[ OUR OPINION ]
Compromise should
protect museum and
Hawaiian sanctity
|
The 1990 Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, or NAGPRA, was aimed at returning human remains held in museums to the care of their Native American or Hawaiian descendants. Faced with a wholesale seizure of its inventory, Bishop Museum proposed that it be designated a native Hawaiian organization eligible to maintain possession of sacred and funerary objects.
The strategy seemed to be the only way to preserve the museum's precious collection of artifacts, and the museum's Hawaiian roots drew sympathy within the Interior Department. Craig Manson, assistant interior secretary for fish, wildlife and parks, said in a letter to Senator Inouye that his department "does not consider 'museum' and 'native Hawaiian organization' to be mutually exclusive categories."
However, designating any museum as an indigenous organization would seem to make a mockery of NAGPRA. It also would backfire on Bishop Museum, which receives millions of dollars from the federal government, thanks to Inouye, who authored NAGPRA and is vice chairman of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs.
A group called Hui Malama I Na Kupuna O Hawaii Nei leads the way in seeking repatriation of bones and artifacts, and it is led by lawyer Edward Halealoha Ayau, former staff counsel to Inouye. Jennifer Goto Sabas, Inouye's chief of staff, is a member of the museum board.
When NAGPRA was under consideration in the Senate, Inouye said eloquently that human remains in American museums were those of Indians, "never the bones of white soldiers or the first European soldiers that came to this continent." That is true, and Bishop Museum officials contesting claims by native Hawaiian groups are trying to protect artifacts, not bones.
Among the items that Bishop Museum wants to keep and preserve are a kii, a fragile, 8-inch stick figure with a human face carved from a dark wood and a 5 inch long hook-shaped pendant carved from creamy white rock oyster. Such pendants, usually suspended from a thick necklace made of braided human hair, were spiritually imbued signs of high status, and were passed down from generation to generation.
Hui Malama maintains that those items were intended for burial with the deceased and should be placed in burial caves. Museum officials want to protect them from deterioration from the elements. Display of such items enhances education about Hawaiians' cultural heritage.
Resolution is needed to protect Bishop Museum's role conveying information about the culture and history of Hawaii and its native people while recognizing the sanctity of Hawaiian rituals. Senator Inouye is in a position to find that common ground.
