From the cover of HPD’s current Preservation Plan.

Georgia’s Historic Preservation Division has composed a survey to solicit your input about the goals of their program.

Fill it out now! It’s online! It’s easy! It’ll take maybe five minutes.

HPD’s present plan is Georgia’s State Historic Preservation Plan 2007-2011: Building a Preservation Ethic, and came out in 2007. It can be downloaded from their website here. That same webpage also has links to annual reports going back to 1999, so you can track the Division’s progress—and its own history.

Anyway, an early step in composing the next preservation plan is soliciting opinions from you! When you have a few minutes, click on the link here and fill out the questionaire.

And get someone else to do it, too!

From their website:

The Historic Preservation Division’s mission is to promote the preservation and use of historic places for a better Georgia.

Remember: “historic places” include archaeological places….

OpenCongress is an easy-to-use aid in tracking the US congressional legislative process, that is, how bills become laws. As OpenCongress notes:

OpenCongress seeks to [merge] official government data with news and blog coverage, social networking, and public participation tools to give you the real story behind what’s happening in the Congress. Our service is free, open-source, non-profit, and non-partisan, designed to encourage government transparency and civic engagement.

The OpenCongress website offers various displays, so the user can track track a bill, a Member of Congress, or an issue area. Issue areas currently include, for example, “archaeology and anthropology,” “historical and cultural resources,” and “historic sites and heritage areas.” The OpenCongress listing in an issue includes both Senate and House bills. The listings show where the bill is in the legislative process—for example, whether it’s in committee, or if it’s passed one house and not the other.

OpenCongress is a reaction in part to how difficult the Library of Congress’s online website, THOMAS, which is named after Thomas Jefferson, is for many people to use efficiently. According to the THOMAS website:

THOMAS was launched in January of 1995, at the inception of the 104th Congress. The leadership of the 104th Congress directed the Library of Congress to make federal legislative information freely available to the public. Since that time THOMAS has expanded the scope of its offerings….

OpenCongress goes beyond THOMAS to offer:

anyone the ability to subscribe to RSS feeds of the most-viewed bills, Members of Congress, as well as RSS feeds listing the bills most written-about in the news and on blogs, so that you can keep track on the weightiest bills in the Congressional fray. We encourage organizations, membership groups, bloggers, and others to syndicate this “most-viewed on OpenCongress” information on their websites and thereby increase the number of people following the truly important bills in Congress.

According to their website, OpenCongress was conceived of in 2004, launched in February 2007, and signficantly upgraded in 2009. Its developers are working on versions for each state. The creator of OpenCongress is the Participatory Politics Foundation, a 501(c)3 non-profit organization based in New York City, and the Sunlight Foundation is the Founding and Primary Supporter of OpenCongress. The Sunlight Foundation was founded in January 2006, the OpenCongress website says,

with the goal of using the revolutionary power of the Internet and new information technology to enable citizens to learn more about what Congress and their elected representatives are doing, and thus help reduce corruption, ensure greater transparency and accountability by government, and foster public trust in the vital institutions of democracy.

Perhaps you’d like to keep an eye on information OpenCongress posts, or set up a web feed (e.g., RSS), to monitor legislation of interest to you. We recently discussed setting up a RSS feed for thesga.org here, if you want more information on setting up an RSS feed….

Nationally, many archaeological resources in the USA are protected through federal ownership in national parks, national landmarks, and other preserves. The legislation commonly known as the 1906 Antiquities Act (original text below) is critical legislation in the protection of archaeological sites. Now, however, some congressmen contemplate changing provisions of this act and reducing the President’s powers.

The 1906 Antiquities Act gives the President the authority to set aside as a national monument, using an executive order, government lands that contain prehistoric and historic resources, including buildings and ruins. The law was in reaction to vandalism of ancient remains in the North American Southwest, and, early on, was also used to preserved battlefield sites in the Eastern US.

