Article found here:  frieze.com

“The most extraordinary aspect of the programme was not its scale but that it employed artists at all, that art was considered as important to a nation as infrastructure. The government saw art as labour, and artists as workers worthy of employment and, therefore, public funds. In 1936, Holger Cahill, the curator who ran the FAP, claimed that, ‘The organization of the Project has proceeded on the principle that it is not the solitary genius but a sound general movement which maintains art as a vital, functioning part of any cultural scheme. Art is not a matter of rare, occasional masterpieces.”

I wonder if we’ll ever get to this point in the near future, where rather than fighting to be recognized as beneficial and useful to society, that acknowledgement comes down from the top.

Ross Dickenson's "Valley Farms"
Ross Dickinson, Valley Farms, 1934

4/2/09 UPDATE:
A Similar New Deal Program, the short-lived (6 mo) Public Works of Art Project, paid artists to depict “the American Scene.”  The Smithsonian’s American Art Museum has an exhibit, “1934: A New Deal for Artists” showing some of the works that were created under this program.  This show will run through January 3, 2010, so there is plenty of time to check it out.  They also have created a neat website where you can locate the places that some of the paintings from this collection depict.  Fun Fact: The murals at Coit Tower (San Francisco) are the largest project completed under this program.