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United States Government Accountability Office: 
GAO: 

Report to Congressional Requesters: 

May 2011: 

Smithsonian Institution: 

Much Work Still Needed to Identify and Repatriate Indian Human Remains 
and Objects: 

GAO-11-515: 

GAO Highlights: 

Highlights of GAO-11-515, a report to congressional requesters. 

Why GAO Did This Study: 

The National Museum of the American Indian Act of 1989 (NMAI Act), as 
amended in 1996, generally requires the Smithsonian Institution to 
inventory and identify the origins of its Indian human remains and 
objects placed with them (funerary objects) and repatriate them to 
culturally affiliated Indian tribes upon request. It also creates a 
special committee to oversee this process. According to the 
Smithsonian, two of its museums—the American Indian and the Natural 
History Museums—have items that are subject to the act. 

GAO was asked to determine (1) the extent to which the Smithsonian has 
fulfilled its repatriation requirements, (2) how the special committee 
provisions have been implemented, and (3) the number of human remains 
and objects that have been repatriated and reasons for any that have 
not. GAO reviewed museum records, including 171 repatriation case 
reports, and interviewed Smithsonian, Repatriation Review Committee, 
and tribal officials. 

What GAO Found: 

Since the NMAI Act was enacted, in 1989, more than 21 years ago, the 
Smithsonian has offered to repatriate over 5,000 human remains, which 
account for approximately one-third of the total estimated human 
remains in its collections. The Smithsonian has also offered to 
repatriate over 212,000 funerary objects, but the extent of progress 
is unknown because the Smithsonian has no reliable estimate of the 
total number of such objects in its collections. The Smithsonian 
generally makes repatriation decisions based on detailed case reports, 
and had completed 171 case reports as of December 31, 2010. Developing 
these case reports is a lengthy and resource-intensive process, in 
part because the NMAI Act generally requires the Smithsonian to use 
the best available scientific and historical documentation to identify 
the origins of its Indian human remains and funerary objects. The 
Smithsonian originally estimated that the repatriation process would 
take about 5 years; however, at the pace that it is progressing, GAO 
believes it could take several more decades to complete this process. 

In response to the special committee requirements of the NMAI Act, the 
Smithsonian established a Repatriation Review Committee to monitor and 
review the Natural History Museum’s repatriation activities. Although 
the Smithsonian believes Congress intended to limit the committee’s 
jurisdiction to the Natural History Museum, the statutory language and 
its legislative history do not support that view. Since it was 
established, the committee has provided no oversight over the 
repatriation activities of the American Indian Museum. In addition, 
GAO found that neither the Smithsonian nor the committee has provided 
regular information to Congress on the repatriation progress at the 
Smithsonian. Although this reporting is not required by the act, given 
the length of time this process has taken and is expected to take in 
the future, policymakers do not have information that would keep them 
apprised of the Smithsonian’s repatriation efforts. The committee also 
hears disputes concerning decisions over the return of human remains 
and objects, but it does not make binding decisions. Moreover, the 
Smithsonian has no independent administrative appeals process by which 
tribes who would like to challenge a repatriation decision can seek 
recourse, and judicial review of the Smithsonian’s repatriation 
decisions may not be practical. 

Through December 31, 2010, the Smithsonian estimates that, of the 
items it has offered for repatriation, about three-quarters of the 
Indian human remains (4,330 out of 5,980) and about half of the 
funerary objects (99,550 out of 212,220) have been repatriated. The 
remaining items have not been repatriated for various reasons, 
including tribes’ lack of resources and cultural beliefs. Resources 
needed include staff to work on repatriations and appropriate 
locations to rebury or house the items. In addition, the Smithsonian 
has not repatriated approximately 340 human remains and 310 funerary 
objects because it has determined that they cannot be culturally 
affiliated with a tribe, and it does not have a policy on the 
disposition of these items. The lack of such a policy limits the 
transparency of the Smithsonian’s actions in handling culturally 
unidentifiable items for both tribes and policymakers. 

What GAO Recommends: 

GAO suggests that Congress may wish to consider ways to expedite the 
Smithsonian’s repatriation process, and recommends that the 
Smithsonian take actions to expand the oversight and reporting role of 
the special committee, establish an administrative appeals process, 
and develop a policy for the disposition of culturally unidentifiable 
items. The Smithsonian agreed with GAO’s findings and recommendations. 

View [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-11-515] or key 
components. For more information, contact Anu K. Mittal at (202) 512-
3841 or mittala@gao.gov. 

[End of section] 

Contents: 

Letter: 

Background: 

Since 1989, the Smithsonian Has Prepared Required Summaries and 
Inventories and Has Offered to Repatriate about One-Third of Its 
Indian Human Remains: 

The Review Committee's Oversight and Reporting Are Limited, and It 
Faces Some Challenges to Fulfilling Its Requirements: 

Most Human Remains and Many Objects Offered for Repatriation Have Been 
Repatriated, but the Smithsonian Has No Policy on Culturally 
Unidentifiable Items: 

Conclusions: 

Matter for Congressional Consideration: 

Recommendations for Executive Action: 

Agency Comments: 

Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and Methodology: 

Appendix II: Processing Times for Repatriation Case Reports: 

Appendix III: Comments from the Smithsonian Institution: 

Appendix IV: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments: 

Tables: 

Table 1: Five Types of Indian Items Covered by the NMAI Act: 

Table 2: Examples of Differences between NAGPRA and the NMAI Act: 

Table 3: Estimated Number of Indian Human Remains and Objects Offered 
for Repatriation as of December 31, 2010: 

Table 4: Estimated Number of Indian Human Remains and Objects 
Repatriated as of December 31, 2010: 

Table 5: Processing Times for Repatriation Case Reports Completed 
between November 28, 1989, and December 31, 2010: 

Figure: 

Figure 1: Organization Chart for the Key Entities Involved in the 
Smithsonian's Repatriation Efforts: 

Abbreviations: 

NAGPRA: Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act: 

NMAI Act: National Museum of the American Indian Act: 

[End of section] 

United States Government Accountability Office: 
Washington, DC 20548: 

May 25, 2011: 

The Honorable Daniel K. Akaka: 
Chairman: 
Committee on Indian Affairs: 
United States Senate: 

The Honorable Edward J. Markey: 
Ranking Member: 
Committee on Natural Resources: 
House of Representatives: 

The Smithsonian Institution holds a large number of Indian human 
remains and culturally significant objects as part of its museum 
collections. These human remains and objects have long been a concern 
for many Indian tribes and Native Hawaiian communities, who have been 
determined to provide an appropriate resting place for their 
ancestors. In 1989, the National Museum of the American Indian Act 
(NMAI Act) was enacted, in part to address these concerns. Sections 11 
and 13 of the act generally require the Smithsonian to (1) inventory 
the Indian and Native Hawaiian human remains and funerary objects in 
its possession or control, (2) identify the origins of the Indian and 
Native Hawaiian human remains and funerary objects using the "best 
available scientific and historical documentation," and (3) upon 
request repatriate them to lineal descendants or culturally affiliated 
Indian tribes and Native Hawaiian organizations.[Footnote 1] The 
Smithsonian is to carry out the inventory and identification 
requirements in consultation and cooperation with traditional Indian 
religious leaders and government officials of Indian tribes. As 
originally written, the act did not set a deadline for the completion 
of these tasks. In addition, section 12 of the act requires the 
Smithsonian to establish a special committee, which the Smithsonian 
refers to as the Repatriation Review Committee,[Footnote 2] to monitor 
and review the inventory, identification, and return of Indian human 
remains and funerary objects. In addition to these repatriation 
provisions, the act also establishes a new Smithsonian museum known as 
the National Museum of the American Indian under a Board of Trustees. 
The act provides the Board of Trustees with sole authority to, among 
other things, dispose of any part of the American Indian Museum's 
collections, subject to the general policies of the Smithsonian's 
Board of Regents, the overall governing body of the Smithsonian. 
[Footnote 3] 

In 1990, about a year after enactment of the NMAI Act, the Native 
American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) was enacted, 
and it established repatriation requirements for federal agencies and 
museums that receive federal funding, other than the Smithsonian. 
[Footnote 4] The repatriation requirements in NAGPRA were more 
comprehensive than those in the NMAI Act as originally enacted in 
1989. NAGPRA covers additional objects--known as sacred objects and 
objects of cultural patrimony--and establishes specific deadlines for, 
among other things, completing inventories.[Footnote 5] NAGPRA also 
requires the establishment of a review committee to monitor and review 
the implementation of the inventory and identification process and 
repatriation activities. We reported on federal agency compliance with 
NAGPRA in July 2010.[Footnote 6] In that report, we found that key 
federal agencies had not fully complied with NAGPRA because they had 
not identified all of their NAGPRA items or made cultural affiliations 
in accordance with the act and its deadlines. We recommended, among 
other things, that the agencies develop plans to complete their 
required inventories and summaries and submit such plans to Congress; 
the agencies generally agreed with our recommendations. 

On October 9, 1996, the NMAI Act was amended to expand the types of 
objects covered by the act and establish deadlines for completing 
certain activities.[Footnote 7] In particular, the 1996 amendments add 
a June 1, 1998, deadline for the completion of inventories required 
under the original act. The amendments also define the term inventory 
as "a simple, itemized list that, to the extent practicable, 
identifies, based upon available information held by the Smithsonian 
Institution, the geographic and cultural affiliation of the remains 
and objects." The amendments, however, do not alter the original 1989 
requirement to use the "best available scientific and historical 
documentation" to identify the origins of such remains and objects. 
The amendments also add a new requirement that the Smithsonian prepare 
summaries for unassociated funerary objects, sacred objects, and 
objects of cultural patrimony by December 31, 1996. The summaries are 
to include, at a minimum, a description of the scope of the 
collection, kinds of objects included, reference to geographical 
location, means and period of acquisition, and cultural affiliation, 
where readily ascertainable. Also, upon request the Smithsonian is to 
return such objects where cultural affiliation has been established in 
the summary or where a requesting Indian tribe or Native Hawaiian 
organization can show cultural affiliation by a preponderance of the 
evidence.[Footnote 8] 

Table 1 includes the definitions of the five types of Indian items 
covered by the NMAI Act. 

Table 1: Five Types of Indian Items Covered by the NMAI Act: 

NMAI Act item: Human remains; 
Definition: Not defined in the NMAI Act.[A] 

NMAI Act item: Funerary objects; 
Definition: Objects that, as part of a death rite or ceremony of a 
culture, are intentionally placed with individual human remains, 
either at the time of burial or later. 20 U.S.C. § 80q-14(4). 

NMAI Act item: Unassociated funerary objects; 
Definition: Objects that, as a part of the death rite or ceremony of a 
culture, are reasonably believed to have been placed with individual 
human remains either at the time of death or later, where the remains 
are not in the possession or control of [the Smithsonian] and the 
objects can be identified by a preponderance of the evidence as 
related to specific individuals or families or to known human remains 
or, by a preponderance of the evidence, as having been removed from a 
specific burial site of an individual culturally affiliated with a 
particular Indian tribe. 20 U.S.C. § 80q-9a(a); 25 U.S.C. § 3001(3)(B). 

NMAI Act item: Sacred objects; 
Definition: Specific ceremonial objects which are needed by 
traditional Native American religious leaders for the practice of 
traditional Native American religions by their present day adherents. 
20 U.S.C. § 80q-9a(a); 25 U.S.C. § 3001(3)(C). 

NMAI Act item: Objects of cultural patrimony; 
Definition: Objects having ongoing historical, traditional, or 
cultural importance central to the Native American group or culture 
itself, rather than property owned by an individual Native American, 
and which, therefore, cannot be alienated, appropriated, or conveyed 
by any individual regardless of whether or not the individual is a 
member of the Indian tribe or Native Hawaiian organization and such 
object shall have been considered inalienable by such Native American 
group at the time the object was separated from such group. 20 U.S.C. 
§ 80q-9a(a); 25 U.S.C. § 3001(3)(D). 

Source: NAGPRA and the NMAI Act. 

[A] The NAGPRA regulations define this term as the physical remains of 
the body of a person of Native American ancestry. 43 C.F.R. § 
10.2(d)(1). 

[End of table] 

The Smithsonian has identified two museums that hold collections 
subject to the NMAI Act: the American Indian Museum and the National 
Museum of Natural History. Final repatriation decisions for the 
American Indian Museum are made by its Board of Trustees; the 
Secretary of the Smithsonian has delegated responsibility for making 
final repatriation decisions for the Natural History Museum to the 
Smithsonian's Under Secretary for Science. 

You asked us to review the status of the Smithsonian's implementation 
of the NMAI Act's repatriation provisions. This report addresses (1) 
the extent to which the Smithsonian has fulfilled its repatriation 
requirements and what challenges it faces, if any, in fulfilling its 
requirements; (2) how the special committee provisions in the NMAI Act 
have been implemented and the challenges the committee faces, if any, 
in fulfilling its requirements; and (3) the number of human remains 
and objects that have been repatriated and the reasons for any that 
have not.[Footnote 9] 

To determine the extent to which the Smithsonian has fulfilled its 
repatriation requirements and what challenges it faces, if any, we 
examined inventories and summaries prepared by the American Indian and 
the Natural History Museums. We also analyzed repatriation case 
reports completed by the two museums to compile key information, 
including the names of the requesting tribes, time frames for 
completing the reports, and the repatriation recommendations. We 
interviewed officials from the museums' respective repatriation 
offices and the Smithsonian's Office of General Counsel on the 
repatriation process.[Footnote 10] We interviewed these officials as 
well as tribal officials to determine any challenges the Smithsonian 
faces in implementing the NMAI Act's repatriation requirements. We 
also obtained in writing the Smithsonian's legal views on how it 
interprets the NMAI Act and an additional memorandum regarding its 
legal views. [Footnote 11] 

To determine how the Smithsonian has implemented the requirement to 
establish a special committee and what challenges the committee faces, 
if any, we examined the NMAI Act's requirements as well as the Review 
Committee's charter and bylaws. We examined the comments made by 
Review Committee members on repatriation case reports; attended 
portions of two Review Committee meetings in Washington, D.C.; and 
interviewed six of the seven Review Committee members.[Footnote 12] 
Because the Board of Trustees has performed oversight of the American 
Indian Museum's collections, we interviewed 5 of the 23 board members 
who were available to meet in between sessions of a board meeting, 4 
of the 8 who make up the American Indian Museum Board of Trustees' 
Repatriation Committee, and received written comments from the full 
board. For the first and second objectives we also reviewed (1) the 
American Indian and the Natural History Museums' Repatriation Office 
progress reports to the Board of Trustees and Review Committee, 
respectively, and (2) Review Committee annual reports to the Secretary 
of the Smithsonian, meeting minutes, and other documents to obtain 
information on implementation. 

To determine how many Indian human remains and objects have been 
repatriated and reasons for any that have not been repatriated, we 
analyzed museum data as well as specific lists prepared by the museums 
of the human remains and objects in their collection that were offered 
for repatriation but not yet repatriated. We contacted 14 of the 68 
tribes to which these human remains and objects were culturally 
affiliated--8 for the American Indian Museum and 6 for the Natural 
History Museum--and interviewed 5 of them to determine why the items 
offered had not been repatriated. The other 9 tribes that we contacted 
did not respond to our inquiries. We chose these tribes based on their 
geographic location and the number of items offered for repatriation. 
A more detailed description of our scope and methodology is presented 
in appendix I. 

We conducted this performance audit from July 2010 to May 2011 in 
accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. 
Those standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain 
sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our 
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe 
that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our 
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. 

Background: 

The Smithsonian Institution was founded in 1846 and is the world's 
largest museum and research complex, consisting of 19 museums and 
galleries, the National Zoological Park, and nine research facilities. 
Of the 137 million artifacts, works of art, and specimens in the 
Smithsonian's collections, about 126 million are held by the Natural 
History Museum and about 825,000 are held by the American Indian 
Museum. Pursuant to the NMAI Act, the American Indian Museum's 
collection was transferred to the Smithsonian from the former Museum 
of the American Indian in New York City, founded by George Gustav 
Heye, and contains items from North America, South America, Central 
America, and the Caribbean. After the NMAI Act was enacted, in 1989, 
the American Indian Museum officially assumed control of the Heye 
collection in June 1990, and the collection was physically moved from 
New York to a newly constructed cultural resources center near 
Washington, D.C., from 1999 to 2004. The new American Indian Museum in 
Washington, D.C., opened its doors to the public in 2004. 

