Senators Push Universities, Museums to "Expeditiously Return" Native Ancestors

WASHINGTON – A bipartisan group of 13 U.S. Senators is asking universities and museums with large collections of Native American human remains why they've failed to repatriate them to tribes-more than 30 years after a federal law was passed that compelled them to do so.

In letters sent to the University of California-Berkeley, Harvard University, Illinois State Museum, Indiana University, and the Ohio History Connection, the senate group-led by Sens. Brian Schatz (D-HI) and Lisa Murkwoski (R-AK) of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs-urged the institutions to comply with the federal Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) and "expeditiously return" cultural items and ancestral remains.

Signed into law in 1990, NAGPRA directs federal agencies and museums with possession or control over holdings or collections of Native American human remains and funerary objects to inventory them, identify their geographic and cultural affiliation, and notify the affected Indian tribes or Native Hawaiian organization.

https://nativenewsonline.net/sovereignty/senators-push-universities-museums-to-expeditiously-return-native-ancestors