However, recent legislative initiatives seek to limit the President’s authority to use this act. Indeed, representatives of over sixty organizations, including the Society for American Archaeology, the Society for Historical Archaeology, and the National Trust for Historic Preservation, sent a letter to President Barack Obama dated 8 April 2010 expressing strong concern regarding attempts to limit the 1906 Antiquities Act. They note:

Recent legislative initiatives that aim to restrict the President’s authority to create National Monuments under auspices of the Antiquities Act would diminish the President’s ability to protect “historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or scientific interest that are situated upon the lands owned or controlled by the Government of the United States.” Since the passage of the Antiquities Act in 1906, fifteen Presidents have used the Act to designate 124 National Monuments. Most recently, President George W. Bush used the authority granted in the Act to designate more than 139,000 square miles surrounding the Northwest Hawaiian Islands as the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument, the largest national monument ever created.

The Antiquities Act mandates appropriate roles for both the President and Congress in the protection of important federal land values. It allows the President to act quickly to protect important objects and values on our public lands. Congress retains the ability to designate National Monuments legislatively, change monument boundaries, direct resources for monument management, re-designate monuments as national parks and even abolish monuments.

The Antiquities Act was signed into law in June 1906 by President Theodore Roosevelt. In part, it was intended to streamline a process for making national parks, which had previously necessitated approval by Congress for each park. The first national battlefields were set aside in the 1890s, including Georgia’s own Chickamauga Battlefield (managed with other resources as the Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park). The Grand Canyon became a National Monument using this Act in 1908; it became a National Park later, in 1919.

The Bureau of Land Management’s National Landscape Conservation System, established in 2000, is intended to help protect some of the nation’s most remarkable and rugged landscapes, and most are in the West. The Antiquities Act was a key legislation that allowed these lands to be set aside initially.

The National Park Service notes on their website:

The Antiquities Act stands as an important achievement in the progress of conservation and preservation efforts in the United States. Its effects are still felt. The Act created the basis for the federal government’s efforts to protect archeological sites from looting and vandalism. It provided a foundation of public policy from which more specific public attention to and preservation of historic places and structures, cultural landscapes, and other cultural resources developed during the course of the 20th century. Today, many different organizations cooperate in diverse partnerships, including governments at the Federal, state, tribal and local levels; professional and scholarly groups; and communities. In shaping public policy to protect a broad array of cultural and natural resources, the impact of the Antiquities Act is unmatched.

Some people object that this Act has been used with the intent to preserve natural areas rather than merely “antiquities” having scientific value. What do you think about the 1906 Antiquities Act and the preservation of antiquities?

The Wilderness Society has prepared and offers online an informative 32-page bulletin about the Antiquities Act and how it has been used (appears to date to about 2001).

An Act for the Preservation of American Antiquities

This is the original text from the National Park Service website. The Act has been amended since.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That any person who shall appropriate, excavate, injure, or destroy any historic or prehistoric ruin or monument, or any object of antiquity, situated on lands owned or controlled by the Government of the United States, without the permission of the Secretary of the Department of the Government having jurisdiction over the lands on which said antiquities are situated, shall, upon conviction, be fined in a sum of not more than five hundred dollars or be imprisoned for a period of not more than ninety days, or shall suffer both fine and imprisonment, in the discretion of the court.

Sec. 2. That the President of the United States is hereby authorized, in his discretion, to declare by public proclamation historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or scientific interest that are situated upon the lands owned or controlled by the Government of the United States to be national monuments, and may reserve as a part thereof parcels of land, the limits of which in all cases shall be confined to the smallest area compatible with proper care and management of the objects to be protected: Provided, That when such objects are situated upon a tract covered by a bona fied unperfected claim or held in private ownership, the tract, or so much thereof as may be necessary for the proper care and management of the object, may be relinquished to the Government, and the Secretary of the Interior is hereby authorized to accept the relinquishment of such tracts in behalf of the Government of the United States.

Sec. 3. That permits for the examination of ruins, the excavation of archaeological sites, and the gathering of objects of antiquity upon the lands under their respective jurisdictions may be granted by the Secretaries of the Interior, Agriculture, and War to institutions which the may deem properly qualified to conduct such examination, excavation, or gathering, subject to such rules and regulation as they may prescribe: Provided, That the examinations, excavations, and gatherings are undertaken for the benefit of reputable museums, universities, colleges, or other recognized scientific or educational institutions, with a view to increasing the knowledge of such objects, and that the gatherings shall be made for permanent preservation in public museums.

