The US Copyright Office published a notice of inquiry on September 19, 2012 requesting public comments as to the feasibility and implications of legislation on a federal resale royalty rights for visual artists, which in Europe is called droit de suite.

Artists in the US currently enjoy limited rights of attribution and integrity under the Visual Artists Rights Act of 1990 (17 USC § 106A (2011)). However, the Copyright Act does not generally permit artists to control post-sale uses of original visual works. Instead, under the first sale doctrine, the acquirer of a visual work generally has the right to display, sell or dispose of the original work without the artist's permission.

However, as the Copyright Office notes, more than 60 countries, including each EU member state, now have resale royalty legislation. In addition, California enacted the California Resale Royalty Act in 1976, which applies to fine art sold in California, where the artists is a US citizen or California resident for more than two years (Cal Civ. Code § 986 (2011)). The California law was recently held to be unconstitutional by a federal district court in California and an appeal is currently pending before the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

The Copyright Office study will assess how a federal resale royalty right for visual artists would affect current and future practices of people involved in creating, licensing, selling, exhibiting, disseminating and preserving works of visual art. The notice also specifically asks for comments on:

Comments are due November 5, 2012 and should be submitted through the Copyright Office's website.