The remains were claimed for repatriation by several Columbia Plateau tribes under NAGPRA, and simultaneously claimed for study by a group of physical anthropologists who argued that the remains were scientifically important and that the evidence for cultural affiliation with the claiming tribes was insufficient under NAGPRA’s standards.

The dispute went through years of litigation, generating extensive legal and scientific documentation, before eventually being resolved by a combination of legal decisions and congressional action that eventually led to repatriation after genetic analysis confirmed a relationship to contemporary Native American populations.

The Kennewick case illustrated the stakes of the conflict between scientific and Indigenous community interests in the clearest possible terms: a single set of ancient human remains became the focus of a decade-long legal battle that involved the fundamental questions of Indigenous sovereignty, the rights of scientists to study ancient materials, and the interpretation of federal law governing the treatment of Native American remains.

The Anzick genome project was conducted in a different spirit, and its outcome was different in character.