Sec. 4. That the Secretaries of the Departments aforesaid shall make and publish from time to time uniform rules and regulations for the purpose of carrying out the provisions of this Act.

The 1906 Antiquities Act has been had minor amendments. The National Park Service has a download of (apparently) the current version (16 USC 431–433) on this webpage (scroll down).

NAGPRA stands for the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. This is a federal law, originally passed in 1990 (with only minor amendments since), which:

Provides for the ownership or control of Native American cultural items (human remains and objects) excavated or discovered on Federal or tribal lands. Vests ownership or control of human remains and associated funerary objects: (1) in the lineal descendants of the Native American; or (2) if the lineal descendants cannot be ascertained, or the funerary objects and so forth are unassociated, in the Indian tribe or Native Hawaiian organization on whose land the remains or objects were located, or which has the closest cultural affiliation with the remains or objects (and makes claim for them), or, if the land was Federal, in the Indian tribe recognized as aborginally occupying the area (unless a different tribe, by preponderance of the evidence, makes a stronger claim). Provides for disposition of unclaimed Native American cultural items according to regulations promulgated by the Secretary of the Interior.

NAGPRA is in the news in March 2010 for three reasons.

First…

First, the National NAGPRA Program launched “the online Culturally Affiliated Native American Inventories Database summarizing data from museums and Federal agencies that have NAGPRA compliance obligations” on March 1st.

Reference databases tend to be quite useful…. Here’s the link to all of the NAGPRA online databases, and here’s one to the new Culturally Affiliated Native American Inventories Database. This database:

is a transmission for public use of data from museums and Federal agencies that have NAGPRA compliance obligations. Many of the Native American human remains described here have been culturally affiliated as a result of consultation with tribes and Native Hawaiian organizations. All individuals on this database should be represented in a Notice of Inventory Completion. The tribe or tribes designated as eligible to receive the human remains in each inventory are noted in the remarks section of the record.

Second…

Second, on March 15th:

The National Park Service…announced a final rule has been published in the Federal Register establishing a process for the disposition of Native American human remains that are in museums or on exhibit in the United States and which have not yet been culturally affiliated to a tribe or Native Hawaiian organization. There are currently more than 124,000 Native American human remains listed under the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990 (NAGPRA) as unidentifiable, 4,000 individuals have been returned to tribes for re-burial in 82 agreements approved by the Secretary of the Interior.

This takes effect in May 2010. It’s specifically meant to address what institutions must do legally with Native American human remains that are considered unidentifiable as to affilation with modern, living Native American peoples (tribes).

Some clarification on the term “culturally unidentifiable” is included in the law (Federal Register, vol. 75, no. 49, Monday, March 15, 2010, page 12403, and here online). It says:

Culturally unidentifiable refers to human remains and associated funerary objects in museum or Federal agency collections for which no lineal descendant or culturally affiliated Indian tribe or Native Hawaiian organization has been identified through the inventory process.

The law goes on (same page):

Disposition means the transfer of control over Native American human remains, funerary objects, sacred objects, and objects of cultural patrimony by a museum or Federal agency under this part.

This transfer process is also sometimes referred to as repatriation. Strictly speaking, repatriation refers to the return of someone to their own country.

The law (Federal Register, vol. 75, no. 49, Monday, March 15, 2010, page 12379, and here online) clarifies:

In brief, this rule pertains to those human remains, in collections, determined by museums and Federal agencies to be Native American, but for whom no relationship of shared group identity can be reasonably traced, historically or prehistorically, between a present day Indian tribe or Native Hawaiian organization and an identifiable earlier group. These individuals are listed on inventories as culturally unidentifiable Native American human remains. The rule requires consultation on the culturally unidentifiable human remains by the museum or Federal agency with Indian tribes and Native Hawaiian organizations whose tribal lands or aboriginal occupancy areas are in the area where the remains were removed. If cultural affiliation still cannot be determined and repatriation achieved, then the Indian tribe or Native Hawaiian organization may request disposition of the remains. The museum or Federal agency would then publish a notice and transfer control to the tribe, without first being required to appear before the Review Committee to seek a recommendation for disposition approval from the Secretary of the Interior. Disposition requests, which do not meet the parameters of the rule, would still require approval from the Secretary, who may request a recommendation from the Review Committee.

