A handful of other remains, dating back to the same period as Kennewick Man and sharing his Caucasoid features, have been found previously, mostly in the western United States where drier weather helped preserve them. If they are Caucasoid, that raises questions about what happened to Kennewick Man and his contemporaries when the Indians arrived. They left almost no trace and appear to have been completely wiped out. The Umatillas reject arguments that failure to study the bones could also be a loss of Indian history. It is passed on to us through our elders and through our religious practices.
Chatters is one of eight archaeologists suing the corps for permission to study the bones.
While the scientists are not allowed to see the bones, members of local tribes have been allowed into the vault to perform religious ceremonies, said Corps of Engineers spokesman Dutch Meier. In June, U.S. Magistrate John Jelderks of Portland, Ore., ordered the corps to determine if the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990 applies to the bones. If it does, they must be returned immediately for burial. The case is the first big legal challenge to the repatriation act, which required the nation's museums to return to tribes the human remains, burial items and other cultural objects collected from sacred sites since Europeans arrived in the New World. The scientists contend Kennewick Man cannot be linked to an existing Indian tribe and thus is not covered by the law.