[Moonmad27]

Guys in the comments thank the resident for a law letting them keep these artifacts. All praise to Zero? The resident can’t write his own laws — yet.

[9thLife]

But there’s probably a way to tax them...

[tanknetter]

Guys in the comments thank the resident for a law letting them keep these artifacts. All praise to Zero? The resident can’t write his own laws — yet.

My recollection is that the law(s) on astronauts keeping artifacts from their spaceflights were on the books quite some time ago, and are pretty restrictive.

Specifically, they're still considered to be national property, just in the care of the astronauts. They can't be sold and (I think) can only be passed along to relatives. Otherwise they need to be returned to NASA.

There are some exceptions. I think I read somewhere that Alan Bean (Apollo XII LM Pilot, 4th man to walk on the moon) mixes small amounts of moon soil into the pain for his artwork. Which is really phenomenal stuff, if anyone would like to go out to the internet and take a look at it. One of my prized-possessions is a first edition copy of "Apollo : An Eyewitness Account By Astronaut/Explorer Artist/Moonwalker" autographed by Bean, Pete Conrad and Dick Gordon.