In response to this final rule, expect museums and institutions it applies to to once again review their collections.

Third…

Most recently, the professional archaeological community has expressed concern for funding for the NAGPRA Grants Program. This program seeks:

to increase the number of successful repatriations through the support for projects that increase the ability of tribes and museums to facilitate consultation and work together through the NAGPRA process.

Funding for this program, as with all federal programs, has received close scrutiny each year. For Fiscal Year 2011, again as with many programs, there’s a proposed cut in the budget. This is of special concern because grant applications can be expected to increase, especially in response to the final rule for culturally unidentifiable human remains mentioned above.

In response to this situation, on March 19th the Society for American Archaeology (SAA), a national organization with more than 7000 members, provided written testimony to the House Appropriations Committee “in regards to funding for the NAGPRA Grants Program, which is essential to the continued success of repatriation efforts in the United States” for Fiscal Year 2011.

Download a copy of the SAA’s testimony from this webpage.

In the written testimony, the SAA noted:

Of concern today is the issue of funding for the NAGPRA Grants Program in FY2011. The administration’s budget proposal, if enacted, would cut funding for the program by $581,000, instead of providing a much- needed increase to reflect current demand. SAA respectfully requests that Congress reject this proposed cut, and increase funding to a level of $4.2 million, as recommended by the 2008 National NAGPRA Review Committee report, in order to meet demonstrated need.

The SAA testimony documents how demand for NAGPRA funds has been increasing, and can be expected to increase. The SAA, therefore, has joined the National NAGPRA Review Committee in requesting increased funding for the NAGPRA Grant Program for FY2011.

Finally…

Although many high-dollar programs are in the news these days, there are also many very important smaller programs in the news. Some link strongly to our nation’s archaeological heritage, such as these events related to the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act.

GaPA stands for Georgians for Preservation Action. This organization, according to their webpage, “is the statewide coordinating council for historic preservation advocacy.”

Now, GaPA has a blog! Follow this blog keep up with breaking news regarding legislative sessions, budget proposals, etc. by checking this blog. The blog includes information about both state and federal bills, issues, and funding.

GaPA was founded in 1987, and seeks to mobilize grassroots preservation efforts around the state. Since its founding, GaPA has been coordinated by The Georgia Trust. The leadership of the SGA has worked with both The Georgia Trust and GaPA on state legislative issues.

Membership in GaPA is free, although they do seek donations to cover their expenses. You do not have to be a member of GaPA to read their blog!

Archaeological sites contain irreplaceable information. Sites are nonrenewable and finite. They can only be excavated once. There is no second chance to recover the important information concealed in the soil. Our precious hidden heritage is vulnerable to erosion and deliberate destruction. Consider the following—Augusta Archaeological Society President John Arena writes with unfortunate news:

A few years ago the Archaeological Conservancy purchased Stallings Island, filled in looters pits, put goats and donkeys placed on the island to control the vegetation, and put a fence around the mound. The Archaeological Conservancy then approached the Augusta Archaeological Society and asked us if we would be site stewards for Stallings Island. Since then, we have periodically inspected the island to check on the animals and also check for looting. AAS member Bobby Brassell and I recently visited the island and found new evidence of looting. We found a couple of small holes inside the fence and a couple of larger holes outside the fence. This was the first evidence of looting we have found in approximately two years.

Looter pit documented by John Arena and Bobby Brassell in winter 2009/2010 on Stallings Island.

This looting, which is the deliberate destruction of archaeological deposits, is illegal. It is illegal because the private landowner has not given written permission for this ground-disturbing activity.

Private-public partnerships in archaeological stewardship are more common in the US Southwest, where there are vast expanses of public lands, many archaeological sites, and few staff members to oversee the land.

Without doubt, our hidden heritage is difficult to protect. Places that are isolated are particularly at risk to disturbance and destruction. The AAS’s stewardship of Stallings Island is an important undertaking.

Can you think of other practical methods archaeological site stewards can use to discourage looters and be more effective caretakers of our hidden past?

