Two Word Change in NAGPRA Sneaks In
In October of last year, the United States Senate Indian Affairs Committee sneaked a controversial wording change into the Native American Graves Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) as part of a technical corrections bill, a wording change that caused a great outcry among scientists and their allies when it was first suggested in 2004. That wording change has yet to be adopted by the Department of the Interior, but may be in the near future. 
The Native American Graves Repatriation Act is one of the most important pieces of American legislation affecting archaeologists. Enacted into law in 1990 by George H.W. Bush, NAGPRA provides a process by which museums and other federal agencies use to return certain Native American human remains and grave goods to lineal descendants, and culturally affiliated Indian tribes and Native Hawaiian organizations, if they can be determined. It was assembled with a great deal of anguish balancing both scientific and Native American needs. 

In 2004, the US Senate bill S.2843 proposed that the NAGPRA definition of Native American be reworded from: 

  'Native American' means of, or relating to, a tribe, people, or culture that is indigenous to the United States
to 
  'Native American' means of, or relating to, a tribe, people, or culture that is or was indigenous to the United States 
While on the surface this change may seem minor, the implications may be very great indeed. Truly ancient human remains and grave goods found on the American continents (such as Kennewick) cannot be identified to a specific tribe or set of tribes, and under NAGPRA as it currently stands, those found on US federal properties may be closely studied and kept in repositories. Those ancient remains are very rare, and represent an important part of understanding how the Americas became populated, questions scientists have yet to answer. 

Archaeologists are concerned because the addition of the two words 'or was' means that very ancient remains which cannot be identified to a specific tribe (such as Kennewick Man), may be repatriated to the tribes which have historic connections to the properties on which the remains were found, rather than kept for future study. As Kate Riley writes in the Seattle Times "Tribes no longer would have to prove a connection to the remains beyond the coincidence the remains were found on their ancestral lands, despite prolific evidence of the widespread migration of early people." 

Objections to the wording have been made by several professional associations including the Society for American Archaeology and the American Association of Physical Anthropologists. 

This is a touchy problem at the very heart of archaeological research in the Americas, which must constantly respect both the past and the present, to work towards understanding and reporting what our collective past might have been, and at the same time respect the rights of the modern day indigenous peoples. 

The wording change has yet to adopted by the Department of Interior and U.S. Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Pasco is asking Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne to delay adoption of the proposed regulation. 

Commentary
  a.. Shed a light on prehistory, Kate Riley in the Seattle Times 
  b.. SAA statement: Comments on 2007 Proposed Rule Relating to Culturally Unidentifiable Human Remains Under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act [79 Federal Register 58582, Published Tuesday October 16, 2007] 
  c.. AAPA statement: Position Statement on the Department of the Interior’s Proposed Rule for the Disposition of Culturally Unidentifiable Human Remains 
  d.. Comments on the NAGPRA Word Change, Friends of the Past 
Background on the Issue
  a.. Two Word Change to NAGPRA (September 2004) 
  b.. Working Together, NAGPRA and archaeology, opposing viewpoints on NAGPRA from archaeologists Joe Watkins and Geoffrey A. Clark, from 1998 
  c.. Kennewick Man and the New World Entrada 
  d.. The Roots of NAGPRA, historical background of the law from Steve Russell 
lifted from Kris Hirst's Archaeology Blog on About.com:

http://archaeology.about.com/b/2008/01/28/two-word-change-in-nagpra-sneaks-in.htm?nl=1