The Smithsonian has acquired a large number of Indian human remains 
and culturally significant objects through a variety of means. For 
example, in the late 1800s, the Surgeon General of the Army requested 
U.S. military forces to send thousands of Indian human remains from 
battlefields and burial sites for the purposes of conducting a cranial 
study. As a result, thousands of sets of human remains were sent to 
the Army Medical Museum and then later were transferred to the 
Smithsonian.[Footnote 13] Other human remains and many more objects 
have been collected through archaeological excavations and donations. 

According to museum officials, when new collections are acquired, the 
Smithsonian assigns an identification number--referred to as a catalog 
number--to each item or set of items at the time of the acquisition 
or, in some cases, many years later. A single catalog number may 
include one or more human bones, bone fragments, or objects, and it 
may include the remains of one or more individuals. All of this 
information is stored in the museums' electronic catalog system, which 
is partly based on historical paper card catalogs. Generally, each 
catalog number in the electronic catalog system includes basic 
information on the item or set of items, such as a brief description 
of the item, where the item was collected, and when it was taken into 
the museum's collection. 

Since the NMAI Act was enacted, the Smithsonian has identified 
approximately 19,780 catalog numbers that potentially include Indian 
human remains (about 19,150 within the Natural History Museum 
collections and about 630 within the American Indian Museum 
collections).[Footnote 14] This number has changed over time as the 
museums have either cataloged more human remains or identified 
additional catalog numbers that contain human remains. According to 
museum officials, Indian human remains, funerary objects, and other 
objects potentially subject to repatriation are generally organized 
within the following museum collections: 

* Physical anthropology (Natural History Museum only): This collection 
consists mostly of human remains but, in rare instances, also some 
funerary objects. 

* Archaeology: This collection consists of a wide variety of objects, 
including funerary objects, some human remains, and some potential 
sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony. 

* Ethnology: This collection consists of a wide variety of objects, 
including potential sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony, 
and some human remains and funerary objects. 

Museum Missions and Repatriation Offices: 

The Smithsonian's overall mission is the increase and diffusion of 
knowledge, and the American Indian and Natural History Museums 
implement this overall mission in different ways. The American Indian 
Museum's mission is advancing knowledge and understanding of the 
Native cultures of the Western Hemisphere, past, present, and future, 
through partnership with Native people and others. The Natural History 
Museum's mission is to inspire curiosity, discovery, and learning 
about nature and culture through outstanding research, collections, 
exhibitions, and education, but does not specifically refer to 
partnership with Native people. 

Both museums have established repatriation offices to carry out their 
repatriation activities (see fig. 1); the American Indian Museum 
established an office in November 1993 and the Natural History Museum 
established an office in September 1991. The repatriation offices 
within the two museums are independent of each other and have separate 
staffs and budgets. For fiscal year 2010, the American Indian Museum's 
Repatriation Office had a budget of approximately $580,000 and 
consisted of five staff--a program manager, repatriation coordinator, 
and three case officers.[Footnote 15] In the same fiscal year, the 
Natural History Museum's Repatriation Office had a budget of 
approximately $1.7 million (including funding for the Review 
Committee) and consisted of 11 staff--including a program manager, 
three case officers, and a lab director with six technical staff. 

Figure 1: Organization Chart for the Key Entities Involved in the 
Smithsonian's Repatriation Efforts: 

[Refer to PDF for image: Organization Chart] 

Top level: 
Board of Regents. 
* Secretary. 

Second level, reporting to Secretary: 
* Under Secretary for Science; 
* Under Secretary for History, Art, and Culture. 

Third level, reporting to Under Secretary for Science: 
* National Museum of Natural History; Director: 
- Review Committee; 
- Associate Director for Research and Collections; 
-- Department of Anthropology; Repatriation Office; Review Committee
Coordinator. 

Third level, reporting to Under Secretary for History, Art, and 
Culture: 
* National Museum of the American Indian, Board of Trustees; 
- Director; 
-- Museum Scholarship Group; Registration Office. 

Source: Smithsonian documents and officials, and the NMAI Act. 

[End of figure] 

NAGPRA Requirements and How They Differ from Those of the NMAI Act: 

One of the purposes of the 1996 amendments to the NMAI Act was to 
ensure that the requirements for the inventory, identification, and 
repatriation of human remain and objects in the Smithsonian's 
possession are being carried out in a manner consistent with NAGPRA. 
[Footnote 16] NAGPRA requires each federal agency and museum with 
NAGPRA items in its collections to (1) compile an inventory of Native 
American human remains and associated funerary objects; (2) compile a 
summary of Native American unassociated funerary objects, sacred 
objects, and objects of cultural patrimony; and (3) repatriate 
culturally affiliated human remains and objects identified through the 
inventory or summary processes if the terms and conditions prescribed 
in the act are met. NAGPRA required that the inventories be completed 
no later than 5 years after its enactment--by November 16, 1995--and 
that the summaries be completed no later than 3 years after its 
enactment--by November 16, 1993. NAGPRA included a provision that 
allows museums that made a good faith effort to carry out an inventory 
and identification to apply for an extension of the inventory 
completion deadline. 

With respect to inventories, NAGPRA requires that they be completed in 
consultation with tribal government officials, Native Hawaiian 
organization officials, and traditional religious leaders. 
Furthermore, in the inventory, federal agencies and museums are 
required to identify geographic and cultural affiliation to the extent 
possible based on information in their possession. If a federal agency 
or museum determined cultural affiliation for human remains and 
associated funerary objects to a tribe(s) in an inventory, the act 
requires it to notify the affected tribe(s) no later than 6 months 
after the completion of the inventory. The agency or museum is also 
required to provide a copy of each notice to the Secretary of the 
Interior for publication in the Federal Register. NAGPRA and its 
implementing regulations generally require that, upon the request of 
an Indian tribe or Native Hawaiian organization, all culturally 
affiliated NAGPRA items be returned to the applicable Indian tribe or 
Native Hawaiian organization expeditiously--within 90 days of 
receiving the repatriation request but no sooner than 30 days after 
publication of the notice. However, as we reported in 2010, we found 
examples where agency officials treated inventories like summaries in 
that the consultation occurred and cultural affiliation determinations 
were made after the preparation of the inventory.[Footnote 17] 

One of the purposes of the 1996 amendments to the NMAI Act was to 
ensure that the requirements for the inventory, identification, and 
repatriation of human remains and objects in the Smithsonian's 
possession are being carried out in a manner consistent with NAGPRA, 
but there remain some differences between the two laws. For example, 
the 1996 amendments to the NMAI Act adopt NAGPRA's definition of 
inventory, but they do not alter the original 1989 requirement to use 
the "best available scientific and historical documentation" in 
identifying the origins of the Indian human remains and funerary 
objects.[Footnote 18] In addition, the NMAI Act does not contain 
specific deadlines for notifying culturally affiliated tribes or 
returning culturally affiliated human remains. Instead, the NMAI Act 
requires that culturally affiliated tribes be notified "at the 
earliest opportunity" and that culturally affiliated items be returned 
"expeditiously." Some examples of differences between the two acts are 
summarized in table 2. 

Table 2: Examples of Differences between NAGPRA and the NMAI Act: 

Topic: Information to use in making cultural affiliation 
determinations for human remains and funerary objects; 
NAGPRA: To the extent possible based on information possessed by the 
museum or federal agency, identify the geographical and cultural 
affiliations of Native American human remains and associated funerary 
objects. 25 U.S.C. § 3003(a); 
NMAI Act: Using the best available scientific and historical 
documentation, identify the origins of Indian human remains and 
funerary objects. 20 U.S.C. § 80q-9(a)(1)(B). Inventory is defined as 
a simple, itemized list that, to the extent practicable, identifies, 
based upon available information held by the Smithsonian Institution, 
the geographic and cultural affiliations of the remains and objects. 
20 U.S.C. § 80q-9(a)(3). 

Topic: Retaining certain items for scientific study; 
NAGPRA: Federal agencies and museums shall expeditiously return 
requested culturally affiliated [NAGPRA items] unless such items are 
indispensable for completion of a specific scientific study, the 
outcome of which would be of major benefit to the United States. Such 
items shall be returned no later than 90 days after the date on which 
the scientific study is completed. 25 U.S.C. § 3005(b); 
NMAI Act: The NMAI Act does not refer to retaining certain items for 
scientific study. 

Topic: Competing claims; 
NAGPRA: Where there are multiple requests for repatriation of [NAGPRA 
items] and, after complying with the applicable requirements, the 
federal agency or museum cannot clearly determine which requesting 
party is the most appropriate claimant, the agency or museum may 
retain such item until the requesting parties agree upon its 
disposition or the dispute is otherwise resolved pursuant to NAGPRA or 
by a federal court. 25 U.S.C. § 3005(e); 
NMAI Act: The NMAI Act does not address what the Smithsonian should do 
when there are competing claims. 

Topic: Annual reports to Congress by the Review Committee; 
NAGPRA: The Review Committee established under NAGPRA is required to 
submit an annual report to Congress. 25 U.S.C. § 3006(h); 
NMAI Act: At the conclusion of the work of the special committee 
established under the NMAI Act, the Secretary of the Smithsonian shall 
so certify by report to Congress. 20 U.S.C. § 80q-10(f). 

Topic: Federal Advisory Committee Act[A]; 
NAGPRA: The Review Committee established under NAGPRA is subject to 
the Federal Advisory Committee Act; 
NMAI Act: The special committee established under the NMAI Act is 
exempt from the Federal Advisory Committee Act; 
20 U.S.C. § 80q-10(g). This means it is not required to meet the act's 
requirements, such as the requirement to hold public meetings. 

Topic: Private cause of action for alleged violations; 
NAGPRA: NAGPRA creates a private cause of action, which allows 
lawsuits to be brought in federal court in response to alleged 
violations. 25 U.S.C. § 3013; 
NMAI Act: Nothing in the NMAI Act authorizes a private cause of action. 

Source: NAGPRA and the NMAI Act. 

[A] Pub. L. No. 92-463, 86 Stat. 770 (1972) (classified at 5 U.S.C. 
app. 2). 

[End of table] 

Special Committee Requirements under the NMAI Act: 

Section 12 of the NMAI Act requires the Smithsonian to establish a 
special committee, which the Smithsonian calls the Repatriation Review 
Committee (referred to hereafter as the Review Committee), and tasks 
the committee with, for example, 

* ensuring fair and objective consideration and assessment of all 
relevant evidence with respect to the inventory and identification 
process; 

* reviewing any finding relating to the origin or the return of 
remains or objects, upon request; and: 

* facilitating the resolution of any dispute with respect to the 
return of remains or objects. 

Section 12 lays out other requirements with respect to the Review 
Committee. For example, it requires the Secretary of the Smithsonian 
to certify by report to Congress at the conclusion of the work of the 
committee. It also requires the Secretary to provide administrative 
support for the committee. 

The Smithsonian established a charter for the Review Committee, which 
states that the purpose of the committee is to serve in an advisory 
capacity to the Secretary of the Smithsonian in matters concerning the 
repatriation of human remains, funerary objects, sacred objects, and 
objects of cultural patrimony. The charter also discusses the 
functions of the committee, duties of its members, and rules of 
evidence, among other things. 

Board of Trustees' Authority Established by the NMAI Act: 

The NMAI Act provides the Board of Trustees of the American Indian 
Museum with certain authority over the museum's collections. For 
example, the act states that the Board of Trustees has sole authority, 
subject to the general policies of the Smithsonian's Board of Regents, 
to lend, exchange, sell, or otherwise dispose of any part of the 
collections of the American Indian Museum. The act also states that 
nothing in section 11 of the act--which addresses inventories--shall 
be interpreted as limiting the authority of the Smithsonian to return 
or repatriate Indian human remains and funerary objects. Furthermore, 
the 1996 amendments to the NMAI Act add that nothing in the summary 
section may be construed to prevent the Smithsonian from making an 
inventory or preparing a written summary or carrying out the 
repatriation of unassociated funerary objects, sacred objects, or 
objects of cultural patrimony in a manner that exceeds the 
requirements of the NMAI Act. 

Based on the flexibilities provided by the NMAI Act, the American 
Indian Museum established a repatriation policy that differs from the 
Natural History Museum's and the act's basic repatriation 
requirements. Under the policy, for example, the American Indian 
Museum will repatriate items if there is sufficient evidence to 
establish a "reasonable belief" of cultural affiliation--a lower 
threshold than the NMAI Act's basic requirement to repatriate items 
where cultural affiliation can be established by a "preponderance of 
the evidence."[Footnote 19] Also, the policy states that the American 
Indian Museum will take into consideration repatriation requests from 
non-federally recognized tribes, which are not covered by the NMAI 
Act's repatriation requirements. 

Since 1989, the Smithsonian Has Prepared Required Summaries and 
Inventories and Has Offered to Repatriate about One-Third of Its 
Indian Human Remains: 

The American Indian and Natural History Museums generally prepared 
summaries and inventories within the deadlines established in the NMAI 
Act, but their inventories and the process they used to prepare them 
raise questions about their compliance with some of the statutory 
requirements. Since 1989, the Smithsonian estimates that it has 
offered to repatriate the Indian human remains in about one-third of 
the catalog numbers identified as possibly including human remains. 
Smithsonian officials that we spoke with identified challenges that 
the museums face in carrying out their repatriation requirements under 
the NMAI Act. 

Both Museums Generally Prepared Required Documents on Time, but 
Inventories Raise Questions about Compliance with the NMAI Act: 

The American Indian and Natural History Museums generally prepared 
required documents by the deadlines established in the NMAI Act. The 
American Indian Museum prepared its first set of inventories in 1993. 
In an effort to voluntarily follow NAGPRA's more comprehensive 
requirements, it included its entire collection in these inventories-- 
not just the human remains and funerary objects it was required to 
inventory at the time. Museum officials later found that the 1993 
inventory did not include an additional 5,000 catalog numbers 
containing objects. These catalog numbers had never been entered into 
the museum's electronic catalog, which was the primary source for the 
1993 inventories. As a result, the museum prepared additional 
inventories in 1995 covering these 5,000 catalog numbers. The museum 
provided all federally recognized tribes with inventories of the 
collections that could be affiliated to them.[Footnote 20] After the 
enactment of the 1996 amendments, the museum did not revise its 
inventories or prepare separate summaries because officials believed 
that the museum had already complied with the new requirements. 

The Natural History Museum also generally prepared its summary and 
inventory documents by the statutory deadlines. 

* The museum prepared 171 summaries of its ethnological collection 
from the United States based on information in its electronic catalog--
170 by tribal grouping and 1 for items that could not be associated 
with any tribal group. Of these 171 summaries, 116 were prepared by 
the December 31, 1996, deadline established by the 1996 amendments, 
[Footnote 21] 50 were completed within 2 months of the deadline, and 5 
were completed still later. Some of these summaries were prepared 
prior to the 1996 amendments' enactment, since the museum had prepared 
summaries upon request from tribes in an effort to voluntarily follow 
NAGPRA's requirement to prepare summaries. After the 1996 amendments 
were enacted, the museum provided all federally recognized tribes with 
summaries of the collections that could be affiliated to them. 

* The museum also prepared 64 inventories of its physical anthropology 
and archaeology collections from the United States--13 for Alaska 
regions, 1 for each additional state and the District of Columbia, and 
1 for items that could not be associated with a particular state. 
These inventories identified about 16,000 catalog numbers as possibly 
including human remains and, according to the museum's Repatriation 
Office, about 3,000 catalog numbers as possibly including funerary 
objects.[Footnote 22] According to museum officials, these inventories 
provided specific geographic information for most human remains and, 
in some cases, specific information about the possible cultural 
affiliations of the human remains and funerary objects. The Natural 
History Museum prepared all of its inventories by the June 1, 1998, 
deadline and provided all federally recognized tribes with inventories 
of the collections that could be affiliated to them. As with the 
American Indian Museum, the inventories prepared by the Natural 
History Museum included potentially many more items than the human 
remains and funerary objects required by the NMAI Act enacted in 1989. 
For example, the inventories included the museum's entire archaeology 
collection from the United States, which consisted of over 200,000 
catalog numbers containing over 1 million objects. 

