again when they Are 16, pregnant and Strung out the most popular proposal that drug Czar William Bennett has made is for More jail space but those who work in the fallout of the drug world shake their Heads at this. Their impulse is not to lock cum. When they talk about mothers and babies the Issue is not whose rights arc violated but what works. .,.-. And on a summer City Day the irony does t escape their notice. How ironic to spend Money jailing Moth ers while others who seek help arc being turned away because there is no room at the treatment Center. pot a Newt group