Click here to take a look at Resources at Risk: Defending Georgia’s Hidden Heritage, a special issue of Early Georgia published in May 2001, for more on archaeological stewardship and site destruction.

The Society for American Archaeology, a national organization with over 7000 members, publishes a newsletter five times each year. The SAA offers that newsletter for free via the Internet. Select the issue you want to read by clicking here.

For issues from 2010 on, when you click on an issue name, its pages appear on a reader, and the issue can also be downloaded as a PDF. For issues prior to 2010, your click will initiate a download.

Archaeologist Jerald Ledbetter records stratigraphic information to provide context for the looted artifacts and bone.

Burke County State Court Judge Jerry Daniel in January 2010 handed down heavy fines on four east Georgia men who pled guilty to multiple counts related to looting a Late Archaic, Stallings culture shell midden site on the Ogeechee River in southern Burke County, Georgia. The four men were apprehended on private land by Georgia Department of Natural Resources Ranger First Class Jeff Billips and Ranger First Class Grant Matherly in late September of 2009. Two were found on the site with digging tools and fled when approached by the rangers. They were caught and charged with criminal trespass and interfering with the duties of an officer. They initially pled not guilty.

The other two men were arrested the next day when they were observed in the act of digging on the site. They had a number of artifacts in their possession, including a bone tool, several spear points and a shell gorget. One of the latter two men was digging through a human burial when caught. They were charged with criminal trespass, digging on an archeological site without permission and littering, and pled guilty to all counts.

In statements made during the sentencing, Judge Daniel said he knew that important archeological sites in Burke County were being badly harmed by site looters and that he wanted to put a stop to this long-standing activity. He also emphasized that the looters were trespassing on private property, and stealing private property, since archaeological sites (with the exception of burials and associated artifacts) under law belong to the landowner. In an attempt to put an end to destructive site looting the judge levied heavy fines and penalties, which included a $1000 fine for each count, a minimum $7384.00 fine to repair the archeological and physical damage to the site, 12 weekends in jail, community service, three years of probation (which requires a surcharge payment of $52/month) and a ban on attending any type of artifact show. After hearing about this heavy sentence, the first two men then pled guilty to avoid potential harsher sentencing in a trial. The three men who live outside of Burke County (one is from Swainsboro and two are from Metter) were banned from Burke County for three years.

All four men have been digging on sites for many years and one acknowledged that he has dug on many sites on the Ogeechee River acknowledged selling artifacts.

Testifying at the sentencing were State Archaeologist Dr. David Crass and Georgia Council on American Indian Concerns (GCAIC) archaeologist Tom Gresham. Crass requested GCAIC involvement in the case, and Gresham was called to the site in early October to document the site and the extent of the looting. He saw numerous piles of Stallings/Thoms Creek pottery, animal bone and chert artifacts left by the looters, as well as spoil piles containing abundant fresh water shell. After the DNR officers gathered the evidence they needed, Gresham and three colleagues mapped the extent of the looting, calculating that about 290 square meters had been disturbed. They also gathered about 47 pounds of bone, 56 pounds of stone artifacts and 82 pounds of pottery. This material is now being analyzed by Jerald Ledbetter and Lisa O’Steen so that some scientific value can be salvaged from the site. The site dates to the Stallings and Thoms Creek cultures of the Late Archaic period, which spans a critical time in Georgia prehistory, from about 3500 to 4000 years ago. This was a time when Indians in the Southeast were becoming more sedentary and began heavily exploiting freshwater shell fish.

Dr. Crass told Judge Daniel that Burke County contains some of the most important Archaic Period sites in Georgia, and that DNR believes an educated and caring private landowner is often the best protection for such sites. He also pointed out that there is an important distinction to be made between wholesale digging and casual surface collecting, and that DNR (and Georgia code) recognizes this distinction.

The Georgia Council on American Indian Concerns actively supported the efforts of DNR’s Law Enforcement Division to prosecute the case and rectify the damage to the site and to the human burials. Although the Council was disappointed that felony charges of burial disturbance were not brought, it was explained that misdemeanor convictions and appropriate penalties in State Court were a better bet than the uncertain outcome of a felony charge in Superior Court.

