The objects collected were frequently obtained in ways that would have been impossible in any other context — taken from battlefields, excavated from burial sites, purchased from individuals who had no authority to sell them, or simply removed from communities that lacked the political power to stop the removal.

The repatriation frameworks established by NAGPRA and the National Museum of the American Indian Act represent the beginning of an effort to address this legacy.

They are not complete remedies — the processes are slow, the resources available to tribal nations for engaging with them are often inadequate, and many institutions have not engaged with their repatriation obligations in good faith.

But they establish a legal framework that recognizes Indigenous communities’ rights over their cultural heritage in ways that did not exist before 1989 and 1990.