Although both museums generally prepared their summaries and 
inventories by the statutory deadlines, the process for preparing the 
inventories raises questions about compliance with two of the NMAI 
Act's requirements. The first question is the extent to which the 
museums prepared their inventories in consultation and cooperation 
with traditional Indian religious leaders and government officials of 
Indian tribes, as required by the NMAI Act. Section 11 directs the 
Secretary of the Smithsonian, in consultation and cooperation with 
traditional Indian religious leaders and government officials of 
Indian tribes, to inventory the Indian human remains and funerary 
objects in the possession or control of the Smithsonian and, using the 
best available scientific and historical documentation, identify the 
origins of such remains and objects. The 1996 amendments did not alter 
this language, although they added a definition of inventory. However, 
the Smithsonian generally began the consultation process with Indian 
tribes after the inventories from both museums were distributed. The 
second question is the extent to which the Natural History Museum's 
inventories--which were finalized after the 1996 amendments--
identified geographic and cultural affiliations to the extent 
practicable based on information held by the Smithsonian, as required 
by the amendments. Its inventories generally identified geographic and 
cultural affiliations only where such information was readily 
available in the museum's electronic catalog. In preparing its 
inventories, the museum did not consult other information that the 
Smithsonian had in its possession to attempt to identify geographic 
and cultural affiliations, such as records in the National 
Anthropological Archives or the Smithsonian Institution Archives, 
which may have included work papers of collectors and donors. 
According to the Smithsonian's legal views and Smithsonian documents, 
this is one of the reasons why the cultural affiliations in the 
Natural History Museum's inventories were tentative. 

In its legal views, however, the Smithsonian states that it has fully 
complied with the statutory requirements for preparing inventories. 
First, the Smithsonian states that the statutory language does not 
require that consultation occur prior to the inventory being 
completed. The Smithsonian points to the definition of inventory added 
by the 1996 amendments in support of its interpretation, noting that 
one could easily construe the consultation requirement to apply with 
greater force to the requirement to use the best available scientific 
and historical documentation to identify the origins of the human 
remains and objects rather than to the development of the inventories. 
[Footnote 23] Second, the Smithsonian states that the law allows the 
Smithsonian to determine, for itself, what was practicable in order to 
meet the statutory deadline for completion of the inventories. The 
Smithsonian acknowledges that neither the American Indian nor the 
Natural History Museum reviewed each and every source maintained by 
the Smithsonian for preparing the inventories--including the National 
Anthropological Archives or individual staff files--because accessing 
those sources would not have been practicable given the size and scope 
of the Smithsonian's collection. 

Furthermore, according to the Smithsonian's legal views, the 
Smithsonian does not interpret section 11 as necessarily requiring 
that the inventory and identification process occur simultaneously, 
and therefore it has adopted a two-step process to fulfill section 
11's requirements. The first step is to prepare a detailed listing 
(the inventory) of the human remains and funerary objects in each 
museum's collection using information in the electronic catalog. The 
Smithsonian stated that it does not believe that the NMAI Act--either 
as originally enacted or after the 1996 amendments--requires cultural 
affiliations included in the inventories to necessarily be conclusive 
and dispositive. The second step is to prepare repatriation case 
reports (the identification). During the second step, the museums 
generally consult with tribes and consider all relevant information, 
including information held by the Smithsonian as well as other 
information needed to meet the NMAI Act's requirement that the 
Smithsonian use the best available scientific and historic 
documentation to identify the origins of remains and funerary objects, 
according to officials. Generally, each case report prepared by the 
museums includes a determination of cultural affiliation and a 
recommendation regarding repatriation, according to officials. The 
officials told us that the museums generally undertake the second step 
only after a tribe submits a repatriation claim based on information 
in the inventories.[Footnote 24] 

The legislative history of the 1996 amendments provides little clear 
guidance concerning the meaning of section 11.[Footnote 25] The 
congressional committee report accompanying the 1996 amendments notes 
that the amendments were entirely consistent with the Smithsonian's 
then-current administrative practice and adopted the Smithsonian's 
administrative deadline of June 1, 1998, to complete an inventory of 
Indian human remains and funerary objects in its possession. This 
suggests that the 1996 amendments ratified the Smithsonian's two-step 
approach to inventory and identification. The committee report, 
however, also notes that one intent of the amendments was to ensure 
that the requirements for the inventory, identification, and 
repatriation of human remains and funerary objects in the possession 
of the Smithsonian was being carried out in a manner consistent with 
NAGPRA, which suggests that the Smithsonian should have included 
geographic and cultural affiliations in its inventory to the extent 
practicable based on information held by the Smithsonian. 

Had the Smithsonian implemented the latter interpretation, it would 
have faced serious challenges in conducting the required consultations 
and research necessary to make the required cultural affiliations 
within the statutory deadlines, given the resources devoted to the 
task. Natural History Museum staff told us that they could not have 
reviewed all relevant information when preparing the inventories 
because they did not have time to do so by the deadline. We recognize 
the dilemma that the Smithsonian faced; it had to either prepare 
incomplete inventories by the deadline or prepare complete inventories 
and miss the deadline. Either approach would have resulted in 
questions about compliance with the NMAI Act. In addition, Smithsonian 
officials believe that only the first step of the two-step process was 
required to be completed within the deadline. Therefore, under this 
interpretation, the Smithsonian does not have a statutory deadline to 
complete the remaining consultations and make the remaining cultural 
affiliation determinations. The congressional committee reports 
accompanying the 1989 act indicate that the Smithsonian estimated that 
the identification and inventory of Indian human remains as well as 
notification of affected tribes and return of the remains and funerary 
objects would take 5 years.[Footnote 26] However, more than 21 years 
later, these efforts are still under way. 

Smithsonian's Progress in Offering Human Remains and Objects for 
Repatriation Has Been Slow: 

From the passage of the NMAI Act in 1989 through December 2010, the 
Smithsonian estimates that it has offered to repatriate the Indian 
human remains in approximately one-third (about 5,280) of the 
estimated 19,780 catalog numbers identified as possibly including 
Indian human remains since the act was passed.[Footnote 27] The 
American Indian Museum offered to repatriate human remains in about 40 
percent (about 250) of its estimated 630 catalog numbers. The Natural 
History Museum has offered to repatriate human remains in about 25 
percent (about 5,040) of its estimated 19,150 catalog numbers 
containing Indian human remains. 

The Smithsonian has also offered to repatriate more than 212,000 
funerary objects from about 3,460 catalog numbers and about 1,240 
sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony from about 1,050 
catalog numbers through 2010 (see table 3). We could not determine 
what share of the total this represents because the Smithsonian cannot 
provide a reliable estimate of the number of funerary objects in its 
collections and, for sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony, 
the Smithsonian relies on tribes to assist in identifying such 
objects. [Footnote 28] 

Table 3: Estimated Number of Indian Human Remains and Objects Offered 
for Repatriation as of December 31, 2010: 

Museum: American Indian; 
Human remains: Estimated catalog numbers: 250; 
Human remains: Estimated actual numbers[A]: 420; 
Funerary objects: Estimated catalog numbers: 980; 
Funerary objects: Estimated actual numbers: 29,400[B]; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Estimated catalog 
numbers: 1,040; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Estimated actual 
numbers: 1,190. 

Museum: Natural History; 
Human remains: Estimated catalog numbers: 5,040; 
Human remains: Estimated actual numbers[A]: 5,560; 
Funerary objects: Estimated catalog numbers: 2,470; 
Funerary objects: Estimated actual numbers: 182,820; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Estimated catalog 
numbers: 10; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Estimated actual 
numbers: 50. 

Museum: Total; 
Human remains: Estimated catalog numbers: 5,280; 
Human remains: Estimated actual numbers[A]: 5,980; 
Funerary objects: Estimated catalog numbers: 3,460; 
Funerary objects: Estimated actual numbers: 212,220; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Estimated catalog 
numbers: 1,050; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Estimated actual 
numbers: 1,240. 

Source: GAO analysis of data provided by the Smithsonian's American 
Indian and Natural History Museums. 

Notes: Because the numbers provided in this table are estimates, we 
have rounded them to the nearest ten. Therefore, totals may not add 
because of rounding. 

[A] The American Indian Museum currently calculates the minimum number 
of individuals, but previously used other methods, including counts of 
individual elements, counts of the number of bone fragments, and other 
counting standards. The minimum number of individuals cannot be 
estimated for human remains that were repatriated before the counting 
method was standardized. 

[B] The American Indian Museum's Repatriation Manager said that some 
of these are lots rather than individual items. A lot generally is a 
group of human remains or artifacts that are related in some way, but 
are not individually numbered or identified. 

[End of table] 

The Smithsonian generally makes repatriation decisions based on the 
case reports prepared by case officers at each museum. At the Natural 
History Museum, the Secretary of the Smithsonian has delegated 
authority for making decisions to the Under Secretary for Science; at 
the American Indian Museum the decision is made by the Board of 
Trustees. Through December 31, 2010, case officers had completed 76 
case reports at the American Indian Museum and 95 at the Natural 
History Museum.[Footnote 29] 

Case reports vary in scope and complexity, and therefore the length of 
time necessary to complete them varies. Both museums' Repatriation 
Managers provided estimates for how long case reports should take to 
complete (18 months for the American Indian Museum, on average, and at 
least 1 year for the Natural History Museum), but added that time 
frames can vary greatly depending on the circumstances. Also, they 
said that these estimates are based on a starting point of when a case 
officer begins to actively work on a case report. Therefore, their 
estimates do not include the months or years during which claims may 
be pending awaiting active consideration. We found that it took a 
median of 2.4 years for the Smithsonian to complete a case report from 
the date of an official claim letter to the date of a case report. 
This varied from 1 month to 18.3 years. Appendix II provides details 
on the length of time taken by the museums to respond to repatriation 
claims. 

According to the Smithsonian's legal views, case reports need to be 
detailed in order to meet both the act's statutory requirements and 
the Smithsonian's fiduciary duties. Under the Smithsonian's legal 
views, the Smithsonian has an affirmative obligation to prepare 
inventories and to use the best available scientific and historical 
documentation to identify the origins of such remains and funerary 
objects. Accordingly, Smithsonian officials told us that once they had 
addressed all of the pending requests, they would begin culturally 
affiliating the human remains and objects still in their collections. 
In preparing case reports, case officers generally review relevant 
documentation, including relevant information held by the Smithsonian, 
and consult with tribes. While the Smithsonian sometimes holds the 
best available information about its collections, according to 
officials, case officers sometimes review sources held outside of the 
Smithsonian as well, such as articles published in journals, state 
site files, and relevant archival information. In some cases, case 
officers have traveled to archives across the country to review 
relevant information, such as notes taken by collectors in the field, 
according to the Natural History Museum's Repatriation Manager. The 
slow progress can be attributed, in part, to the Smithsonian's view 
that it has a legal and fiduciary duty to use the best available 
scientific and historical documentation to determine the cultural 
affiliation of human remains and objects.[Footnote 30] The two museums 
have established internal goals for the number of case reports they 
will complete in 2011--5 at the Natural History Museum and 4 at the 
American Indian Museum. However, Smithsonian officials could not 
estimate when they will complete this process for human remains and 
funerary objects. At the pace the Smithsonian has been going, it could 
take decades more to prepare case reports for the remaining human 
remains and funerary objects in its collections. 

The Smithsonian Identified Challenges to Meeting Its Repatriation 
Requirements: 

Officials we spoke with from the Smithsonian, the Review Committee, 
and the American Indian Museum's Board of Trustees identified 
challenges the museums face in carrying out the Smithsonian's 
repatriation requirements under the NMAI Act. These challenges fall 
into four main categories: 

* Limited staff and staff turnover: For example, the Board of Trustees 
told us that the American Indian Museum's Repatriation Office is small 
and has suffered over the years from turnover and vacancies. The 
Natural History Museum's Repatriation Manager said that the museum had 
limited staff to prepare repatriation case reports, which has 
contributed to the length of time needed to address claims. According 
to the American Indian Museum's Repatriation Manager, in one instance 
the museum was not permitted to fill an open position for a 
repatriation staff member because of budgetary constraints, and this 
resulted in over a year of lost research time. 

* Complex or limited information: Repatriation staff told us that 
complex and sometimes limited records of the Smithsonian's collections 
can pose a challenge. For example, the Natural History Museum's 
Repatriation Manager told us that records for late 19th and early 20th 
century archaeological excavations are often incomplete and scattered 
among record locations at the museum. Furthermore, the manager told us 
that some collections have been transferred between the Natural 
History Museum and non-Smithsonian museums and that, in some cases, 
relevant information in the original records was omitted or simplified 
during the transfer of items. The American Indian Museum's 
Repatriation Manager also told us that complex and sometimes limited 
records of the Smithsonian's collections can pose a challenge, but 
added that the museum lacks information on the origin of only a few 
human remains and funerary objects in its collections. 

* Difficulties overcoming tribal issues: Review Committee and board 
officials said that tribes' limited resources for repatriation 
activities and turnover in tribal governments can pose challenges. 
Furthermore, the Review Committee has repeatedly expressed its 
concerns about whether the Natural History Museum's repatriation staff 
are doing enough to reach out to tribes. The committee has recommended 
several times between 2003 and 2010 that the museum's Repatriation 
Office hire a tribal liaison to conduct tribal outreach. The 
Repatriation Manager said, however, that a tribal liaison is not 
needed because repatriation staff conduct outreach and have built 
positive relationships with tribes. 

* Poor data management (American Indian Museum): The American Indian 
Museum has historically not maintained centralized files related to 
its repatriation activities, according to the museum's Repatriation 
Manager. Instead, staff members at that museum have kept their own 
separate working files. As a result, repatriation staff have faced 
difficulties in locating case-related information. To tackle this 
challenge, the American Indian Museum adopted a new case management 
system in January 2011 to better organize and track its repatriation 
activities. The new system will allow the museum to store extensive 
amounts of case-related data in a centralized system and, for example, 
allow the museum to more quickly respond to inquiries about 
repatriation cases, according to the museum's Repatriation Manager. 

The Review Committee's Oversight and Reporting Are Limited, and It 
Faces Some Challenges to Fulfilling Its Requirements: 

The Review Committee conducts numerous activities to implement the 
special committee provisions in the NMAI Act, but we found its 
oversight and reporting are limited, and it faces some challenges in 
fulfilling its requirements under the NMAI Act. Contrary to the NMAI 
Act, the Review Committee does not monitor and review the American 
Indian Museum's inventory, identification, and repatriation 
activities, although it does monitor and review the Natural History 
Museum's inventory, identification, and repatriation activities. The 
Review Committee also does not submit reports to Congress on the 
progress of repatriation activities at the Smithsonian. In addition, 
although the Review Committee has heard few disputes, no independent 
appeals process exists to challenge the Smithsonian's cultural 
affiliation and repatriation decisions. Finally, the Review Committee 
identified challenges it faces in fulfilling its requirements under 
the NMAI Act. 

Contrary to the NMAI Act, the Review Committee Only Monitors the 
Repatriation Activities of the Natural History Museum: 

Section 12 of the NMAI Act requires the Secretary of the Smithsonian 
to appoint a special committee to monitor and review the inventory, 
identification, and return of Indian human remains and objects under 
the act. The law does not limit the applicability of the Review 
Committee to the Natural History Museum. The Secretary nevertheless 
established a Review Committee to meet this requirement in 1990 that 
oversees only the Natural History Museum's repatriation activities and 
is housed within that museum. According to the Smithsonian's legal 
views, it interprets the act as limiting the Review Committee's 
oversight of repatriation activities to the Natural History Museum's 
repatriation activities. The Smithsonian's five reasons for its 
position, along with our response, are presented below. 

