When her application for a grant was turned down due to the content and subject matter of her art she sued the NEA in federal court in California. The court ruled "that the decency and respect clause constituted an unreasonable restraint on artistic speech and found that it violated the First Amendment" (Hale). However, the case was appealed to the United States Supreme Court. "The Court held that because the decency and respect clause was not mandatory, i.e. the Act does not require NEA to base it's funding decisions on this standard, it merely directs NEA to consider them as part of the funding process, it was not an unreasonable attempt by Congress to regulate artistic content in violation of the First Amendment rights of Karen Finley" (Hale). Many people were surprised at the Court's decision because they believed that any governmental restriction on the content of art was unconstitutional, and that although the Act did not attempt to ban art, the power to withhold funding was in effect the same thing. .
Another case demonstrates that the issue of art obscenity and government funding is far from settled. As recently as the fall of 1999 a great deal for publicity and media attention was generated by an art show appearing at the Brooklyn Museum of Art entitled Sensation. Sensation included a piece done by Chris Ofili, "which illustrated a picture of the Virgin Mary, which is covered with elephant dung and pornographic cutouts" (Boyd). New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, responding to massive complaints from New York citizens, threatened to cut off all New York City funding for the Museum, unless the show was shut down. "When the Museum refused to shutdown the exhibit, Mayor Giuliani went to federal court seeking an injunction to halt the show. In addition, he cut off the annual funding from the City to the museum which was about $6-7 million, and directed various City agencies to have the Museum evicted from the City owned building in which it was housed" (Boyd).
