US And California Defend Nazi-Looted Art Laws Against Museum Challenges

(MENAFN- USA Art News) New laws enacted in the United States and California to assist in the recovery of Nazi-looted art are facing legal challenges from prominent institutions. The Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection Foundation (TBCF) in Madrid and the Norton Simon Museum (NSM) in Pasadena, California, are contesting the federal and state statutes. These laws aim to revise procedural rules for claims involving art stolen during the Nazi era.

Both museums are navigating renewed litigation concerning art ownership claims that courts had previously ruled in their favor. Both the U.S. Congress and the California legislature specifically cited these prior court decisions as justifications for amending the laws. The legal challenges initiated by TBCF and NSM will now subject the statutes themselves to judicial review regarding their constitutionality.

On October 19, Judge John Walter of the federal district court in Los Angeles indicated he would rule in the TBCF case without oral arguments, relying solely on submitted briefs. Both the museum and the plaintiffs have sought summary judgment in a reconsideration of a claim to retrieve Camille Pissarro's Rue Saint Honoré, apres midi, effect de pluie (1897), a painting previously awarded to TBCF. The U.S. Supreme Court ordered this reconsideration in 2025, after California amended its procedural laws in 2024 to support state residents suing museums over stolen artworks.

California's legislature criticized a 2022 Ninth Circuit federal court of appeals decision that applied Spanish property law to the TBCF case. That ruling determined TBCF owned the painting under Spain's“acquisitive prescription” principle. The Supreme Court vacated this decision, establishing that under California's new procedural statute, California's substantive law applies to claims for stolen art in museums, regardless of earlier judicial outcomes. The plaintiffs, David Cassirer and other heirs of the original owner, Lilly Neubauer, are seeking the painting's return. Neubauer, a Berlin-based Jew, was compelled to sell the work to Nazis in 1939 to secure an exit visa, and was denied access to the payment. The heirs argue that California property law, which states“under which good title can never be acquired to stolen property,” mandates the painting's return. They also cite a subsequent legislative change, the amendment by the U.S. Congress to the federal Holocaust Era Art Recovery (HEAR) Act. This amendment took effect in April 2026 and explicitly applies to pending lawsuits.

For Nazi-loot claims it covers, the updated HEAR Act prohibits art possessors from using“defences or substantive doctrines based on the passage of time,” including“acquisitive prescription.” Previous court proceedings had found TBCF gained ownership under Spanish acquisitive prescription because it possessed the painting for over three years without knowledge it was stolen. The plaintiffs assert that the 2025 HEAR Act's prohibition on relying on acquisitive prescription“conclusively resolves” all matters in their favor.

However, TBCF is challenging these new statutes, asserting that the California law violates the U.S. Constitution by retroactively stripping its vested property rights in the painting without due process. It argues that applying the HEAR Act to this case would also be unconstitutional. TBCF contends that acquisitive prescription is a property vesting law under Spain's substantive law, not a“defence based on the passage of time.” It highlights that prior court rulings repeatedly established its property rights vested by 1999,“more than twenty-six years before the [HEAR] Act's enactment.” TBCF has raised additional challenges, including that the new California law constitutes an impermissible state attempt to regulate conduct extraterritorially in Spain. Both the United States and California governments have intervened in the lawsuit, submitting briefs to defend the constitutionality of their statutes. Amicus curiae briefs have also been filed by both sides. A decision is anticipated by late February.

In a separate lawsuit, the NSM on October 14 challenged a complaint filed in September in state court, subsequently removing it to the federal district court in Los Angeles. The claimants seek the recovery of Lucas Cranach the Elder's diptych, Adam and Eve (around 1530). These paintings were among 800 works stolen from the Old Masters dealership in the Netherlands, owned by Jacques Goudstikker, a Dutch Jew, by Nazi Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring in 1940.

Previous litigation for the Cranach diptych resulted in a judgment for the museum. In 2018, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed the case based on the“act of state” doctrine, which prevents U.S. courts from adjudicating actions of the Dutch government within its borders, including the alleged wrongful sale of the Cranach paintings to a third party. This prior lawsuit was brought by Marei von Saher, Goudstikker's sole surviving heir.

The current lawsuit relies on California's new law, which permits new claims even if previously dismissed on procedural grounds. It was brought by Von Saher's assignees, Daniel Gryczman and the Jewish Federation Council of Greater Los Angeles. The NSM has characterized the new lawsuit as a“misguided and meritless” action aimed at reversing its prior judgment, and is seeking a permanent injunction to prevent re-litigation. Representatives for the museum state that the previous judgment dismissed Von Saher's claims“on the merits” and quieted NSM's title to the Cranach diptych, requesting the court grant its petitions to spare it“the open-ended threat of future litigation.”

A third lawsuit, based on the new California law, is also progressing. The daughters of Czech Jewish artist Dina Gottliebova Babbitt are seeking to recover portraits Babbitt was forced to create while imprisoned at the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp from the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum (ABM) in Poland. According to a representative for the ABM, the museum, an instrumentality of Poland, has not yet been formally joined to the case under the process required to sue a foreign government instrumentality, nor has it filed a response. Babbitt's daughters filed their complaint in September.

The HEAR Act amendment is also being challenged in other federal courts. One case, filed against Austria and two Austrian museums in the federal district court for the Southern District of New York, is examining the constitutionality of the HEAR Act's invalidation of otherwise applicable defenses.

These legal battles have a direct impact on American museums, shaping how they manage and litigate claims related to Nazi-looted art.

Source: The Art Newspaper

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