Tom Gresham notes that these sentences were largely a result of several actions taken by the archeological community in the past two decades. The principal charge was excavating on a site without written permission of the landowner and without notifying DNR. This law was proposed by archeologists in 1993 to allow prosecution without requiring the landowner to press charges. Additionally, the DNR rangers had been trained and sensitized to the problem of site looting and were very effective in gathering evidence and presenting a strong case. Dr. Crass lauded the two rangers and their colleagues, Sergeant Max Boswell and Captain Thomas Barnard, saying that they handled the case with high professionalism.

Third, it is likely that a long running campaign by archaeologists to inform the public about the harm that site looting does to all Georgians created the atmosphere for harsher sentencing.

Society for Georgia Archaeology President Dennis Blanton observes that

the outcome of this case sends all of the right signals: Georgia’s irreplaceable archaeological sites are under siege and require vigilant protection, there is a broad spectrum of our citizens out there that cares deeply about them, and such sites have a critical story to tell about our human forbears. We can only hope that looters will take note and that others will be alert to illegal digging elsewhere in the state.

Tom Gresham remarked that he had never seen such a wide array of punctated and stab-and-drag motifs on the pottery. One sherd alone has five types of punctation. As noted a decade ago by Ken Sassaman, Stallings-like pottery on the Ogeechee River is mostly sand tempered, with very little fiber. Thus, it is more accurately typed as Thoms Creek pottery. Of the approximately 700 sherds collected from the spoil piles, every one is Thoms Creek/Stallings pottery. The animal bone contains a great deal of deer and turtle bone, and only small amounts of bird and other mammal bone. No fish bone has yet been identified. As mentioned, human bone, probably from two individuals, has also been identified.

Illegal digging on shell middens along the Ogeechee River is a long-standing problem, presumably fed by the antiquities market that highly values bone pins often found in shell middens. Ken Sassaman, Kristin Wilson and Frankie Snow wrote an article in the Spring 1995 issue of Early Georgia citing this problem and documenting two looted sites on the Ogeechee River not far from the recently looted site. It is anticipated that the analysis of the pottery, stone and bone from the present site will be described in an article in Early Georgia.

Photo by Herbert Knosowski/Associated Press.

Writes John Tierney in the 16 November 2009 New York Times:

Scientists and curators have generally supported the laws passed in recent decades giving countries ownership of ancient “cultural property” discovered within their borders. But these laws rest on a couple of highly debatable assumptions: that artifacts should remain in whatever country they were found, and that the best way to protect archaeological sites is to restrict the international trade in antiquities.

Tierney’s article is titled “A Case in Antiquities for ‘Finders Keepers’,” and discusses the ownership of artifacts traded on the international art market. Some of these items are very well known, for example, the bust of Nefertiti from what is now Egypt, presently kept in a Berlin Museum.

Obviously each nation involved may have laws that conflict, making the ownership of antiquities a complicated matter, with no obvious, undeniable solutions.

If you own a piece of land in the United States of America, do you own the antiquities on that land? Is the same true if that land is in England?

The Society for American Archaeology continues to monitor legislative actions, especially at the Federal level. In mid-June, the Society submitted a letter to the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Subcommittee on Public Lands and Forests regarding S. 409, Southeast Arizona Land Exchange and Conservation Act of 2009, also known as the Apache Leap Conveyance bill.

The letter says that the bill:

would direct the Department of Agriculture to accept certain parcels of non-federal land in five counties in Arizona from Resolution Copper in exchange for federal land in Pinal County, Arizona, including Apache Leap and the Oak Flat Campground area, the latter in which mining activity is prohibited. It is our understanding that under the legislation Resolution Copper could then conduct mineral exploration and “block-cave” extraction activities beneath the surface of the Oak Flat and Apache Leap areas.

These lands include known archaeological sites and resources, as well as places significant to several Native American tribes. Additional, undiscovered sites are also likely to be present.

Block-cave mining is a technique where underground extraction is conducted such that surface materials “fall in” because the materials below them have been removed (essentially creating “sinkholes”). This kind of action would destroy and disturb archaeological remains.

The archaeological resources are now protected by numerous federal statutes, including the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA), the Archaeological Resources Protection Act, and the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, and others. Transferral of the land would remove those protections, and has raised the concern of the SAA.