* The NMAI Act only covered items that the Smithsonian had at the time 
of enactment in 1989: The Smithsonian's legal views are that Congress 
only intended the Review Committee to advise the Smithsonian with 
respect to the collection of Indian human remains and funerary objects 
in the possession of the Smithsonian at the time of the NMAI Act's 
enactment in 1989. At that time, all such items were all in the 
collections of the Natural History Museum. The Smithsonian bases this 
interpretation on the statutory language and a congressional committee 
report that said one purpose of the act was to provide a process of 
identification for the human remains of Native Americans that are 
currently in the possession of the Smithsonian Institution.[Footnote 
31] However, the version of the act that this report accompanied did 
not become law. The congressional committee report accompanying the 
version of the act that became law notes that the Smithsonian is to 
complete an inventory of Indian human remains and funerary objects in 
the Smithsonian collections which, in due course, will encompass those 
in the existing Heye collection.[Footnote 32] Furthermore, section 12 
and the act's legislative history do not indicate that the Review 
Committee's jurisdiction is limited to the Natural History Museum, nor 
do they include any language that would dictate a time when the 
committee's jurisdiction should begin. The language of section 12 
clearly directs the Secretary to appoint a special committee to 
monitor and review the inventory, identification, and return of Indian 
human remains and objects under the NMAI Act. 

* The Review Committee provision in section 12 of the NMAI Act does 
not address the Heye collection: The Smithsonian's legal views are 
that Congress neither addressed nor considered whether the Review 
Committee's jurisdiction should extend to human remains and funerary 
objects obtained through the transfer of the Heye collection because 
at the time the Smithsonian was not aware that the collection 
contained human remains or funerary objects. However, the act's 
legislative history demonstrates that Congress believed the collection 
contained human remains and funerary objects because it discussed an 
inventory of the human remains and funerary objects in the Heye 
collection in the congressional committee report accompanying the 
version of the act that became law. 

* The American Indian Museum did not exist at the time of enactment: 
Since the American Indian Museum did not exist at the time of the 
act's enactment in 1989, the Smithsonian's legal view is that it did 
not have any collections that could be subject to the act's 
repatriation provisions. However, 6 months before the act's passage, 
the Museum of the American Indian in New York and the Smithsonian 
entered into a memorandum of understanding to transfer the museum's 
assets to the Smithsonian. When Congress passed the NMAI Act in 1989, 
it knew that the new American Indian Museum would house the Heye 
collection. Moreover, the act established the American Indian Museum 
and therefore it existed as of the date the law was enacted. 

* The American Indian Museum did not exist when the Review Committee 
began its work: Because the Review Committee by statute was to begin 
its repatriation review process within 120 days of the act's passage, 
the Smithsonian's legal view is that Congress could not have intended 
its charge to extend to the American Indian Museum's collection since 
the museum did not exist 120 days after the act's passage. However, 
section 12 only required the Secretary to appoint the Review Committee 
120 days after the act's passage; section 12 is silent as to when the 
committee was to begin its work. Moreover, as stated above, the act 
established the American Indian Museum and therefore it existed as of 
the date the law was enacted. 

* The NMAI Act provides the Board of Trustees with sole authority over 
the museum's collections: The Smithsonian's legal view is that by 
granting the American Indian Museum Board of Trustees sole authority 
over the museum's new collection, Congress intended for the board to 
have independent, plenary authority over its collections, subject only 
to the general policies of the Board of Regents. In the Smithsonian's 
legal view, given this intention, Congress would not have provided the 
Board of Trustees with such broad powers, and, at the same time, cause 
it to be subject to the oversight of an independent review committee. 
We asked Smithsonian officials to provide examples of how the Review 
Committee would interfere with the Board of Trustees' sole authority 
if the committee reviewed the American Indian Museum case reports and 
heard disputes, but none were provided. We therefore believe that the 
Review Committee's monitoring and review of the American Indian 
Museum's repatriation activities would not interfere with the board's 
sole authority over the museum's collections and, in particular, its 
policies to repatriate to non-federally recognized tribes and to make 
cultural affiliations using a "reasonable basis" standard. This is 
because the Review Committee's role is only advisory, as acknowledged 
by the Smithsonian. 

Even though the Review Committee has not been overseeing the 
repatriation activities of the American Indian Museum, since its 
establishment its Board of Trustees has overseen repatriation 
activities and has taken an active role in the repatriation process. 
For example, in 1991, the board adopted a repatriation policy that 
assigned specific authority and responsibility for each aspect of the 
repatriation process. It has also overseen the activities of the 
museum's own Repatriation Office at board meetings. For example, board 
members told us they review and comment on repatriation case reports, 
vote to approve each report, sometimes contribute to case reports, and 
have been involved in inventorying museum collections. In addition, 
the board has, at times, created a Repatriation Committee composed of 
a subset of board members to further its oversight of the museum's 
repatriation program. No dispute had been presented to the board for 
resolution through December 31, 2010, but in 2009 it did help resolve 
a challenge to a repatriation recommendation.[Footnote 33] Should 
there be a dispute in the future, the board told us that it plans to 
rely on its recently adopted process for initiating an ad hoc Special 
Review Committee to resolve disputes. The process states that a 
Special Review Committee would be convened by the board's Repatriation 
Committee. 

The Review Committee Monitors the Natural History Museum but Does Not 
Report to Congress: 

To fulfill its responsibility under the NMAI Act to monitor and review 
the inventory, identification, and return of Indian human remains and 
objects, the Review Committee has performed a number of activities to 
oversee the Natural History Museum's repatriation process including 
the following: 

* Assessing the Natural History Museum's progress in implementing the 
act: The committee generally meets twice annually with Repatriation 
Office staff and sometimes with other museum staff, including 
management, to discuss the status of ongoing claims and other 
repatriation activities. During the meetings, case officers report 
their interactions with tribes as they address the tribes' claims for 
the repatriation of objects or human remains. The meetings also allow 
committee members to review candidates to fill vacant committee seats, 
discuss the status of personnel in the Repatriation Office, and raise 
concerns regarding the repatriation process with the office program 
manager. 

* Reviewing museum case reports: The committee's reviews of the 
Repatriation Office's repatriation case reports are intended to offer 
an "independent appraisal of whether the case reports provide a fair 
and objective consideration and assessment of all relevant 
information," according to the Review Committee annual report. The 
committee examines the methodology and information the case officers 
use during their research, assesses their conclusions, and, if 
necessary, provides editorial suggestions to clarify and improve the 
reports. The committee has been provided courtesy copies of some case 
reports prepared by the American Indian Museum's Repatriation Office. 

* Reporting annually to the Secretary: The committee's reports include 
concerns it has regarding the repatriation process at the Natural 
History Museum and updates on disputes, or potential disputes, over 
cultural affiliation. The reports also provide information regarding 
conferences or workshops the committee has attended or organized and 
coordination efforts, if any, the Review Committee has had with the 
American Indian Museum. 

* Hearing and helping resolve disputes: The committee hears disputes 
brought by tribes and other interested parties regarding repatriation 
decisions by the Natural History Museum and makes recommendations for 
resolving these disputes to the Secretary of the Smithsonian. It has 
heard two such disputes, which we describe later in this report. In a 
separate case, the committee reported that it was able to avoid a 
potential dispute when it arranged a consultation with one tribe in 
Oregon, other potentially affiliated Oregon tribes, and expert 
consultants after a tribe complained about a case report that did not 
recommend repatriation to the tribe. According to the Review 
Committee, the meeting proved to be extremely helpful and provided new 
information for the Review Committee to consider. As a result, the 
Repatriation Office decided to rewrite its report on the remains and 
reassess its recommendation. The human remains and funerary objects 
were later found to be culturally affiliated with two tribes. 

* Conducting tribal outreach: The committee has a long-standing policy 
of interacting with Native American communities and relevant 
organizations. For example, committee members have attended NAGPRA 
Review Committee meetings and conferences to explain the Smithsonian 
repatriation process to tribes. The committee also provided support 
for a 1995 repatriation workshop organized by the American Indian 
Museum and conducted a survey in 2001 of tribes in California to 
determine their level of interest in having the Natural History 
Museum's Repatriation Office conduct workshops on Smithsonian 
repatriation. 

Although section 12 of the NMAI Act requires the Secretary, at the 
conclusion of the work of the Review Committee, to so certify by 
report to Congress, there is no annual reporting requirement similar 
to the one required for the NAGPRA Review Committee. As we stated 
earlier, in 1989, it was estimated that the Smithsonian Review 
Committee would conclude its work in about 5 years and cease to exist 
at the end of fiscal year 1995.[Footnote 34] Yet the committee's 
monitoring and review of repatriation activities at the Natural 
History Museum has been ongoing since the committee's establishment in 
1990. In fact, the Smithsonian is not required to report annually to 
Congress outside of the annual budget process, and Smithsonian 
officials said the Smithsonian has not reported to Congress on 
repatriation activities on a regular basis since the NMAI Act was 
enacted.[Footnote 35] Furthermore, the Board of Trustees of the 
American Indian Museum does not have a formal reporting process to 
inform the Secretary of the Smithsonian or the Smithsonian's Board of 
Regents of its activities. As a result, over the last 21 years, 
policymakers have not received regular information to assess the 
effectiveness of the Smithsonian's efforts to repatriate the Indian 
human remains and objects in its collections. We believe that this 
would be an appropriate role for the Smithsonian's Review Committee, 
and would be similar to the role of the NAGPRA Review Committee. 

The Review Committee Has Heard Few Disputes, and No Independent 
Appeals Process Exists for Smithsonian Decisions: 

As stated above, the Review Committee is also responsible for hearing 
disputes at the Natural History Museum with respect to the return of 
Indian human remains or objects and makes nonbinding recommendations 
to the Secretary of the Smithsonian. Since the Review Committee was 
established, in 1990, only two disputes have been brought before it. 

* In 1995, a tribe disputed the Natural History Museum's Repatriation 
Office's finding that the human remains and funerary objects it 
claimed were culturally unidentifiable and recommendation that they be 
held until the museum could determine their cultural affiliation. The 
Review Committee reviewed the case report, requested written summaries 
of the positions of the museum and the tribe, heard testimony 
presented by the museum and the tribe, and recommended that the human 
remains be repatriated to the tribe and that other potentially 
affiliated tribes be notified of the decision. Several of the notified 
tribes disputed the repatriation recommendation, and the tribes 
reached an agreement to jointly repatriate the human remains and 
funerary objects. In the end, the Secretary decided to implement the 
committee's recommendation and repatriated the remains and funerary 
objects to the requesting tribe and also to four additional tribes in 
1997. 

* In 2009, a tribal group disputed the Repatriation Office's finding 
that two items it had claimed were not culturally affiliated with the 
tribes within the group, and that there was insufficient evidence to 
determine that four additional items met the statutory definition of 
sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony. The Review Committee 
again reviewed the case report, requested position statements from the 
tribal group and the museum, and heard testimony and unanimously 
agreed that the Natural History Museum's cultural affiliation 
determination was incorrect for the two items and that all six items 
met the statutory definition of sacred objects and objects of cultural 
patrimony. On the basis of its review of this evidence, the Review 
Committee recommended to the Secretary that the items be offered for 
repatriation. However, the Under Secretary for Science decided that 
the group had not presented sufficient evidence to establish by the 
required legal standard that the items met the statutory definitions 
or were culturally affiliated with any tribe in the group, so the 
Smithsonian would retain the items.[Footnote 36] In the letter 
informing the group of its decision, the Under Secretary stated that 
although he respected the Review Committee's recommendation and 
understood why the committee "may have given more weight to general 
assertions provided by tribal leaders," the tribal group had not given 
sufficient evidence to prove its claim. 

An official from the tribal group involved in the second dispute told 
us that the tribal group has considered challenging the Secretary's 
decision, but it has no recourse because the Smithsonian does not have 
an appeals process and cannot be sued in federal court for the 
decision. The American Indian Museum's Board of Trustees, which makes 
final repatriations decisions for that museum, established an appeals 
process in 2010 whereby, in the event of a dispute, the board would 
appoint five individuals to an ad hoc Special Review Committee to hear 
the dispute. However, this process lacks independence, because it 
relies on decision makers overseeing their own decisions. The 
Smithsonian also cannot be sued under the NMAI Act or the 
Administrative Procedures Act, the law commonly used to sue federal 
agencies.[Footnote 37] Currently, the Smithsonian Board of Regents is 
the only entity within the Smithsonian organization that has the 
authority to oversee the decisions of both the Secretary and the NMAI 
Board of Trustees, but there is no existing process to appeal these 
decisions to the Board of Regents. In contrast, under NAGPRA, tribes 
can use the Administrative Procedures Act or section 15 of NAGPRA to 
challenge a federal agency's repatriation decision if they believe it 
violates the act. 

The Review Committee Identified Challenges It Faces: 

The Review Committee has identified two challenges it faces to 
implementing its responsibilities under the NMAI Act. First, the 
Review Committee has documented its inability to oversee the American 
Indian Museum's repatriation activities as a challenge. The 
relationship between the Review Committee and the American Indian 
Museum has been mixed. Since its establishment, the Review Committee 
has maintained that the NMAI Act mandates a single review committee 
for monitoring repatriation activities at all museums and units of the 
Smithsonian Institution. The American Indian and Natural History 
Museums do coordinate on some issues, such as conducting tribal 
consultations and providing funding for consultation and repatriation 
expenses for tribes.[Footnote 38] However, the American Indian 
Museum's board has consistently stressed its independence from the 
Review Committee with regard to monitoring the repatriation process. 
According to the Review Committee, there has been no direct 
communication between the committee and the Board of Trustees as of 
December 31, 2010. 

According to the Review Committee's annual reports, it has taken steps 
to reach out to the American Indian Museum and offer some oversight of 
its repatriation program. For example, during the late 1990s, the 
Review Committee's annual reports indicate that the committee 
requested, received, and reviewed courtesy copies of some American 
Indian Museum case reports. The committee suggested that the Natural 
History Museum's Repatriation Office coordinate more closely with the 
American Indian Museum, along with other Smithsonian museums, and 
other institutions to help ensure consistency in repatriation policy. 
The Review Committee also requested that it be much more involved in 
the American Indian Museum's repatriation process to meet its mandate. 

In its 2000 annual report, the committee informed the Secretary that 
it had met with resistance in trying to monitor the American Indian 
Museum's repatriation activities, emphasizing its belief that its 
mandate encompassed the repatriation activities of the museum. The 
committee further stated that if it could not perform these duties, 
the American Indian Museum would continue to be "the only museum in 
the United States that receives federal funding and [is] not subject 
to a monitoring of its repatriation activities by an independent 
committee without a direct interest in activities other than 
repatriation." The Review Committee also reported in 2005 and 2007 
that it had conducted little or no monitoring of the American Indian 
Museum's repatriation activities. 

However, dialogue has opened up recently between the two museums, with 
potential for the relationship to expand, according to the Chair of 
the Review Committee. Furthermore, according to the Review Committee, 
the current Directors of the American Indian and Natural History 
Museums have expressed interest in establishing a more collaborative 
relationship between the two museums' repatriation programs. 

The second challenge identified by the Review Committee is a lack of 
consistent administrative support. The committee has experienced two 
lengthy instances during which it did not have a coordinator, a 
position that handles a variety of tasks, including arranging biannual 
meetings (travel, reimbursements to members), drafting minutes of the 
meetings (on which the annual reports to the Secretary are largely 
based), and managing the process for filling open seats on the 
committee. 

In the first instance, in July 2005, the coordinator resigned and the 
Review Committee operated without a coordinator until October 2006. In 
its 2005 annual report, the Review Committee stated its concern over 
the length of time it took to fill this position and the negative 
effect that not having administrative support had on its work. For 
example, the committee stated that without a coordinator, it was not 
possible for it to prepare formal minutes for meetings in 2006. 
Instead, a brief outline of the meeting was recorded after a new 
coordinator was hired in October 2006. 

In the second instance, according to the Natural History Museum's 
Repatriation Manager, the coordinator was released by the Smithsonian 
in December 2007 because of a reduction in workforce at the 
Smithsonian. A museum employee was transferred to the coordinator 
position that same month but later resigned in February 2008, and the 
Smithsonian did not hire a new coordinator until March 2009, resulting 
in an additional year without a coordinator. Although the 2007 meeting 
minutes had been transcribed by the time the new coordinator had been 
hired, as of December 31, 2010, the coordinator was in the process of 
preparing the minutes for 2009 and 2010. There are also no minutes for 
the 2008 meetings, and the recordings for those meetings have not yet 
been transcribed. The committee has said that not having a coordinator 
from 2008 to 2009 made it difficult for it to maintain documentation 
of its activities and make appropriate logistical arrangements 
necessary for the committee to function. According to Smithsonian 
officials, during the time that the Review Committee was without a 
coordinator, its travel, reimbursement, meeting arrangements, and the 
process for filling open seats were facilitated by museum staff in 
coordination with the Review Committee. Smithsonian officials added 
that they offered to pay for transcription of meeting minutes, but the 
Review Committee decided to wait until a coordinator was in place to 
transcribe the tapes. 

