The Smithsonian and the Enola Gay.

• Author: Washburn, Wilcomb E.

Not since 1855 has the Smithsonian been riven by a controversy to equal that precipitated by the proposed Enola Gay exhibit. The issue then was whether the Smithsonian should be the national library, as the librarian Charles Coffin Jewett wanted, or a research institute, as Secretary Joseph Henry preferred. Henry won, but not before a congressional investigation led by Jewett's backers on Capitol Hill put Henry's leadership to the test. Today the possibility of a similar congressional investigation hangs threateningly over the Smithsonian.

The Smithsonian is currently seen neither as a national library nor as a research institute. Rather it is regarded as a museum, or collection of museums, whose principal purpose is to put on exhibitions for the general public. Its published annual report no longer even lists the publications of its research scholars. The jewel in the crown of all Smithsonian museums is the National Air and Space Museum (NASM), the world's most visited museum. The history of its establishment, dating from its authorization (but not funding) by Congress in 1946, reflects a continuing debate between those who wanted to "memorialize" and "enshrine" the sacred symbols of American ingenuity in conquering air and space (such as the Wright Brothers Flyer and the Apouo II spacecraft), and those who wanted to "educate" and "interpret" their broader meaning.

The extraordinary increase in visitors to the Smithsonian to see the Mercury spacecraft in which Alan Shepard and John Glenn were hurled into space in 1961 and 1962, and the even more intense excitement when the moon rocks brought back by the 1969 Apollo II mission were exhibited, turned the tide in favor of those insisting that a great new museum be funded to enshrine such glorious objects. Stirred by the passionate arguments of Reserve Brigadier General Senator Barry Goldwater on the floor of the Senate in 1970, an appropriations bill was finally included in the Smithsonian's 1972 budget.

The first director of the Air and Space Museum was astronaut Michael Collins, who piloted the spacecraft on the spectacular Apollo mission to the moon in 1969. He opened the museum on July 1, 1976, on the two hundredth anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, another reminder of the patriotic character of the institution's birth. When the Enola Gay exhibit was being planned in the 1990s, one observer was uncertain whether the staff of the Air and Space Museum could "overcome" the celebratory character of its establishment "and make the exhibit of the Enola Gay the educational opportunity it is planning ... Can it make this shrine into a school?" he wondered.[1]

In 1987 Martin Harwit, an astrophysicist rather than a retired military officer like most of his predecessors, was appointed director of the National Air and Space Museum. By that time many of the curators of the museum's early years, who were experts on the technical aspects of the hardware of air and space craft, had retired, left, or been let go. A new corps of curators, trained as social historians in America's universities in the tamultuous 1960s and 1970s, has taken their place. The Smithsonian's newer curators, sensitive to the condescension or condemnation of their university colleagues for representing an institution whose exhibits were considered celebratory rather thin critical, technical rather than interpretive, gradually shifted their emphasis to match the approach of their academic colleagues. From an ideological point of view that shift usually meant moving to the political left and to a view of the United States as more often than not the cause of the world's problems.

Warning signs might have alerted the Smithsonian's top administrators to the coming storm. The West as America, exhibit in the National Museum of American Art in 1991 was so totally reflective of the Marxist fantasies of the academic left that it amused and outraged even such liberal institutions as the Washington Past. The Smithsonian reacted defensively, making a hasty modification of some of its exhibit labels and bringing in academic proponents of "the new Western history" to defend the exhibit's point of view.

The "Science in America" exhibit in the National Museum of American History-opened in 1994 after a long preparation period in which the American Chemical Society, which underwrote the exhibit, almost withdrew in disgust-caused a less explosive but slower burning reaction. The exhibit emphasized discrimination against women and minorities in science, pollution of the environment, and other negative aspects of science, while underplaying its positive achievements. Officials of the American Physical Society as well as the American Chemical Society expressed their dismay and disappointment directly to the secretary, and change seems to be in the works.

Hardball

The election of November 1994 changed radically the grounds of the debate over the Smithsonian's future. Instead of "softball" questions traditionally floated to Smithsonian secretaries during the annual hearings on its budget (nearly 80%, of which is provided by the taxpayers), the new Smithsonian secretary, Ira Michael Heyman, chosen by the Board of Regents in May of 1994 and installed in September, had to expect "hardball" questions drilled close to his head by the new Republican majority. New members appointed in January 1995 to the Smithsonian's Board of Regents included Rep. Samuel Johnson (R-Texas), Rep. Robert Livingston (R-La.), Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.), and Sen. Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.). Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (D-N.Y.), and Rep. Norman Y. Mineta (D-Calif), were reappointed to the Board.

Secretary Heyman, coming on board as the latest Smithsonian controversy was erupting, at first sought to calm the waters and steer a middle course. Writing in a statement drafted "well before my installation as Secretary" and published in the October 1994 issue of the Smithsonian magazine, Heyman put the Enola Gay controversy in terms of principles of fundamental importance to the Smithsonian." One was "the independence of the Institution from detailed political direction," making it "analogous to a public university." Heyman's "public university background" made him "especially sympathetic to this viewpoint." The other principle related to the question of the Smithsonian as a museum exhibiting objects "without context" and "without any particular educative role." Heyman expressed distaste for "those who argue that we should present our positive accomplishments...more as propagandists than as educators." Yet, he added, "it is the responsibility of the curators of the Smithsonian to organize their exhibitions fairly.'"(2)

Heyman had the practical experience of standing between the California legislature and the distinguished Berkeley faculty, but dealing with Speaker Willie Brown of the California legislature was different from dealing with Speaker Newt Gingrich of the U.S. House of Representatives. Heyman's goal in both relationships was to uphold academic freedom while keeping the funding authorities supportive. But he became increasingly convinced that academic freedom in a great public museum is different from that in a great public university. Over the years, exhibits -- particularly showy blockbuster exhibits -- have assumed a larger role, while research in museums has become increasingly invisible. Directors have assumed "I am the museum" personalities and curators have been reduced from the role of "curator-in-charge" of exhibitions to "resource persons." Directors or their delegated project managers, now determine the character of museum exhibits and approval is too often measured by the extent to which the exhibit opening attracts vips and is noticed in the "Style" section of the newspaper. It is rare that a curator is even mentioned in the press coverage. There is frequently no individual author or creator of an exhibit: hence, the notion of academic freedom for an individual to express his views...