Thus, SAA recommends increased protections and that tribal stakeholders be allowed to continue traditional acorn gathering unimpeded by mineral extraction and extraction.

S. 409 is sponsored by Senator Jon Kyle of Arizona, and co-sponsored by John McCain, also of Arizona. Both Senators are Republicans.

Download a copy of the SAA’s letter from this webpage. It’s called “SAA Testimony on S. 409, the Apache Leap Conveyance bill,” and is dated June 17, 2009.

The SAA was founded in 1934 and has over 7000 members from all fifty states, and nations around the world.

Information about Subcommittee action on the bill is here. Information on the Senate bill is here. The related House bill is H.R. 2509, with four co-sponsors, all Arizona Representatives. Read about the House bill here.

The National Park Service has an e-newsletter called Heritage News you can subscribe to. It’s published monthly, and delivers timely information on events and activities of interest to the national heritage community.

The July 2009 issue has a short article on the arrests of 24 members of a looting network in July. The arrests happened on June 10th in southeast Utah and were widely reported in the national media. According to Heritage News:

The indictments were the result of a two-year undercover operation by the Bureau of Land Management, the FBI, and the US Attorney for Utah. The archeological investigation was one of the largest ever. The defendants are alleged to have stolen and profited in the sale of 256 Native American artifacts, worth an estimated $335,685, from the Four Corners region of Utah. Among the stolen antiquities were decorated Anasazi pottery, a buffalo headdress, sandals, and ceremonial masks.

Another tidbit from this issue of Heritage News: Ninety properties were listed in the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places in May 2009. One was the Boyd and Sallie Gilleland House, a ca. 1929 Craftsman bungalow in Dawsonville. Boyd Gilleland was a moonshiner during Prohibition, and built his still in his house. Most ’shiners put their stills far from their houses and deep in the woods, because they do emit a notable odor. The article says:

Reportedly, Gilleland brewed upstairs while wife Sallie cooked dinner downstairs to mask the smoke and odor of distilling alcohol. The house’s location on Georgia Highway 9, which heads straight into Atlanta, was ideal for the moonshine’s transportation and sale at local speakeasies. Millions of gallons of illicit whiskey from all over north Georgia were transported into the city during Prohibition (1920-33) and even into the 1940s.

Heritage News also lists grant information and publishes a calendar of activity on national legislation, including committee meetings and actions. Perhaps the most useful, however, is a listing of links to stories reported elsewhere called “Heritage in the News” with recent stories you may find interesting.

Read the newsletter online here.

The National Park Service, which is administered by the Department of the Interior, has gathered together an online listing of Federal laws pertaining to archaeology. As they note:

The laws and regulations that govern the preservation of the nation’s cultural heritage developed over the course of the 20th century, beginning with the protection of cultural sites on federal lands. Today, many aspects of the nation’s cultural heritage are recognized, protected, and interpreted in national parks, other public lands, and in communities. Many of these laws are broadly applicable—the Antiquities Act and the National Historic Preservation Act—while others are specific to particular lands or resource types.

Perhaps most historically important of these laws is the Antiquities Act of 1906, which has been amended once. Section 1 states:

Any person who shall appropriate, excavate, injure, or destroy any historic or prehistoric ruin or monument, or any object of antiquity, situated on lands owned or controlled by the Government of the United States, without the permis- sion of the Secretary of the Department of the Government having jurisdiction over the lands on which said antiquities are situated, shall, upon conviction, be fined in a sum of not more than five hundred dollars or be imprisoned for a period of not more than ninety days, or shall suffer both fine and imprisonment, in the discretion of the court.

Another of my personal favorites is Executive Order 11593, signed by Richard M. Nixon in 1971. Section 1 begins:

The Federal Government shall provide leadership in preserving, restoring, and maintaining the historic and cultural environment of the Nation.

I found a few of the links to be broken, but this list is a good start for anyone interested in Federal laws, policies, and programs that relate to archaeology. Click here to go to the NPS page listing.