Most Human Remains and Many Objects Offered for Repatriation Have Been 
Repatriated, but the Smithsonian Has No Policy on Culturally 
Unidentifiable Items: 

The Smithsonian estimates that, of the items offered for repatriation, 
it has repatriated about three-quarters of the Indian human remains, 
about half of the funerary objects, and almost all the sacred objects 
and objects of cultural patrimony. Some items have not been 
repatriated for a variety of reasons, including tribes' lack of 
resources, cultural beliefs, and tribal government issues. In 
addition, the Smithsonian has not repatriated some human remains and 
funerary objects that it has determined to be culturally 
unidentifiable, and it does not have a policy on how it will undertake 
the ultimate disposition of these items. 

The Smithsonian Estimates That It Has Repatriated About 4,330 Indian 
Human Remains and About 100,700 Objects: 

The Smithsonian estimates that, of the items offered for repatriation, 
as of December 31, 2010, it has repatriated about three-quarters 
(4,330) of the Indian human remains, about half (99,550) of the 
funerary objects, and nearly all (1,140) sacred objects and objects of 
cultural patrimony (see table 4). 

Table 4: Estimated Number of Indian Human Remains and Objects 
Repatriated as of December 31, 2010: 

Museum: American Indian; 
Human remains[A]: Number offered for repatriation: 420; 
Human remains[A]: Number repatriated: 390; 
Human remains[A]: Percent: 93; 
Funerary objects: Number offered for repatriation: 29,400[B]; 
Funerary objects: Number repatriated: 8,200; 
Funerary objects: Percent: 28; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Number offered for 
repatriation: 1,190; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Number repatriated: 
1,090; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Percent: 92. 

Museum: Natural History; 
Human remains[A]: Number offered for repatriation: 5,560; 
Human remains[A]: Number repatriated: 3,940; 
Human remains[A]: Percent: 71; 
Funerary objects: Number offered for repatriation: 182,820; 
Funerary objects: Number repatriated: 91,360; 
Funerary objects: Percent: 50; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Number offered for 
repatriation: 50; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Number repatriated: 
50; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Percent: 100. 

Museum: Total; 
Human remains[A]: Number offered for repatriation: 5,980; 
Human remains[A]: Number repatriated: 4,330; 
Human remains[A]: Percent: 72; 
Funerary objects: Number offered for repatriation: 212,220; 
Funerary objects: Number repatriated: 99,550; 
Funerary objects: Percent: 47; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Number offered for 
repatriation: 1,240; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Number repatriated: 
1,140; 
Sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony: Percent: 92. 

Source: GAO analysis of data provided by the Smithsonian's American 
Indian and Natural History Museums. 

Notes: (1) Because the numbers provided in this table are estimates, 
we have rounded them to the nearest ten. (2) Totals may not add 
because of rounding. (3) In addition to repatriating human remains and 
objects included in this table, the Smithsonian has also returned some 
Native American items solely because they were illegally acquired by 
the Smithsonian, or in the case of the American Indian Museum, by the 
museum's predecessor, the Museum of the American Indian in New York. 
Specifically, the American Indian Museum has returned about 30 such 
items, and the Natural History Museum has returned about 19 such 
items. An item is considered illegally acquired, for example, if the 
collector did not have the legal right to acquire it. 

[A] According to Smithsonian officials, the museums calculate the 
number of human remains differently. The Natural History Museum 
calculates the minimum number of individuals. The American Indian 
Museum currently calculates the minimum number of individuals, but 
previously used other methods, including counts of individual elements 
and counts of the number of bone fragments. The minimum number of 
individuals cannot be estimated for human remains that were 
repatriated before the counting method was standardized. The total 
number of human remains includes skeletal material, hair, scalps, and 
other cultural objects that may contain human remains. 

[B] The American Indian Museum Repatriation Manager told us that some 
of these are lots rather than individual items. A lot generally is a 
group of human remains or artifacts that are related in some way, but 
are not individually numbered or identified. 

[End of table] 

Officials from several tribes that we spoke with, that had 
repatriation experiences with the American Indian and Natural History 
Museums, expressed overall satisfaction with how the Smithsonian 
facilitated the return of human remains and objects once offered for 
repatriation. An official with one tribe told us that museum staff 
provided guidance for submitting the repatriation claim, such as an 
example of a claim letter to use as a template for his tribe's 
official request for the human remains. Officials with other tribes 
told us they appreciated that the museum staffs showed understanding 
of the tribes' cultural requirements by taking great care to properly 
handle and transfer the human remains to a burial site. An official 
from one tribe described how the museum provided special training in 
addition to coordinating the repatriation activities. In two other 
instances, tribal officials said some museum staff attended 
repatriation ceremonies. Officials from several tribes we spoke with 
also said they had received funding that assisted them in carrying out 
repatriation activities with the museums. 

Items Have Not Been Repatriated for a Variety of Reasons: 

Many successful repatriations have occurred, but approximately 1,650 
human remains, 112,670 funerary objects, and 100 sacred objects 
offered for repatriation have not been repatriated. Tribes have either 
not repatriated these items or generally not pursued repatriation 
because of their lack of resources, cultural beliefs, tribal 
government issues, the time needed for intertribal coordination, and 
need for pesticide testing. 

* Lack of resources: Officials from two tribes told us that, at times, 
their tribes have lacked the necessary staff to facilitate the return 
of human remains and funerary objects affiliated to them. Officials 
from two other tribes said that their tribes did not have an 
appropriate location to serve as a final resting place for the items 
offered for return, so they have been unable to proceed with the 
repatriation process. 

* Cultural beliefs: In some cases, tribal cultural beliefs prevent 
repatriation. For example, one tribal official told us that 
repatriation can have harmful effects on the tribe, including the 
deceased tribal members associated with the remains or objects. In 
another instance, one working group of four tribes said that because 
it has an ongoing dispute with the Natural History Museum, it will not 
repatriate offered items because the dispute has created a situation 
where it is spiritually too dangerous for the tribes to deal with the 
human remains and funerary objects that have been offered for 
repatriation. 

* Tribal government issues: In one case, a tribe had a change in 
leadership that effectively halted any repatriation efforts. In 
another case, a tribal official told us that the tribe was 
experiencing political turmoil, and as a result, it was not a good 
time for the tribe to make decisions, such as deciding to apply for a 
repatriation grant. 

* Time needed for intertribal coordination: According to museum 
officials, in a number of cases, the museums have offered the same 
items to multiple tribes, and time is needed for those tribes to 
coordinate and determine the disposition of the items. In another 
case, human remains were offered to one tribe, but a tribal official 
explained that the tribe needed time to coordinate with other tribes 
closely linked to the tribe's ancestral homeland to determine an 
appropriate burial site. 

* Need for pesticide testing: The American Indian Museum Repatriation 
Manager told us that, in the 1990s, the museum offered 96 objects to 
one tribe as sacred objects but these have not been repatriated 
because of the possibility of pesticide contamination.[Footnote 39] 
The manager said that because the museum lacked the necessary 
technology to test the objects for pesticides at the time, the tribe 
placed a moratorium on this repatriation until the museum could 
provide adequate assurances that the objects were safe to handle. 

In these particular situations where the tribes have not yet 
repatriated items offered to them, the American Indian Museum 
Repatriation Manager said that the museum will maintain stewardship of 
the items or pursue other options. For example, in cases where tribes 
do not pursue repatriation, the museum may ask whether the tribe is 
amenable to having other tribes repatriate the items. The Natural 
History Museum's Repatriation Program Manager said that on multiple 
occasions, his office has attempted to follow up with tribes to 
determine if they are ready to repatriate human remains and objects 
offered to them, and plans to wait for these tribes to respond. 

The Smithsonian's Repatriation Policies Do Not Discuss How to Handle 
Culturally Unidentifiable Items: 

The NMAI Act requires the Smithsonian, upon request, to repatriate 
culturally affiliated Indian and Native Hawaiian human remains and 
funerary objects. The act does not discuss how to handle human remains 
and objects that cannot be culturally affiliated, otherwise referred 
to as culturally unidentifiable items. Both museums have repatriation 
policies, but neither policy addresses culturally unidentifiable 
items. In contrast, a recent NAGPRA regulation that took effect in May 
2010 requires, among other things, federal agencies and museums to 
consult with federally recognized Indian tribes and Native Hawaiian 
organizations from whose tribal or aboriginal lands the remains were 
removed before offering to transfer control of the culturally 
unidentifiable human remains.[Footnote 40] 

We found that both museums could not culturally affiliate some items, 
but they have treated these items differently. Natural History Museum 
officials stated that about 340 human remains and about 310 funerary 
objects are culturally unidentifiable and will be retained by the 
museum until additional information can be used to determine 
affiliation. In contrast, the Repatriation Manager at the American 
Indian Museum stated that the museum cannot always determine the 
cultural affiliation for human remains and associated funerary objects 
in its collection; however, through consultation many of these cases 
have been resolved by tribes stepping forward and serving a custodial 
role in the respectful treatment and disposition of these items. The 
manager further stated that the American Indian Museum's philosophy is 
to ultimately not have any human remains or associated funerary 
objects within its collection, and the Repatriation Office will 
continue consulting with tribes and researching viable options 
regarding the respectful treatment and disposition of all human 
remains and associated funerary objects within its collection. 
Furthermore, according to the Chair of the Board of Trustees' 
Repatriation Committee, the highest priority of the board is the 
expeditious return of all human remains and associated funerary 
objects in the museum's collection to culturally affiliated entities 
regardless of geography or sociopolitical borders. 

Museum policies and Smithsonian officials state that, although not 
required to, the Smithsonian generally looks to NAGPRA and the NAGPRA 
regulations as a guide to its repatriation process, where appropriate. 
However, in a May 2010 letter commenting on the NAGPRA regulation on 
disposition of culturally unidentifiable remains, the Directors of the 
American Indian and Natural History Museums cited overall disagreement 
with the regulation, suggesting that it "favors speed and efficiency 
in making these dispositions at the expense of accuracy." The 
Directors also described the potential for remains to be transferred 
to communities other than the communities of origin based on the 
geographic parameters outlined in the regulation. They noted that such 
transfers could affect the working relationships that the museums' 
staff develop with tribe members. Furthermore, they stated that 
reaching out to tribes to offer remains that were located on their 
current or historical land is not an ideal approach because tribes 
submit repatriation requests when they are ready to engage in 
repatriation activities. Contacting tribes in the manner outlined in 
the recent NAGPRA regulation, according to the Directors, could push 
certain tribes into repatriation claims that they may not be capable 
of facilitating and affect the working relationships that the museums' 
staff develop with tribe members. 

During our review, we spoke to officials from two tribes interested in 
receiving items the Smithsonian has determined to be culturally 
unidentifiable. One tribal official believes that all Native Americans 
are brothers and therefore all Indian human remains should be offered 
for repatriation to a requesting tribe based on this belief alone. In 
addition, the American Indian Museum's Board of Trustees told us that 
one tribe has come forward and offered to take custody of all human 
remains the museum has determined to be culturally unidentifiable, and 
rebury them on a special plot on its reservation. In the absence of a 
Smithsonian policy for these human remains and objects, the 
Smithsonian's actions in handling culturally unidentifiable items lack 
transparency for both tribes and policymakers. Tribes don't know how 
culturally unidentifiable items are to be handled, and they cannot 
hold the Smithsonian accountable to a particular policy. Officials 
from both museums, however, suggested that the number of culturally 
unidentifiable Indian human remains in their collections could 
decrease as technology improves to provide new evidence of cultural 
affiliation, at which point the Smithsonian could have the data 
necessary to determine a cultural affiliation. 

Conclusions: 

The Smithsonian has inventoried, identified, and repatriated thousands 
of Indian human remains. This represents important progress toward 
fulfilling one of the nation's important duties to its Native people. 
However, at the rate that the Smithsonian is identifying and 
culturally affiliating the human remains and objects in its 
collections, it may take decades more for it to complete this process. 
This process is lengthy in part because the Smithsonian believes it 
must base every cultural affiliation decision on the best available 
scientific and historical documentation because of its legal and 
fiduciary duties. The current process is time consuming and resource 
intensive, which means that the Smithsonian spends time and resources 
to make determinations when, in some cases, it may be possible to make 
quicker determinations. 

In addition, the approach that the Smithsonian has taken to establish 
a Review Committee to monitor and review inventory, identification, 
and return of Indian human remains and objects does not provide the 
oversight specified in section 12 of the NMAI Act. The act gives the 
Review Committee jurisdiction over all Smithsonian museums, and the 
Smithsonian's reasons for limiting its jurisdiction to the Natural 
History Museum are unpersuasive. Because the Review Committee is only 
advisory and does not set policy or make binding decisions, we believe 
that it could monitor and review the American Indian Museum's 
repatriation activities without interfering with the sole authority of 
its Board of Trustees. 

Moreover, because the Review Committee is not required to report on 
Smithsonian repatriation activities annually to Congress, like the 
NAGPRA Review Committee, Congress continues to lack information on the 
progress the Smithsonian is making in implementing the NMAI Act. 
Congress has received little information on the Smithsonian's progress 
over the last 21 years, and given the amount of additional time the 
Smithsonian is likely to need to fulfill its repatriation 
responsibilities, there is no mechanism for Congress to receive 
regular progress reports in the future. 

Also, at the Smithsonian, there is no independent administrative 
appeals process for tribes that believe the decisions by the Secretary 
or the Board of Trustees do not satisfy the NMAI Act's requirements. 
Given that the Administrative Procedures Act does not apply to the 
Smithsonian, judicial review may not be practical. Currently, the 
Smithsonian's Board of Regents is the only body whose purview includes 
oversight of the decisions made by the Secretary of the Smithsonian as 
well as the American Indian Museum's Board of Trustees. Without an 
independent appeals process, tribes have no way of holding the 
Secretary and the Board of Trustees accountable for repatriation 
decisions. 

Finally, the NMAI Act requires the Smithsonian to, upon request, 
repatriate culturally affiliated Indian and Native Hawaiian human 
remains and objects, but it is silent on the treatment of items the 
Smithsonian cannot culturally affiliate. The Smithsonian has not yet 
clearly articulated its plans for these culturally unidentifiable 
items. In the absence of such plans, the final disposition of these 
items is not clear. Tribes or other interested parties thus have no 
way to hold the Smithsonian accountable for decisions about how or 
when to retain or repatriate these items. 

Matter for Congressional Consideration: 

Congress may wish to consider ways to expedite the Smithsonian's 
repatriation process including, but not limited to, directing the 
Smithsonian to make cultural affiliation determinations as efficiently 
and effectively as possible. 

Recommendations for Executive Action: 

We are recommending that the Smithsonian Institution's Board of 
Regents take the following four actions. 

* Direct the Secretary of the Smithsonian to expand the Review 
Committee's jurisdiction to include the American Indian Museum, as 
required by the NMAI Act, to improve oversight of Smithsonian 
repatriation activities. With this expanded role for the Review 
Committee, the Board of Regents and the Secretary should also consider 
where the most appropriate location for the Review Committee should be 
within the Smithsonian's organizational structure. 

* Through the Secretary, direct the Review Committee to report 
annually to Congress on the Smithsonian's implementation of its 
repatriation requirements in the NMAI Act to provide Congress with 
information on the Smithsonian's repatriation activities. 

* Establish an independent administrative appeals process for Indian 
tribes and Native Hawaiian organizations to appeal decisions to either 
the Board of Regents or another entity that can make binding decisions 
for the Smithsonian Institution to provide tribes with an opportunity 
to appeal cultural affiliation and repatriation decisions made by the 
Secretary and the Board of Trustees. 

* Direct the Secretary and the American Indian Museum's Board of 
Trustees to develop policies for the Natural History and American 
Indian Museums for the handling of items in their collections that 
cannot be culturally affiliated to provide for a clear and transparent 
repatriation process. 

