Congress has moved to give new life to a law meant to help families recover art stolen during the Holocaust, while at the same time reopening a long-running battle between heirs and the institutions that still hold those works.
The US House of Representatives on Monday approved an extension of the Holocaust Expropriated Art Recovery (HEAR) Act, a 2016 law designed to make it easier for victims’ descendants to bring restitution claims decades after the fact. The measure, according to the New York Times, which had already passed the Senate unanimously, now heads to President Donald Trump’s desk.
At its core, the change is about time. The original law gave heirs up to six years to file a claim after identifying a looted work, sidestepping the usual statute-of-limitations arguments that museums have often used to block cases. But courts have still, at times, leaned on the passage of decades to dismiss claims, arguing that it leaves current owners unable to mount a fair defense.
The new bill tries to close that door. It would limit the ability of museums and other holders to rely on time-based defenses, effectively pushing more cases to be decided on their merits rather than procedural grounds.
Supporters say that’s long overdue. Lawmakers backing the bill argue that some institutions have spent years entrenching and litigating to retain works that were taken under duress. Meanwhile advocacy groups say the existing system still tilts too heavily in favor of current owners.
Museums, not surprisingly, see it differently. The Association of Art Museum Directors supported extending the law, albeit a different version. Its representatives warn that stripping away certain defenses could upend basic legal principles and strain relationships with foreign governments, particularly in cases involving state-owned collections.
International cases are more complicated. The legislation also takes aim at sovereign immunity, the doctrine that generally shields foreign governments from being sued in U.S. courts. Under the new language, Nazi-era seizures would explicitly count as violations of international law, potentially allowing more cases against foreign institutions to move forward.
That shift could reopen disputes that had seemed settled. One often-cited example is the Guelph Treasure, a cache of medieval artifacts sold in 1935 under pressure from the Nazi regime. U.S. courts previously declined to hear the case, but the new bill could change how similar claims are treated going forward.
Foreign governments are watching closely. German officials, while affirming their commitment to restitution, have raised concerns about eroding sovereign immunity and argue that such claims should be handled within national legal systems. French entities have expressed similar unease about U.S. courts overriding existing frameworks.
For claimants, though, the stakes are immediate. Lawyers representing heirs in ongoing cases, like those seeking the return of Egon Schiele works tied to the collection of the cabaret artist Fritz Grünbaum, say the changes could prove decisive, particularly in cases where foreign museums have relied on immunity defenses.
Even then, the law won’t resolve everything. In many disputes, the facts themselves remain contested: whether a sale was forced, whether ownership can be clearly established, whether enough evidence survives. What the bill does is shift the battleground, from procedural barriers to the underlying questions.
