The agency recently announced what it said were the two largest awards in its history, which together consume nearly 10 percent of its annual budget of $207 million. Both went to handpicked recipients.

A majority of the awards, which the agency has not publicized, are to scholars with ties to religious or conservative institutions, and support work on topics including the Bible’s influence on the American founders, the history of the parental rights movement and the current ills of the humanities. Four are to people listed only as 'unaffiliated independent scholar'.