Agency Comments: 

We provided a copy of this report for review and comment to the 
Smithsonian Institution. In its written comments, the Smithsonian 
agreed with the report's findings and recommendations and identified 
actions that it plans to consider to respond to our recommendations. 
The Smithsonian's written comments are reprinted in appendix III. 

We are sending copies of this report to the appropriate congressional 
committees, the Secretary of the Smithsonian, and other interested 
parties. In addition, this report is available at no charge on the GAO 
Web site at [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov]. 

If you or your staff members have any questions about this report, 
please contact me at (202) 512-3841 or mittala@gao.gov. Contact points 
for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be 
found on the last page of this report. GAO staff who made major 
contributions to this report are listed in appendix IV. 

Signed by: 

Anu K. Mittal: 
Director, Natural Resources and Environment: 

[End of section] 

Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and Methodology: 

This appendix details the methods we used to examine the Smithsonian
Institution’s implementation of the repatriation requirements in the
National Museum of the American Indian Act (NMAI Act).[Footnote 41] We 
were asked
to determine: 

1. the extent to which the Smithsonian has fulfilled its repatriation
requirements and what challenges it faces, if any, in fulfilling its
requirements; 

2. how the special review committee provisions in the NMAI Act have
been implemented and the challenges the committee faces, if any, in
fulfilling its requirements; and; 

3. the number of human remains and objects that have been repatriated
and the reasons for those that have not. 

For all three objectives, we examined the NMAI Act’s implementation at
the two Smithsonian museums with collections subject to the act—the
American Indian and Natural History Museums.[Footnote 42] We reviewed 
the NMAI Act, the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act
(NAGPRA) and its implementing regulations, and the museums’
repatriation policies. We interviewed officials from the museums’
respective repatriation offices and the Smithsonian’s Office of General
Counsel on the repatriation process. We obtained the Smithsonian’s legal
views on how it interprets the NMAI Act in writing and also received an
additional memorandum regarding its legal views. We reviewed museum
data on the total number of human remains and objects the museums have
had in their collections through December 31, 2010. 

To check the reliability of these data, we interviewed officials and
discussed the methodology used in collecting and maintaining these data.
Smithsonian officials told us they face a number of challenges in
estimating the total number of Indian human remains and objects. For
example, the Natural History Museum’s Repatriation Office Manager and
the American Indian Museum’s Curator of Collections Research and 
Documentation said that their records over time contained different
numbers.[Footnote 43] We also cross-checked the data across multiple 
source documents and tried to reconcile any differences through 
discussions with museum staff. Given the challenges with the data, we 
present the numbers in the report as estimates and we rounded them to 
the nearest ten. The use of rounding did not materially affect our 
findings, conclusions, and recommendations because of the large number 
of human remains and objects. We believe that the data are 
sufficiently reliable to accurately portray broad trends showing the 
Smithsonian’s progress in implementing the NMAI Act’s repatriation 
requirements. 

In addition, during the course of our review, for all three 
objectives, we traveled to several locations to attend repatriation 
conferences and visit with tribes. 

* Wisconsin: We attended the National Association of Tribal Historic
Preservation Officers 2010 Annual Conference in Green Bay, Wisconsin,
and presented the findings of our July 2010 report on federal agency
compliance with NAGPRA.[Footnote 44] During the conference, we met 
with several tribes interested in repatriation issues. 

* Oklahoma: We interviewed the Cheyenne Tribe of Oklahoma and the
Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, who have both repatriated human remains
from the Natural History Museum. In addition, we attended a NAGPRA
conference held in Oklahoma City that included an address by the 
Director of the American Indian Museum on repatriation activities at 
that museum. 

* Alaska: In Anchorage, Alaska, we interviewed the Director of the
Smithsonian Arctic Studies Center, which is housed within the Alaska
State Museum. We also interviewed the Director of the Anchorage
Museum, who formerly handled repatriation activities for the Kaw Nation
of Oklahoma and also served as the Repatriation Manager of the American
Indian Museum. We interviewed an official with the Ukpeagvik Inupiat
Corporation who participated in a repatriation with the Natural History
Museum. We met with an official from the Native American Rights Fund
and one from the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Land Management’
s Alaska State Office to discuss repatriation issues in Alaska.
In Fairbanks, Alaska, we attended the Alaska Federation of Natives
2010 Annual Conference. During the conference, we interviewed members
of the Native Village of Crooked Creek to discuss their repatriation
experiences. 

* Washington, D.C.: We attended the NAGPRA at 20 conference
commemorating NAGPRA’s 20th anniversary. As part of this conference,
we attended a panel discussion that included the manager of the American
Indian Museum Repatriation Office and the current and former managers
of the Natural History Museum Repatriation Office. The panel was focused
on the differences between the NMAI Act and NAGPRA. 

In addition to the tribes we interviewed during our site visits, we
contacted 10 tribes that had completed repatriations with both the
American Indian and Natural History Museums and interviewed 2 of them
on their experiences with these museums. 

To address our first objective, we reviewed museum summaries and
inventories to generally determine their contents and if they were
prepared within the deadlines in the act. The American Indian Museum
prepared inventories in 1993 and 1995 and was able to provide one
example of its inventories along with sample cover letters for each year
(the American Indian Museum did not prepare separate summaries); the
Natural History Museum was able to provide copies of all of its 
summaries and inventories. We reviewed (1) the American Indian Museum
Repatriation Office’s progress reports to the museum’s Board of 
Trustees, (2) the Natural History Museum Repatriation Office’s 
progress reports to the Review Committee, and (3) the Review Committee’
s annual reports to the Secretary of the Smithsonian and meeting 
minutes.[Footnote 45\ We obtained and reviewed all repatriation claims 
submitted to the Smithsonian and analyzed all 171 case reports 
prepared by repatriation staff at both the American Indian and Natural 
History Museums to collect information about the museums’ repatriation 
activities, including the number of catalog numbers considered in each 
report. Specifically, where it was available in case reports, we 
collected information that falls into the following three categories: 

* Repatriation claim: For case reports that include information about a
repatriation claim for one or more items addressed in the report, we
recorded the name of the requesting entity or requesting entities, the 
first date of contact between the Smithsonian and the requesting 
tribe, the date of the official claim letter, and the date of the 
report as well as the date of any amendments or addenda to the report. 
We also recorded descriptive information in the case reports about 
factors that affected the timeliness with which the Smithsonian 
addressed the claim. 

* Culturally unidentified remains and funerary objects: For human
remains and funerary objects explicitly identified as culturally
unidentified, we recorded the total number of catalog numbers that fall
into this category for human remains and funerary objects and, where
available, the approximate number of human remains and funerary objects
represented by these catalog numbers. 

* Recommendations regarding repatriation: In cases where the case report
includes a recommendation that the Smithsonian repatriate human
remains or objects to specific tribes or consult with specific tribes
regarding the disposition of remains or objects, we recorded the names 
of those tribes. We also recorded whether or not the case report 
recommends that any human remains or objects be retained by the 
Smithsonian. 

Each case report was reviewed by two analysts independently, answers
were recorded, results were compared by a third reviewer, and then any
differences were reconciled. Using this information, we calculated the
length of time from the date of a tribal claim to the date of a case 
report using available month and year information, where applicable 
and when such dates were available. In the couple of instances when 
case reports had no month, we imputed January. We used the date of the 
official claim letter as the basis for the report-processing times 
because information on when the Smithsonian actively started working 
on each claim was not routinely available. As a result, the processing 
times include the time that the claims were inactive while they were 
awaiting active consideration. For the Natural History Museum, we used 
the date that the NMAI Act was originally enacted-—November 28, 1989—-
for claims submitted prior to that time. For the American Indian 
Museum, we used the date the museum officially took control of its 
collections-—June 1, 1990-—for claims submitted prior to that time. We 
supplemented the case report review by reviewing all claim letters 
submitted from enactment through December 2010 to both museums. In the 
few instances when case reports did not document a claim letter but we 
found there actually was a claim based on the claim letter review, we 
added the date to our time frames. We also interviewed officials from 
the American Indian and Natural History Museums, members of the 
American Indian Museum’s Board of Trustees and the Review Committee, 
and tribes who have submitted claims for remains or objects held by 
the Smithsonian to determine any challenges the Smithsonian faces in 
implementing the NMAI Act’s repatriation requirements. 

For purposes of our analysis, intercoder reliability was measured as the
percent agreement between the independent coders and a threshold of
70 percent agreement was used as a basis to assess intercoder 
reliability. Using percent agreement as a measure of intercoder 
reliability was appropriate in our case since the majority of the 
variables coded in this exercise are count variables or nominal 
variables with multiple possible responses where the likelihood of 
agreement through mere chance is decreased. Thirteen of the 15 items 
evaluated achieved an acceptable level of agreement between 74 and 97 
percent. For the 2 items in which agreement was less than 70 percent, 
attempts were made to better understand the pattern of errors and 
reviewers met to discuss and were able to effectively resolve these 
inconsistencies. Ultimately, most items, including those 2 items, were 
not systematically reported on, but rather used for anecdotal purposes. 

For our second objective, we examined the Review Committee charter and
bylaws. We analyzed the repatriation offices’ progress reports and 
Review Committee annual reports, meeting minutes, and other documents. 
To document the activities and challenges of the Review Committee, we
examined comments made by Review Committee members on repatriation
case reports, attended portions of two Review Committee meetings in
Washington, D.C., in December 2009 and December 2010,[Footnote 46] and 
interviewed 6 of the 7 Review Committee members at each meeting. 
[Footnote 47] In addition, we received written comments from the full 
Review Committee. Because the Board of Trustees has performed 
oversight of the American Indian Museum’s repatriation activities, we 
interviewed 5 of the 23 board members, 4 of the 8 who make up the 
board’s Repatriation Committee. We met with these 5 members because 
they were available to meet in between sessions of a board meeting. We 
also received written comments from the full board. In addition, we 
reviewed the Administrative Procedures Act and case law interpreting 
it. 

For our third objective, we analyzed museum data as well as specific 
lists prepared by the museums of the human remains and objects in their
collections that were offered for repatriation but never repatriated. We
contacted 14 of the 68 tribes or tribal entities to which these human
remains and objects were culturally affiliated—8 for the American Indian
Museum and 6 for the Natural History Museum—and interviewed 5 of
them to determine why the items offered had not been repatriated. The
other 9 tribes that we contacted did not respond to our inquiries. We 
chose tribes in a way to ensure geographic diversity and targeting 
those with a substantial number of items offered for repatriation. 
Where items were offered to multiple tribes (of which there were 
numerous cases), we included at least one of those tribes. We reviewed 
the repatriation policies of both museums to determine if they covered 
culturally unidentifiable items. We interviewed Smithsonian officials 
and both Repatriation Offices to determine if they have a policy for 
handling culturally unidentifiable items. We interviewed and submitted 
written questions to both the Review Committee and board about the 
disposition of culturally unidentifiable items, and we reviewed the 
Department of the Interior’s regulation on culturally unidentifiable 
items under NAGPRA. 

We conducted this performance audit from July 2010 to May 2011 in
accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards. Those
standards require that we plan and perform the audit to obtain 
sufficient, appropriate evidence to provide a reasonable basis for our 
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. We believe 
that the evidence obtained provides a reasonable basis for our 
findings and conclusions based on our audit objectives. 

[End of section] 

Appendix II: Processing Times for Repatriation Case Reports: 

This appendix provides (1) overall time frames for completing case 
reports and factors affecting the time frames and (2) specific details 
on the processing times for repatriation case reports. 

Overall Time Frames for Completing Case Reports and Factors Affecting 
the Time Frames: 

The Smithsonian completed 171 case reports from November 28, 1989,
through December 31, 2010-—at least 126 were completed in response to a
claim. The remainder were completed proactively without a claim. For the
41 case reports prepared by the American Indian Museum through 2010
where we identified a claim, we found that it took a median of 1.5 years
from the date of an official claim letter to the date a draft case 
report was submitted to the museum’s Board of Trustees for final 
approval and a repatriation decision.[Footnote 48] This varied from 3 
months to 8.2 years. For the 85 claim-based case reports prepared by 
the Natural History Museum through 2010, we found that it took a 
median of 2.8 years from the date of an official claim letter to the 
date a final case report was approved by the Secretary of the 
Smithsonian. This varied from 1 month to 18.3 years. We used the date 
of the official claim letter as the basis for the report processing
times because information on when the Smithsonian actively started 
working on each claim was not routinely available. As a result, the
processing times include the time that the claims were pending while 
they were awaiting active consideration. We identified examples of claim
letters remaining in the queue awaiting active consideration for months
and even years before the museums initiated a case report.[Footnote 49] 

Case reports prepared by the Smithsonian ranged in length from a 3-page
report about the remains of a single individual to a 631-page report 
that addressed the remains of more than 1,200 individuals and more than
14,400 funerary objects held by the Natural History Museum. On average,
case reports prepared by the Natural History Museum considered
33 catalog numbers, while case reports prepared by the American Indian
Museum considered 11 catalog numbers. 

We identified a number of factors that have affected the length of this
process, based on information in the case reports. For example, 

* Repatriation offices were not yet established: Several claims were
submitted to the American Indian and Natural History Museums before
they established repatriation offices in November 1993 and September
1991, respectively. 

* Staffing changes occurred: We identified examples where staff
responsible for preparing the case report left the Smithsonian, 
resulting in delays to the case report preparation process. 

* Waiting for tribal response: In some cases, the museums did not 
receive needed responses or information from the requesting tribe in a 
timely manner. For example, in one case a tribe submitted a claim for 
human remains held by the Natural History Museum and subsequently told 
the museum that it was opposed to documentation of the remains and asked
that the documentation be halted. The museum sought clarification from
the tribe on how to proceed, and about 5 months passed before the tribe
agreed to allow the museum to continue documentation. 

* Competing claims: The Natural History Museum gives priority to claims
for named individuals. In some cases, a tribe may submit a claim for all
human remains and objects potentially affiliated to it, then, later 
on, a lineal descendant may submit a competing claim. In those cases, 
the museum may halt its work on the original claim to work on the latter
claim. 

* Museum priorities: Previously, the museums prioritized claims for 
human remains, resulting in some delays in addressing claims for 
sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony. Currently, the 
Natural History Museum prioritizes claims for named individuals, but 
otherwise both museums address claims in the order they are received. 

In a couple of cases, the museums expedited the case report process and,
in other cases, the museum conducted a significant amount of work before
receiving an official claim, which may have reduced the length of time
needed to complete the report. For example, in one instance, the Natural
History Museum agreed to a tribal request to expedite the repatriation
process so that the tribe could complete the process at the same time it
completed repatriations from the National Park Service. Furthermore,
both museums have proactively initiated research and produced case
reports about some of the human remains in their collections and, in 
some instances, later received claims for these human remains. These 
case reports are included in the time frames provided below. 

Specific Details on the Processing Times for Repatriation Case Reports: 

Table 5 shows the specific details on the processing times for 
repatriation case reports completed through December 31, 2010. 

Table 5: Processing Times for Repatriation Case Reports Completed 
between November 28, 1989, and December 31, 2010: 

National Museum of the American Indian: 

Date of case report: July 1991; 
Date of claim: Apr. 1991; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.2; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: May 1992; 
Date of claim: Jan. 1985; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 37+[A]. 

Date of case report: Sept. 1993; 
Date of claim: Apr. 1993; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 87. 

Date of case report: May 1994[B]; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 146+[A]. 

Date of case report: Jan. 1995; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 272. 

Date of case report: Jan. 1995[B]; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not 
applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 36. 

Date of case report: Feb. 1995; 
Date of claim: Sept. 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: Feb. 1995; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Feb. 1995; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 338. 

Date of case report: Apr. 1995; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 22. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1995; 
Date of claim: Sept. 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.9; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1995; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1995; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 3. 

Date of case report: Sept. 1995; 
Date of claim: Mar. 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.5; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 129. 

Date of case report: Oct. 1995; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Oct. 1995; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 8. 

Date of case report: Nov. 1995; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: Mar. 1996; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Mar. 1996; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 41. 

Date of case report: Apr. 1996; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Apr. 1996; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: May 1996; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: May 1996; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 13. 

Date of case report: June 1996[B]; 
Date of claim: National Museum of 
the American Indian: Feb. 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.3; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 25. 

Date of case report: June 1996; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 14. 

