Under the U.S. legal framework that applied in this case — NAGPRA-adjacent law governing the repatriation of remains to lineal descendants — the lineal descendants hold the legal authority over the material and therefore over decisions about its use. Ernie LaPointe, as the documented closest living lineal descendant, holds the legal right to decide who analyzes Sitting Bull’s genetic material and for what purposes.
This is a clean answer in legal terms, but it raises some questions in ethical terms. LaPointe’s sisters share the relationship with Sitting Bull — were they consulted? Was there broader community consultation with Lakota Sioux tribal governments about the appropriateness of the study? The public record does not provide complete information about the consultation process, though LaPointe has described the decision as his to make, which is consistent with the legal framework.
The study’s treatment of Sitting Bull’s genetic data — using it to confirm a family relationship, with the family’s consent and at the family’s invitation — is ethically cleaner than the more common situation in ancient DNA research, where institutions claim the right to analyze the remains of Indigenous ancestors without meaningful descendant community input. But it still requires that we accept the model of lineal-descendant authority as the appropriate framework, and not everyone agrees that this fully captures the obligations owed to an ancestor’s community.
The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s interest in Sitting Bull’s legacy — as the community on whose land he died, and with whom he was buried — represents a different kind of claim that the lineal-descendant framework does not fully accommodate. This does not mean the lineal-descendant framework is wrong. It means that the appropriate framework for governing decisions about the remains of historically significant Indigenous individuals is genuinely contested, and that legal authority and ethical authority do not always align perfectly.