Picking up a torch last carried by the late Sen. Edward Kennedy, lobbying efforts are underway to enact into U.S. federal law a droit de suite right enjoyed in the U.K. and elsewhere, that is, a right for an artist to be compensated upon subsequent sales of his or her work. American law has long resisted the concept of secondary market compensation for artists, and Kennedy’s efforts to write droite de suite into American law failed in the course of the enactment of the Visual Artists Rights Act in 1987. European nations have struggled to quantify the effect of inconsistent droite de suite legislation; some argue that the piecemeal regime has simply pushed sales into countries without it, others note that U.K. art sales have continued to rise.
After initial coverage of the renewed effort, it is difficult to predict if this issue has any legs. The late Sen. Kennedy's attempt, after all, was more than twenty years ago. Arguments about on all sides about Europe's fractured regime, some say it drives sales out of the countries that provide the right, others say it doesn't matter.
From here, as with any regulatory regime, the goal should be uniformity.