On March 11th, President Obama signed the Omnibus Appropriations Act (H.R. 1105), which funds federal departments, agencies, and programs not funded through the regular appropriations process for FY2009, which began October 1, 2008. Note that this signing was nearly half way through the fiscal year to which it applies.

Monies that will at least partly benefit archaeological and historical programs listed here total nearly $500 million, out of $410 billion total for the Omnibus Appropriations Act. That’s 0.12%. Note that additional funds had come to archaeological endeavors through the original appropriations process.

For a certified PDF of the bill, click here (1.2 MB). To read the bill online, click here to go to the link on THOMAS, the Library of Congress webpage for legislative information (named after President Jefferson). The enrolled version is the final text, passed by both the House and the Senate, and signed by President Obama.

The SGA website’s editor has just learned that the Society for American Archaeology expressed strongly worded concerns to the Republican and Democratic leaders of the Georgia State Senate about cuts to archaeology program funding during budget negotiations in late March. President Dean R. Snow sent the following letter to the Georgia’s Lieutenant Governor, The Honorable Casey Cagle, dated 27 March 2008.

Dear Lieutenant Governor Cagle:

The Society for American Archaeology (SAA) is greatly concerned about the Georgia House of Representative’s version (HB 119) of the state’s budget for Fiscal Year 2010. This plan would practically eliminate the state’s archaeological program precisely at a time when it is needed most.

SAA is an international organization that, since its founding in 1934, has been dedicated to the research about and interpretation and protection of the archaeological heritage of the Americas. With more than 7,500 members, SAA represents professional archaeologists in colleges and universities, museums, government agencies, and the private sector. SAA has members in all 50 states as well as many other nations around the world.

HB 119 cuts more than $250,000 from the Historic Preservation Division (HPD) of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, eliminating the State Archaeologist and other positions. These reductions would seriously hamper the State of Georgia’s ability to conduct important project reviews and consultations required by federal law. If the cuts in HB 119 were enacted, the state would see a substantial delay in the implementation of stimulus projects funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Federal agencies are required under Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 to consult with HPD whenever federal actions in Georgia may affect historic properties, including archaeological sites. HB 119 will eliminate the review staff needed by the state to respond in a timely fashion.

In addition, federally-required consultations with Native American tribes on federally-funded projects would also be delayed or eliminated, potentially exposing federal agencies to legal challenge, further delaying implementation of needed stimulus projects. A number of legally-required project surveys on state lands would have to be contracted to professional consulting companies, which may incur costs to the state greater than the amount of spending reduced by the legislation. The proposed cuts would also end funding for proper storage of the artifact collections recovered from state lands. These materials belong to the people of Georgia and deserve to be curated in a scientifically sound manner. Finally, the State Archaeologist’s Office provides public education to Georgia’s residents and visitors regarding the state’s historic and prehistoric past. This critical service to the public will be lost if the cuts are allowed to stand.

While we understand that many states are facing difficult fiscal situations due to the current economic situation, the House budget’s proposed reductions to the HPD are counterproductive and will cause the state more problems than it will solve. These reductions will result in a substantial delay in the implementation of badly needed stimulus projects, difficulty for the state to carry out legally-required reviews and consultations, and the inappropriate care and storage of irreplaceable archaeological resources.

We respectfully urge the State Senate to restore full funding for the state archaeology program in its version of the Fiscal Year 2010 budget.

Regards,

Dean R. Snow, President

The recent amendment to one of Georgia’s archaeology laws might affect you, whether you are an avocational or professional archaeologist.

Code Section 12-3-621 has always required a person who is going to dig on an archaeological site to first notify the Office of the State Archaeologist. This recent amendment has made that notification a lot easier. You can send an email from HPD’s website, at www.gashpo.org—see Archaeological Services, and under that click on “Notify State Archaeologist before you dig.” The text of the law is there as well. The other way is by calling the archaeology notification hotline phone number toll-free, at (866) 755-0014. Leave a voicemail message at that number anytime, giving your contact information and the location of your intended excavations.

If you have questions, please feel free to contact the State Archaeologist, Dr. David Crass, david.crass@dnr.state.ga.us, (404) 656-9344, or HPD’s Archaeology Program Coordinator, Christine Neal, christine.neal@dnr.state.ga.us, (404) 657-1367.