AIA View of CPAC Meeting on the the Bolivian and Greek MOU

Nathan Elkins, writing on the AIA's blog, gives his views about what happened at the CPAC meeting concerning proposed renewals of the Bolivian and Greek MOUs.

Of course, CPO remembers it all a bit differently.

More importantly, CPO feels he has been misquoted concerning what he said about current import restrictions being improperly based on where a coin is "made" vs. "found." Elkins is flat out wrong. CPO certainly did not "admit[] this was only his interpretation of the CPIA as other attorneys, academics, and the federal courts have not agreed with Tompa’s understanding of the ‘found in’ vs. ‘made in’ argument."

Perhaps Elkins can be more specific about his contention. Certainly both Urice and Adler have agreed with CPO in their Rutgers Law Review Article. Moreover, then State Department Deputy Legal Adviser Mark Feldman also seemed to agree that the focus must be where an object is found in his statements made at the time the CPIA was being discussed.

Finally, Elkins--who is no lawyer-- appears to have a fundamental misunderstanding of what a U.S. District Court and the Fourth Circuit have actually said about the matter.  Both have agreed that import restrictions only apply to objects of archaeological interest "first discovered within" and "subject to export control" of a specific UNESCO State Party.  Yet, they have refused to conduct a judicial review of the designated lists because they consider the issue to be a "political question" that makes the issue "non-justiciable."  So, no Court has actually looked at the issue on the merits.