Laws
are in place to allow people to keep their privacy and so that their personal
belongings are respected as theirs. Native Americans have felt that laws need
to be set as boundaries to say what objects are allowed to be displayed or sold
in museums and what objects must remain on their burial grounds, undisturbed. Certain
laws have been established and I believe that this is for the good because
person belongings and family heirlooms are respected, and it keeps illegal
activities from occurring.
Certain
laws that are enforced are in place to help collectors of Native American
artifacts know what they may or may not do. These collectors collect Native American
artifacts to be sold on the internet or to be displayed in museums. However,
some collectors abuse their job as a collector. Some collectors will go and dig
up coffins from Native American burial grounds and sell the items found there.
Native Americans feel offended by this action because it is their family
heirlooms and it is disrespectful to the owner and the family to dig up items
that belonged to the deceased. So, laws were placed by museums and websites,
such as Ebay, to help maintain legality and fairness in collecting.
From
the Office of the United States Attorneys, the law states that archaeological
crime includes vandalism and theft from archaeological sites and trafficking.
These archaeological and Native American sites that are protected are
prehistoric sites, such as rock shelters, caves, rock art, rock alignments, earthen
mounds, earthen middens, mound complexes, ceremonial centers, shell mounds,
middens, refuse pits, burial pits, graves, and cemeteries. Burial sites are
also protected by the law. All of these illegal excavations of Native American
artifacts fall under a category called “pot hunting.” According to PBS, the
repercussions of pot hunting include fines up to thousands of dollars, time in
jail, and the items being seized without recompensation. It is not worth doing
something unethical if a person will get punished severely and not get to keep
the artifact.
Not
only does the US government have laws against illegal collecting. Also,
purchase of an illegal item will end in recompensation, even if the customer
and new owner of the item did not know the item was illegally collected. To
provide customer guarantee, websites have their own rules to prove authenticity
and guarantee that when a customer is shopping for an item, they are not buying
an illegal item. Ebay states, under their section for Native American arts,
crafts, or jewelry that “any item described as Alaska Native, American Indian,
or Native American but be made by an enrolled member of a state or federally
recognized tribe or by someone certified.” The website also says that any
artifact that has unknown origin cannot be claimed to be Native American. This
provides better customer satisfaction and protects funeral objects because all
artifacts require proof. Burke Museum states that laws are in place to ensure
legality and so that items are in the hands of their owner.
I agree with what the laws state
and why they are in place. I believe that it is unlawful and unethical to dig
up and sell artifacts belonging to the deceased or to the Native American
tribes. I believe that if artifacts were found, the collectors should ask the
owners of the artifact or find an owner and ask for their permission to sell or
display the artifact. It would be quite shocking to go on Ebay and see one of
your family heirlooms for sale, when it was not you or your family who put it
there.
However,
there are loopholes that can be found on these rules. In my opinion, loopholes
could come from an “accidental finding.” Technically, the law goes as far as to
state that an artifact found in someone’s backyard or in the woods rightfully
belongs to the government. However, as kids, we all like to go search for
artifacts in the woods or in our backyards. How is a kid supposed to know what
types of digging up “treasure” is legal. Kids at the age of five or six are not
taught these kinds of rules. In my opinion, one or two items are okay. But if a
kid has ten or twenty items, then the parents should be monitoring and making
sure all the items found are okay by the law. But, even if parents do not
realize this, law enforcement does enforce these laws. There are members of law
enforcement who will raid houses, if a suspect is thought to have many illegally
obtained artifacts.
These laws apply to collecting
outside of Native American artifacts, but also to other tribes and groups. When
I was at Macchu Picchu, our tour guide told us that a lot of the objects that
were dug up were not returned to the Peruvian Government. Instead, the
artifacts are housed at Yale University because it was a Yale professor who discovered
them. At times, the kid rule, “finder’s keepers, loser’s weepers,” can be
unfair. These artifacts at Macchu Picchu rightfully belong to the Peruvian government
since they have belonged on the Peruvian land for hundreds of years.
These
laws behind collecting Native American artifacts are in place for ethical
reasons and to prevent illegal obtainment of artifacts. It is unethical to dig
up a coffin and look for items that were buried with the coffin just for money.
Personal heirlooms and funeral items should be left undisturbed as respect. Collectors
need to be able to think about ethical reasons, instead of just being
unscrupulous and only caring about the value of the object. In doing so, the
descendants of the Native American tribe will be much happier, knowing that
they will not have belongings stolen from them for money and that their
ancestor’s graves are respected.
Pictures:
Sources:
- I used this website as an introduction to the topic of controversies surrounding collecting of artifacts in general. The website discussed possible controversies from collecting artifacts. The website also discussed the laws associated with collecting and how they can be broken.
- This website was useful in explaining the controversies involved in Native American artifact controversies. Also, it was useful in explaining the laws and how they apply. It also explained why "pot hunting" is common, due to an increase in the value of the artifacts.
- This website was useful because it is a website by the government designed to state the laws surrounding collecting Native American Artifacts.
- This website was helpful because it showed me that sites such as Ebay have rules as to how artifacts have to be certified, to prevent replicas from being sold as originals.
- This website was useful because it shows the controversies that surround collecting. It mainly states how artifacts can be acquired and the process the owners, or tribes, have to go through to prove that an artifact was originally theirs.
- This website provided other situations in which collectors have been scrutinized. One such example that I plan to use to relate to the circumstances surrounding Native Americans is the case that Peru plans to sue the US over the fact that Yale University houses objects that were found at Machu Picchu. Yale believes that since they found it, it’s their objects now and Peru believes that since the objects were on their land, they should have ownership over the objects.
- This website was useful because it recounted some situations when families have experienced law enforcement of the Native American artifacts.
- This website was useful because I was able to read the website and find a loophole in the laws of collecting. This website was also useful because I was able to see how the laws differed at the level of the individual, the state, and the country.
- This website was useful because it was a questions and answers about collecting and the laws behind collecting. It was good because it defined exactly what an artifact was, which is important in knowing what is legal to collect and what is not. It was also useful because it gave insights as to how people, who are not law enforcement, can help to enforce the law.
