Families have a legal right to their own dead. If there is no medical or legal hold on a body, it may be released to a family member for after-death care and final disposition. In most US states, families may care for their own dead. Eight states (according to Lisa Carlson and Josh Slocum, authors of Final Rights: Reclaiming the American Way of Death) make it necessary to use a funeral director. At the time of writing, these are Indiana, New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, Michigan, Illinois, Nebraska, and Louisiana.
Caring for our own dead is a sacred right and NT’s educational mission is closely tied to the premise that families have a right to their dead and to ritualize the death transition according to their own beliefs.
The National Funeral Consumers’ Alliance, FCA, is a good resource for information about consumer rights.