Date of case report: May 1997; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report 
(in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: May 1997; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: July 1997; 
Date of claim: Sept. 1995; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 3. 

Date of case report: July 1997; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 112. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1997; 
Date of claim: Sept. 1995; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.9; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 97. 

Date of case report: Sept. 1997; 
Date of claim: Feb. 1997; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Oct. 1997; 
Date of claim: Oct. 1996; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.0; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Oct. 1997; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Mar. 1998; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Apr. 1998[B]; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 8. 

Date of case report: May 1998[B]; 
Date of claim: Dec. 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 451. 

Date of case report: June 1998; 
Date of claim: June 1997; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.0; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 181. 

Date of case report: Sept. 1998; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 3. 

Date of case report: Oct. 1998; 
Date of claim: Dec. 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Oct. 1998; 
Date of claim: Nov. 1997; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.9; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Jan. 1999; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1997; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: Jan. 1999; 
Date of claim: Dec. 1997; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.1; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 4. 

Date of case report: Oct. 1999; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1998; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.2; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: Feb. 2000; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1998; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.5; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Apr. 2000; 
Date of claim: Sept. 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 5.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 16. 

Date of case report: Apr. 2000; 
Date of claim: July 1999; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 22. 

Date of case report: May 2000; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1999; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: May 2000; 
Date of claim: July 1999; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: June 2000; 
Date of claim: Nov. 1999; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 14. 

Date of case report: Oct. 2000; 
Date of claim: Feb. 1998; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Jan. 2002; 
Date of claim: Oct. 1999; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.3; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: June 2002; 
Date of claim: July 2001; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.9; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: June 2002; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: June 2002; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: June 2002; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 5. 

Date of case report: June 2002; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Aug. 2002; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Oct. 2002[B]; 
Date of claim: National Museum of 
the American Indian: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not 
applicable; Number of catalog numbers considered: 4. 

Date of case report: Aug. 2003; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: Sept. 2003; 
Date of claim: June 2003; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.3; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Aug. 2004; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 4. 

Date of case report: Oct. 2004; 
Date of claim: Mar. 2000; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 4.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 19. 

Date of case report: Nov. 2004; 
Date of claim: July 2003; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.3; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 27. 

Date of case report: May 2005; 
Date of claim: Oct. 2001; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: Sept. 2005; 
Date of claim: Aug. 2004; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.1; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 3. 

Date of case report: Dec. 2005; 
Date of claim: Apr. 2001; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 4.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Oct. 2006; 
Date of claim: Mar. 2003; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Oct. 2006[B]; 
Date of claim: Jan. 2004; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 43. 

Date of case report: May 2007; 
Date of claim: Sept. 2002; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 4.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: June 2007; 
Date of claim: May 2002; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 5.1; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: June 2007; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 4. 

Date of case report: May 2009; 
Date of claim: Feb. 2001; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 8.2; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: Aug. 2009; 
Date of claim: Mar. 2004; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 5.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 9. 

Date of case report: Aug. 2009; 
Date of claim: Mar. 2008; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 127. 

Date of case report: June 2010; 
Date of claim: Jan. 2006; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 4.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 157. 

Date of case report: Nov. 2010; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

National Museum of Natural History: 

Date of case report: May 1992; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1989; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 36. 

Date of case report: July 1992; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1988; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 35. 

Date of case report: July 1992; 
Date of claim: Oct. 1989; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 56. 

Date of case report: May 1993; 
Date of claim: Sept. 1989; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 11. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1993; 
Date of claim: Feb. 1988; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 236. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1993; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1989; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 16. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1993; 
Date of claim: Nov. 1989; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 19. 

Date of case report: Sept. 1993; 
Date of claim: June 1988; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Mar. 1994; 
Date of claim: Jan. 1993; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.2; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 8. 

Date of case report: Mar. 1994[B]; 
Date of claim: July 1993; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Apr. 1994; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 47. 

Date of case report: June 1994; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 97. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1994[B]; 
Date of claim:July 1993; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.1; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Sept. 1994; 
Date of claim: Feb. 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 7. 

Date of case report: Oct. 1994; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1988; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 4.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 8. 

Date of case report: Jan. 1995; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1988; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 5.1; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 43. 

Date of case report: Apr. 1995; 
Date of claim: Apr. 1990; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 5.0; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 13. 

Date of case report: Apr. 1995; 
Date of claim: Jan. 1993; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.2; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: June 1995; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 32. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1995; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1988; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 5.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 61. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1995; 
Date of claim: Mar. 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1995; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 7. 

Date of case report: Oct. 1995; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.2; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 22. 

Date of case report: Dec. 1995; 
Date of claim: July 1993; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 13. 

Date of case report: Feb. 1996; 
Date of claim: Jan. 1993; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.1; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 92. 

Date of case report: Mar. 1996[B]; 
Date of claim:No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 102. 

Date of case report: Apr. 1996[B]; 
Date of claim: Feb. 1991; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 5.2; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 6. 

Date of case report: Apr. 1996; 
Date of claim: Sept. 1995; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 7. 

Date of case report: May 1996; 
Date of claim: July 1992; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 29. 

Date of case report: June 1996; 
Date of claim: Sept. 1989; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 6.5; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 44+[A]. 

Date of case report: July 1996; 
Date of claim: Feb. 1996; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 339. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1996; 
Date of claim: July 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.1; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 344. 

Date of case report: Sept. 1996; 
Date of claim: Nov. 1989; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 6.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 5. 

Date of case report: Sept. 1996; 
Date of claim: Dec. 1993; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 440. 

Date of case report: Sept. 1996[B]; 
Date of claim: Jan. 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 4. 

Date of case report: Mar. 1997; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1992; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 4.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 9. 

Date of case report: Mar. 1997; 
Date of claim: June 1995; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 18. 

Date of case report: Apr. 1997; 
Date of claim: Feb. 1997; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.2; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 743. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1997[B]; 
Date of claim: June 1988; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 7.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 44. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1997; 
Date of claim: Jan. 1993; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 4.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 38. 

Date of case report: Dec. 1997; 
Date of claim: May 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 44. 

Date of case report: July 1998; 
Date of claim: June 1998; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.1; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1998; 
Date of claim: Sept. 1986; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 8.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: Aug. 1998; 
Date of claim: Nov. 1997; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 10+[A]. 

Date of case report: Mar. 1999; 
Date of claim: July 1997; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 47. 

Date of case report: Apr. 1999; 
Date of claim: Sept. 1989; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 9.3; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 7. 

Date of case report: Apr. 1999; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: May 1999; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1998; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Dec. 1999; 
Date of claim: Mar. 1999; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 69. 

Date of case report: Jan. 2000; 
Date of claim: Nov. 1991; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 8.2; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Apr. 2000; 
Date of claim: Nov. 1996; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Nov. 2000; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1996; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 4.3; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: June 2001; 
Date of claim: Nov. 1998; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Oct. 2001; 
Date of claim: Oct. 1999; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.0; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 8. 

Date of case report: Dec. 2001; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1989; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 12.0; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 7. 

Date of case report: Apr. 2002; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1996; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 5.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 98. 

Date of case report: July 2002; 
Date of claim: Feb. 2000; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 44. 

Date of case report: Mar. 2003; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1994; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 8.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 18. 

Date of case report: Mar. 2003; 
Date of claim: July 2002; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Aug. 2003; 
Date of claim: Jan. 2002; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Aug. 2003; 
Date of claim: Feb. 2002; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.5; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Mar. 2004; 
Date of claim: Apr. 1999; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 4.9; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 14. 

Date of case report: Mar. 2004; 
Date of claim: July 2002; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: Apr. 2004; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 184. 

Date of case report: May 2004; 
Date of claim: Feb. 1988; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 14.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 64. 

Date of case report: Sept. 2004; 
Date of claim: Feb. 2004; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 3. 

Date of case report: Feb. 2005; 
Date of claim: Dec. 1997; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 7.2; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 11. 

Date of case report: Sept. 2005; 
Date of claim: July 1998; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 7.2; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 79. 

Date of case report: Nov. 2005; 
Date of claim: June 2004; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 4. 

Date of case report: Dec. 2005; 
Date of claim: Sept. 1989; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 16.0; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2,054+[A]. 

Date of case report: Apr. 2006; 
Date of claim: Oct. 2003; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.5; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 5. 

Date of case report: June 2006; 
Date of claim: Mar. 2004; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.3; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 7. 

Date of case report: Oct. 2006; 
Date of claim: June 2004; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 2.3; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 204. 

Date of case report: Dec. 2006; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1999; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 7.3; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 10. 

Date of case report: Jan. 2007; 
Date of claim: Dec. 1998; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 8.1; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Feb. 2007; 
Date of claim: July 1996; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 10.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 7. 

Date of case report: Mar. 2007; 
Date of claim: Oct. 2006; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.4; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: June 2007; 
Date of claim: July 1996; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 10.9; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 3. 

Date of case report: Sept. 2007; 
Date of claim: Dec. 2003[C]; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 3.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: Aug. 2008; 
Date of claim: July 2002; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 6.1; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Aug. 2008; 
Date of claim: Jan. 2004; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 4.6; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 9. 

Date of case report: Oct. 2008; 
Date of claim: Dec. 1998; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 9.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 33. 

Date of case report: Oct. 2008; 
Date of claim: Aug. 2007; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.2; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 62. 

Date of case report: Nov. 2008; 
Date of claim: Nov. 2007; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.0; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: June 2009; 
Date of claim: Feb. 2008; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.3; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 133. 

Date of case report: Sept. 2009; 
Date of claim: Dec. 2007; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Nov. 2009; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 2. 

Date of case report: Apr. 2010[B]; 
Date of claim: Oct. 1999; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 10.5; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 8. 

Date of case report: Apr. 2010; 
Date of claim: June 2008; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 4. 

Date of case report: Apr. 2010; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 1. 

Date of case report: Sept. 2010; 
Date of claim: Jan. 2009; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 1.7; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 5. 

Date of case report: Oct. 2010; 
Date of claim: No claim; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): Not applicable; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 225. 

Date of case report: Nov. 2010; 
Date of claim: Aug. 1992; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 18.3; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 76. 

Date of case report: Dec. 2010; 
Date of claim: Mar. 1993; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 17.8; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 23. 

Date of case report: Dec. 2010; 
Date of claim: Aug. 2010; 
Elapsed time between claim and case report (in years): 0.3; 
Number of catalog numbers considered: 12. 

Source: GAO analysis of repatriation case reports and claim letters 
from the Smithsonian's American Indian and Natural History Museums. 

Notes: In calculating the processing times for completion of the case 
reports, we used the date of claim as a starting point, with two 
exceptions. First, for the American Indian Museum, we used a starting 
date of July 1, 1990, for any case reports that had a claim received 
prior to that date because the museum did not officially take control 
of its collections until June 21, 1990. Second, for the Natural History 
Museum, we used a starting date of December 1, 1989, for any case 
reports that had a claim received prior to that date because the NMAI 
Act was enacted on November 28, 1989. 

[A] For some case reports, the total number of catalog numbers 
considered is not clear. In those instances, we provide the minimum 
number of catalog numbers considered, as indicated by the + symbol. 

[B] After completing this report, the museum prepared an amendment or 
addenda to the report. In some instances, preparing amendments or 
addenda may involve extensive research, according to officials. 

[C] The museum first received a claim in February 2001, but did not 
receive possession and control of the claimed items until December 
2003. 

[End of table] 

[End of section]m 

Appendix III: Comments from the Smithsonian Institution: 

Smithsonian Institution: 

May 6, 2011: 

Ms. Anu Mittal: 
Director: 
National Resources and Environment: 
United States Government Accountability Office: 
441 G Street, NW: 
Washington, DC 20548: 

Dear Ms. Mittal: 

On behalf of the Smithsonian Institution, I write to express our 
gratitude to you and the staff of the Government Accountability Office 
(GAO) for this comprehensive report of the Smithsonian's repatriation 
activities. With one of the world's largest and most important 
collections of Native American cultural objects, the Smithsonian 
Institution has a demonstrated and laudable record of repatriation of 
Native American human remains and cultural objects. In fact, the 
Smithsonian was one of the first institutions in the country to return 
Native American human remains and cultural objects, and engaged in 
such voluntary returns even prior to the passage of the National 
Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) Act. 

As your report recognizes, the Smithsonian has offered to repatriate 
close to 6,000 human remains and over 212,000 cultural objects — a 
record far surpassing any other institution holding objects subject to 
any repatriation legislation. Similarly, your report gives due credit 
to the Smithsonian by recognizing that the Institution has gone above 
and beyond the letter of the law in many respects, including the 
international repatriations conducted by the National Museum of the 
American Indian and the repatriations to non-federally recognized 
tribes (when supported by federally recognized tribes) conducted by the
National Museum of Natural History. Such an immense undertaking 
demonstrates the Smithsonian's commitment to the repatriation process, 
its responsiveness to the concerns of Native communities, and its 
respect for the ideals of the legislation. 

While the Smithsonian's record is commendable, we recognize that our 
policies and procedures could be improved and we welcome the GAO's 
recommendations on how the Smithsonian can better achieve its goals 
and serve its constituents. I address each recommendation separately 
below to note the efforts already underway to implement these 
recommendations. 

Expand the jurisdiction of the Review Committee to include the 
National Museum of the American Indian: 

Congress directed that the Board of the Trustees of the National 
Museum of the American Indian shall have sole authority over the 
collections of the National Museum of the American Indian. At the same 
time, Congress created a Review Committee to monitor the repatriation 
of human remains and funerary objects present in the collections of 
the Smithsonian. Because of the special delegation of authority given 
to the Board of Trustees of the National Museum of the American 
Indian, the Smithsonian has interpreted the jurisdiction of the Review 
Committee to extend only to the repatriation activities of the 
National Museum of Natural History. The Smithsonian, nonetheless,
agrees with the GAO's recommendation that the advisory nature of the 
Review Committee could be expanded to include consultation with the 
National Museum of the American Indian. The Smithsonian has already 
met with members of the Review Committee to ascertain its view on this 
recommendation. Additional discussions between Smithsonian senior 
management, the Board of the Trustees of the National Museum of the 
American Indian and the Review Committee are necessary to determine 
how to implement this recommendation, including where the most 
appropriate location for the Review Committee should be within the 
Smithsonian's organizational structure. 

Direct the Review Committee to re ort annual]	to Congress on the 
Smithsonian's implementation of its repatriation requirements under 
the NMAI Act: 

The NMAI Act does not require any annual reporting to Congress. We 
recognize, however, that information on the repatriation activities of 
those entities subject to the Native American Graves Protection and 
Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) are contained in an annual report submitted 
by the National NAGPRA Program, and because the Smithsonian is not 
subject to NAGPRA, information regarding the Smithsonian's 
repatriation activities is not included in that report. To provide 
Congress with a complete and robust understanding of the repatriation 
process on a nationwide level, the Smithsonian, through the Office of 
the Secretary, will submit, on a voluntary basis, annual reports to 
Congress. The format and presentation of the report are matters to be 
discussed internally, but, for consistency and familiarity purposes, 
the Smithsonian intends to use the National NAGPRA report as a guide 
and framework for its discussion and report. 

Establish an administrative appeal process for Indian tribes and 
Native Hawaiian Organizations to appeal decisions to either the Board 
of Regents or another entity that can make binding decisions for the 
Smithsonian Institution: 

In over twenty years of repatriation activities at the Smithsonian, 
only two claims have resulted in a dispute proceeding before our 
Review Committee. The Review Committee's dispute resolution provisions 
are seldom tested demonstrating both the infrequency of such disputes 
and the success of the Smithsonian's repatriation program. The 
dissatisfaction of the tribal claimants with the lack of an additional 
appeal process in the most recent dispute proceeding, concluded in 
2009, has heightened the Smithsonian's sensitivity to this issue. The 
Smithsonian will review its dispute resolution procedures, with the 
understanding that the goal is to ensure that claimants have proper 
avenues to seek redress from Smithsonian repatriation decisions, 
including a process for the review of final management determinations. 
Because such a process is outside the scope of the NMAI Act 
requirements and represents a departure from the Smithsonian's current 
practices, the exact nature of the appeal process and its 
implementation require additional input from a variety of 
stakeholders, including consultation with the Native community, and 
continued internal discussion. 

