Biden’s new tribal consent laws force NYC Museum of Natural History to close Native American exhibits
History lovers slammed the American Museum of Natural History for shuttering all its Native American-related displays Friday, with one disappointed historophile saying the now-empty major exhibition halls and display cabinets show “history being made secret.”
“People come here to learn and see the displays,” Dan Shoop, 60, told The Post as he wandered the eerily abandoned halls dedicated to the Eastern Woodlands and the Great Plains.
“If it’s not on public display, it robs the people of a chance to learn about a culture of great historic importance to this country.”
The shocking evacuation started just hours after museum director Sean Decatur announced the changes in a letter to staff Friday morning.
“The halls we are closing are artifacts of an era when museums such as ours did not respect the values, perspectives and indeed shared humanity of Indigenous peoples,” Decatur wrote in the missive obtained by The Post.
“Actions that may feel sudden to some may seem long overdue to others,” he added.
The closures will result in almost 10,000 square feet of exhibition spaces being off-limits to visitors, the New York Times noted.
In compliance with the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), the AMNH stripped the displays of its Native relics with plans to ship them back to the tribes they once belonged to.
Shoop said he raced to the museum after hearing the news to view the exhibits for the last time.
“It cheapens it for all of us,” the Hells Kitchen native said. “I think it’s a shame because there’s a lot of history being made secret.
“As I look around — these are basket-weaving displays and over there is snowshoe making — I wonder how much of this display is particularly disrespectful to religious beliefs. It doesn’t seem to be ceremonial,” he added, noting his hopes the displays would make a return.
Shoop was just one of many New Yorkers who visited the museum Friday to pay their final respects to the exhibits.
A museum member told The Post they opposed how the AHNM went about the closures and wished there had been an earlier warning before the cabinets were stripped.
“I think New Yorkers should have had a chance to say goodbye,” said the person, who asked to remain anonymous.
“You can’t make a reservation for tomorrow. It would have been much better if they said it was closing two weeks from now. Many people in this hall said they wanted a chance for their kids to see it.”
According to the AMNH, the exhibits will reopen, though it could not provide a timeline.
“Some objects may never come back on display as a result of the consultation process. But we are looking to create smaller-scale programs throughout the museum that can explain what kind of process is underway,” Decatur told the Times.
The alterations are a response to new federal regulations that went into effect this month regarding the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA).
Passed unanimously in 1990, the law sought to provide protocols for museums and other institutions to return indigenous human remains, funerary objects and other “objects of cultural patrimony” to recognized tribes, according to the National Park Service.
Many of the remains and objects in question were seized from the native peoples without their consent or were excavated and taken by non-native anthropologists and collectors without regard for tribal traditions, the policy noted.
Camilla Schaper of Harlem applauded the museum for removing the Native American relics, saying it is “the right thing to do.”
Schaper, who was born the same year the exhibition opened, said she was visiting for the first and last time Friday.
“It belongs to the different tribes and it’s for them to decide what’s for us and what’s for them,” the 57-year-old told The Post.
Another museum member agreed, saying it allows the institution to reopen a Native American exhibit with a fresh perspective.
“It’s policy to get permission from the artifacts’ descendants. I think it’s appropriate,” they said.
“It will come back in some other form. Looking around, the exhibit is due for a refresh anyway.”
Over the years, however, critics called out the legislation for including too many possible loopholes for institutions while placing unfair requirements on native tribes, a Cato Institute review explained.
As a result, the Biden administration has pushed to speed up the repatriation process — which gave way to the revised regulations that were finalized in December, the Department of the Interior announced at the time.
The new regulations approved last month aim to alleviate some of that strife — including a stipulation for “required free, prior and informed consent before any exhibition of, access to, or research on human remains or cultural items.”
“NAGPRA is an important law that helps us heal from some of the more painful times in our past by empowering Tribes to protect what is sacred to them. These changes to the Department’s NAGPRA regulations are long overdue and will strengthen our ability to enforce the law and help Tribes in the return of ancestors and sacred cultural objects,” said Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Bryan Newland said in December.
The revised additions also seek to hasten returns by giving institutions five years to prepare all human remains and related objects for repatriation — and giving more authority to tribes in that process.
“We’re finally being heard — and it’s not a fight, it’s a conversation,” Myra Masiel-Zamora, an archaeologist and curator with the Pechanga Band of Indians, told the Times.
“We can say, ‘This needs to come home,’ and I’m hoping there will not be pushback,” she said, adding that there has been a noticeable shift in conversations with institutions in just two weeks since the new regulations went into effect on Jan. 12.
Museum leaders have been consulting lawyers and additional curators as they prepare to comply with the policy, the Times noted.
Many institutions will also be hiring staff to help them meet the requirements.
While similar changes are underway at other museums — including the Field Museum in Chicago, according to the Times — the changes at the American Museum of Natural History, which receives about 5 million visitors per year, will likely be among the most acutely noted.
“What might seem out of alignment for some people is because of a notion that museums affix in amber descriptions of the world. But museums are at their best when they reflect changing ideas,” Decatur told the outlet.
Some of the objects removed from display include those that were used to teach students on field trips about native tribes, the Times said.
Highlights including a Menominee canoe and a Hopi Katsina doll will now be inaccessible, the outlet explained.
“The revised policies provide improved guidance on museums’ responsibility for NAGPRA and now outline each step in the process,” Dr. Candace Sall, director of the Museum of Anthropology and American Archaeology Division at the University of Missouri, told The Post Friday.
“Best practices in museum work include tribal consultations and many museums have already been consulting with tribes for years. As we prepare to open the museum in our new location, we are in active consultations with our tribal partners as we use the co-production of knowledge framework for the new exhibits,” she continued.
“I hope everyone remembers that this is sensitive work that must be done with the utmost respect,” she noted.
The new regulations have met with some pushback — including concerns from the Society for American Archaeology that the stipulations were interfering with museums’ collections management practices.
Returning native human remains — which typically cannot be exhibited and sit in storage in museums across the country — is a major goal of the new regulations.
As of 2023, the remains of about 96,000 individuals remain in institutional holdings, a federal report revealed.
But there has also been some wariness from tribal leaders who worry that they may not be able to support the flood of new requests from museums, the Times said.
At a committee meeting last June, Scott Willard, who works on repatriation issues for the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma, expressed discomfort with how the new regulations could make Native remains sound like “throwaway items,” the paper reported.
“This garage sale mentality of ‘Give it all away right now’ is very offensive to us,” he said at the time.
Willard did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for a comment on the latest actions.
