National Museum of the American People
Congress of Russian Americans is one of the more than 140 organizations that represent 59 different American ethnic, minority, nationality and genealogical groups who have come together in the Coalition for the National Museum of the American People to advocate for the establishment of a National Museum of the American People. The Museum would be devoted to telling the story of the many peoples who have migrated to the United States, from the earliest arrivals 20,000 years ago until the present. Democratic Virginia Rep. Jim Moran and Republican Tennessee Rep. John Duncan introduced legislation in July that calls for studying the creation of a National Museum of the American People without any federal taxpayer funds. The bill had 10 other co-sponsors. CRA Washington, DC representative John Stepanchuk took part in a press conference on Capitol Hill with the Congressmen, along with members of other organizations representing America’s many ethnicities.
The National Museum will tell the story of all the American People from prehistoric times to the present and advance and disseminate knowledge of that story. For the different groups who became Americans, the Museum will tell who they were, where they first settled, how they became Americans, and how they transformed our nation. The Museum will also be a scholarly institution; there are already more than 50 eminent scholars who focus on migration and immigration of different peoples who support this effort.
Besides the Permanent Exhibition telling the Story of the American People, the Museum could include such components as: a national genealogical center, a Center for the Advanced Studies of the American People, a film center, a Peopling of America program to designate historic sites where significant migration/immigration events occurred, and an educational resource center. There are a variety of sites near the National Mall in Washington designated for museums by the U. S. Commission of Fine Arts, the National Capital Planning Commission and the National Park Service. The Commission will explore these various possibilities. Pending adoption of the Congressional Resolution, the Museum could open in 2018-19.