Develop policies for the National Museum of Natural History and the 
National Museum of the American Indian for the handling of items in 
their collections that cannot be culturally affiliated: 

In the House Report accompanying passage of the NMAI Act, Congress 
stated that the repatriation provisions of the NMAI Act provided a 
"reasonable method and policy for the repatriation of Indian bones and 
funerary objects in the possession of the Smithsonian." H. Rep. No. 
101-340, at 16 (1989). At the same time, Congress recognized that 
"many human remains in the collection are of unknown origin and will, 
therefore, remain in the collection." Id. This evidence of legislative 
intent is quite different from NAGPRA where the National NAGPRA Review 
Committee was specifically charged in the legislation with compiling 
an inventory of culturally unaffiliated human remains and for 
developing a process for the disposition of such remains. See 25 
U.S.C. § 3006(c)(5). Absent a legislative mandate to address these 
unaffiliated remains, the Smithsonian has focused its efforts on the 
return of affiliated remains. Of the entire collection of human 
remains currently in the possession of the Smithsonian, only a very 
small percentage are presently considered to be culturally 
unidentifiable. This low percentage of unaffiliated human remains is a 
testament to the work of the Smithsonian in employing the best 
available scientific and historical information to provide cultural 
affiliations for the majority of these human remains as required by the
NMAT Act. 

While neither the National Museum of Natural History nor the National 
Museum of the American Indian has a current policy with respect to 
culturally unaffiliated human remains, both institutions, in the 
interests of transparency, are committed to developing policies in 
this regard. Such policies will give guidance to Native communities 
and the public as to how the Smithsonian will handle and treat such 
remains. Discussions have already begun in both museums with respect 
to the development of such policies. In fact, despite the lack of a 
definitive policy, the National Museum of the American Indian has 
already engaged in some voluntary returns of human remains which could 
not be culturally affiliated with any present day Indian tribe. 

Thank you again for your careful consideration of the matters 
presented in your report. The Smithsonian remains committed to the 
repatriation process and will continue to refine our practices and 
procedures in order to comply with both the letter and spirit of the 
NMAI Act. 

Sincerely, 

Signed by: 

G. Wayne Clough: 

[End of section] 

Appendix IV: GAO Contact and Staff Acknowledgments: 

GAO Contact: 

Anu K. Mittal (202) 512-3841 or mittala@gao.gov: 

Staff Acknowledgments: 

In addition to those named above, Jeffery D. Malcolm, Assistant 
Director; Pamela Davidson; Emily Hanawalt; Cheryl Harris; Rich Johnson; 
Mark Keenan; Sandra Kerr; Anita Lee; Ruben Montes de Oca, Ben Shouse; 
and Jeanette M. Soares made key contributions to this report. 

[End of section] 

Footnotes: 

[1] Pub. L. No. 101-185, 103 Stat. 1336-47 (1989), codified as amended 
at 20 U.S.C. §§ 80q to 80q-15. The act defines funerary objects as 
objects that, as part of a death rite or ceremony of a culture, are 
intentionally placed with individual human remains, either at the time 
of burial or later. 20 U.S.C. § 80q-14(4). The act includes the return 
of Indian human remains and associated Indian funerary objects and the 
return of Indian funerary objects not associated with Indian human 
remains. 20 U.S.C. § 80q-9(c),(d). 

[2] In this report, we refer to the Repatriation Review Committee 
simply as the Review Committee. 

[3] The Smithsonian was established in 1846 with funds bequeathed to 
the United States by James Smithson. In accordance with James Smithson’
s will, the institution was established in Washington, D.C., “for the 
increase and diffusion of knowledge among men.” See Act of August 10, 
1846, ch. 178, 9 Stat. 102 (1846), codified as amended at 20 U.S.C. § 
41. To that end, the 1846 act provided for the institution’s business 
to be conducted by a Board of Regents and a Secretary. 

[4] Pub. L. No. 101-601, 104 Stat. 3048-58 (1990), codified at 25 
U.S.C. §§ 3001-3013. 

[5] See table 1 for definitions of sacred objects and objects of 
cultural patrimony. The NMAI Act, as amended, adopted the same 
definitions for these items as NAGPRA. 

[6] GAO, Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act: After 
Almost 20 Years, Key Federal Agencies Still Have Not Fully Complied 
with the Act, [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-768] 
(Washington, D.C.: July 28, 2010). 

[7] National Museum of the American Indian Act Amendments of 1996, 
Pub. L. No. 104-278, 110 Stat. 3355 (1996). Unless otherwise noted, 
subsequent references in this report to the NMAI Act are references to 
the act as amended. 

[8] The preponderance of the evidence means more likely than not. 

[9] Unless otherwise specified, in this report the term objects refers 
to funerary objects, sacred objects, and objects of cultural patrimony. 

[10] Although the American Indian Museum uses the term Repatriation 
Department, for consistency this report uses Repatriation Office to 
refer to the entities at both museums that have primary responsibility 
for repatriation activities. 

[11] In this report, we refer to the Smithsonian’s written legal views 
and the additional memorandum collectively as the Smithsonian’s legal 
views. 

[12] At the first meeting, one member had recently passed away, and 
the Smithsonian was seeking a replacement; at the second meeting, one 
member was absent for personal reasons. 

[13] The NMAI Act cites about 4,000 sets of human remains, but 
Smithsonian officials said that the correct figure is about 2,600. 

[14] Sections 2(6) and 2(7) of the NMAI Act indicate that the 
Smithsonian had approximately 18,000 human remains. According to the 
Natural History Museum’s Repatriation Program Manager, the 18,000 
figure actually refers to the number of museum catalog numbers that
include Indian human remains and he was unsure as to the source of the 
figure as a higher number had been reported to Congress earlier. This 
figure also did not include the Indian human remains in the American 
Indian Museum’s collection. 

[15] The museums refer to the staff who conduct research and prepare 
case reports differently-—the American Indian Museum refers to them as 
research specialists and the Natural History Museum refers to them as 
case officers. For consistency, this report refers to both as case 
officers. 

[16] S. Rep. No. 104-350, at 3-4 (1996). 

[17] [hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-10-768]. 

[18] This language appears in section 11, which addresses the 
inventory, identification, and return of Indian human remains and 
funerary objects. Section 13 requires the Smithsonian to apply, to the 
greatest extent practicable, section 11’s principles and procedures to 
the inventory, identification, and return of Native Hawaiian human 
remains and funerary objects. 

[19] A reasonable belief means whether a third party with no vested 
interest in any particular outcome would agree with the conclusion 
reached, according to Smithsonian officials. The preponderance of the 
evidence means more likely than not. 

[20] The American Indian Museum’s Repatriation Office told us that 
additional Indian human remains have been identified since the 
inventories were prepared. 

[21] The December 31, 1996, deadline for the completion of the 
summaries was less than 3 months after the 1996 amendments’ enactment 
on October 9, 1996. 

[22] The 16,000 figure differs from the approximately 19,150 figure 
previously discussed for the Natural History Museum for two reasons. 
First, the inventories did not include the more than 2,500 human 
remains that were repatriated between the NMAI’s enactment in 1989
and when the inventories were prepared. Second, the 19,150 figure 
includes catalog numbers as possibly including human remains that have 
been identified since the inventories were prepared—-about 650 catalog 
numbers through December 2010. The museum listed its uncataloged 
collections in its inventories, but provided minimal information about 
these collections. 

[23] In its legal views, the Smithsonian stated that its consultation 
process with Native communities began after the inventories were 
distributed. However, current American Indian Museum officials and a 
former Natural History Museum official told us that the museums 
regularly met with Native communities as inventories were being 
prepared. For example, Smithsonian staff met with representatives of 
Native communities to discuss key issues related to the development of 
the American Indian Museum, including architectural matters, 
exhibitions, training, and public programs. In stating its legal view 
that given the statutory definition of inventory one could easily 
construe the consultation requirement to apply with greater force to 
the requirement to identify the origins of human remains and funerary 
objects, the Smithsonian added that it has engaged in lengthy 
consultations with Native communities and claimants to satisfy the 
consultation requirement. 

[24] The Smithsonian uses the same two-step process to implement the 
act’s summary provision. However, the use of the process for summaries 
does not raise similar concerns about compliance with the act because 
the summary was to be (1) followed by consultation with tribal 
government and Native Hawaiian officials and traditional religious
leaders, and (2) based upon available information held by the 
Smithsonian and describe the scope of the collection, kinds of objects 
included, reference to geographical location, means and period of 
acquisition and cultural affiliation, where readily ascertainable. 

[25] S. Rep. No. 104-350 (1996). 

[26] H. Rep. 101-340(I), at 33 (1989); H. Rep. No. 101-340(II), at 42 
(1989). 

[27] We consider human remains and objects to be offered for 
repatriation when the Smithsonian (1) completes its analysis and finds 
that the remains and objects are subject to repatriation, and (2) 
notifies all applicable tribes about its findings. The Smithsonian has
faced challenges in estimating the total number of catalog numbers as 
well as human remains and objects in catalog numbers because of shifts 
over time in counting standards, cataloging issues, and new 
discoveries of human remains and objects. For this reason, we view the 
numbers we present as best estimates as indicated by the use of the 
terms about or approximately. 

[28] The Repatriation Manager at the Natural History Museum estimates 
that about 2,930 catalog numbers were identified as possibly funerary 
in that museum’s inventories. However, this figure is low because, 
according to the museum’s Repatriation Manager, none of the funerary 
objects repatriated through December 31, 2010, were identified in the
inventories as possibly funerary. The American Indian Museum’s 
Repatriation Manager estimates that about 3,420 catalog numbers have 
been identified as possibly including funerary objects at that museum 
since the NMAI Act was enacted. 

[29] In some cases, the museums have hired contractors to prepare case 
reports. 

[30] The NMAI Act states that nothing in section 11 of the act—-which 
addresses inventories—-shall be interpreted as limiting the authority 
of the Smithsonian to return or repatriate Indian human remains and 
funerary objects and that nothing in the summary section may be 
construed to prevent the Smithsonian from carrying out the 
repatriation of unassociated funerary objects, sacred objects, or 
objects of cultural patrimony in a manner that exceeds the 
requirements of the NMAI Act. In addition, the committee report 
accompanying the 1989 NMAI Act states that the House Natural Resources 
Committee wishes to make clear the formal process established by the 
act “is not meant to be a limitation on any other authority the 
Smithsonian Institution may have to return human remains and funerary
objects.” H. Rep. No. 101-340(II), at 26 (1989); H. Rep. No. 101-
340(I), at 26 (1989). 

[31] S. Rep. No. 101-143, at 1 (1989). This report accompanied an 
earlier version of the NMAI Act that was not enacted. As reported to 
the Senate, the bill would have required, among other things, the 
Smithsonian’s Board of Regents to conduct a study and make 
recommendations as to the final disposition of Indian human remains in 
the Smithsonian’s possession and report to Congress within 3 years on 
the study and recommendations. S. 978, 101st Cong. (1989) (unenacted). 

[32] H. Rep. No. 101-340(II), at 25 (1989); H. Rep. No. 101-340(I), at 
15 (1989). The Museum of the American Indian in New York is often 
referred to as the Heye collection. 

[33] This challenge to a repatriation recommendation involved one 
tribal group’s request for an item it had identified as both a sacred 
object and an object of cultural patrimony. The American Indian Museum 
case report stated that the item did not meet the statutory definition 
and therefore should not be repatriated to the group. When the group 
disagreed with the museum’s decision, the board instructed 
Repatriation Office staff to again consult with the tribal group in 
person. The staff conducted further consultations and, as a result,
ultimately changed the case report to recommend repatriation, and the 
board reversed its decision and repatriated the object. 

[34] H. Rep. 101-340(I), at 33 (1989); H. Rep. No. 101-340(II), at 42 
(1989). 

[35] The law establishing the Smithsonian required it to report to 
Congress each session. Act of August 10, 1846, ch. 178, § 3, 9 Stat. 
102, 104 (1846), codified as amended at 20 U.S.C. § 57. Section 3003 
of the Federal Reports Elimination and Sunset Act of 1995 eliminated
this reporting requirement to Congress starting 4 years after the date 
of enactment (fiscal year 1999). 

[36] The Under Secretary for Science has been given the authority to 
approve the reports for the Secretary. Once the Under Secretary for 
Science approves the report, it is no longer a draft and it is the 
official finding of the museum. 

[37] Pub. L. No. 89-55, 80 Stat. 381, codified as amended at 5 U.S.C. 
§§ 500-559 (1946). See Dong v. Smithsonian Institution, 125 F.3d 877, 
879 (D.C. Cir. 1997). 

[38] Section 14 of the NMAI Act authorizes the Secretary of the 
Interior to make grants to Indian tribes to assist such tribes in 
reaching and carrying out agreements with the Smithsonian Board of 
Regents for the return of Indian human remains and funerary objects
under section 11. Smithsonian and Interior officials said that the 
Secretary of the Interior has not made any grants for this purpose. 
However, the Smithsonian has allocated funds to assist entities 
including tribes, tribal organizations, coalitions of tribes, and some
international indigenous groups with repatriation activities. 
Specifically, the Natural History Museum reports that over a 17-year 
period, between 1994 through 2010, it awarded over 100 grants to 
outside entities totaling about $400,000, or an average of about 6 
grants per year at about $3,800 per grant. The American Indian Museum 
Repatriation Office provided 4 years of data, covering fiscal years 
2007 through 2010, on funding it has used for repatriation activities; 
it did not readily have data going further back. During that 4-year
period, museum officials reported awarding about $135,350. At the 
American Indian Museum, these funds can be awarded and used by outside 
entities or used by museum staff. These funds cover the costs, such as 
travel and accommodations, associated with (1) tribal consultation 
visits to view the collection and meet with repatriation office staff
and (2) transporting repatriated items back to the tribes. 

[39] Pesticides are poisons or toxins used to kill pests by entering 
the organism through dermal contact (skin), oral ingestion (mouth), or 
inhalation (nose or mouth). In the past, museums applied pesticide 
treatments in order to prevent or destroy pests and to preserve
the collections. Items considered for repatriation may be tested for 
several hazardous compounds including arsenic and mercury. Information 
gathered from pesticide testing and records may help the tribe 
determine the object's future use and disposition. 

[40] 75 Fed. Reg. 12378 (Mar. 15, 2010). The final rule also allows 
museums and federal agencies to transfer control of funerary objects 
associated with culturally unidentifiable human remains and recommends 
that such transfers occur if not precluded by federal or state law. 

[41] Pub. L. No. 101-185, 103 Stat. 1336-47 (1989), codified as 
amended at 20 U.S.C. §§ 80q1-15. 

[42] We contacted one other Smithsonian museum-—the National Museum of 
American History-—because we were told that museum might have items 
subject to the NMAI Act. An official from that museum stated that 
other than some items returned in the 1980s, prior to the NMAI Act, 
the museum does not have any items subject to the NMAI Act’s 
repatriation requirements. 

[43] In the future, the Natural History Museum Repatriation Manager 
said that the museum may still catalog more human remains, but that 
there would be very few. 

[44] GAO, Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act: 
After Almost 20 Years, Key Federal Agencies Still Have Not Fully 
Complied with the Act, GAO-10-768 (Washington, D.C.: July 28, 2010). 

[45] The annual reports and meeting minutes we examined covered the 
years 1991 through 2007. For 2008 and 2009, the Review Committee was 
without a Review Committee coordinator who oversees the transcription 
of the meeting minutes, which are used to draft the annual reports. 

[46] The Smithsonian was originally included as part of our NAGPRA 
repatriation review. We conducted some preliminary audit work at the 
Smithsonian from July 2009 through December 2009 before deciding that 
the Smithsonian’s repatriation efforts should be evaluated and 
reported on separately. 

[47] At the first meeting, one member had recently passed away and the 
Smithsonian was seeking a replacement; at the second meeting one 
member was absent for personal reasons. 

[48] There can be several weeks or months between the time when a case 
report is submitted to the Board of Trustees and when the board 
approves it, according the American Indian Museum Repatriation Manager. 

[49] Both museums had a significant number of pending claims as of 
December 31, 2010—-25 claims from 10 tribes at the American Indian 
Museum and 5 claims from 5 tribes at the Natural History Museum. The 
earliest of these claims dates to 2001. In some cases, pending claims 
have been addressed in part. 

[End of section] 

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