OpenGlyph — Catalogue of the American Public DomainJurisdiction: United StatesRev. 2026.08
Images / art

Two archives, queried live.

Every record below comes from The Met or Smithsonian Open Access and was filtered on that archive’s own rights field before it reached this page. 17 shown for “Pinback button advocating for Home Rule” — 48 records examined, 17 dropped by the rights gate.

Archives queried 2026-09-04 18:17 UTC · fetched live for this request

Object
Public domainThe Met’s isPublicDomain field is true for this object.
CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian’s metadata_usage.access reads CC0 — a waiver, not an expired term.
Not shownAnything failing its archive’s rights field is dropped server-side and never appears here.
Commode à vantaux, by David Roentgen

Commode à vantaux

David Roentgen · ca. 1775–79 with later alterations

Public domainThe Met
Pinback button advocating for Home Rule

Pinback button advocating for Home Rule

Artist not stated in the record · before 1973

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Circus Sideshow (Parade de cirque), by Georges Seurat

Circus Sideshow (Parade de cirque)

Georges Seurat · 1887–88

Public domainThe Met
Pinback Button, "Home Rule Charter, Yes!"

Pinback Button, "Home Rule Charter, Yes!"

Artist not stated in the record · 1974

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Poem of Farewell to Liu Man, by Yelü Chucai

Poem of Farewell to Liu Man

Yelü Chucai · dated 1240

Public domainThe Met
Pinback button advocating for a Civilian Review Board

Pinback button advocating for a Civilian Review Board

Artist not stated in the record · ca. 1970

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Four anecdotes from the life of Wang Xizhi, by Zhao Mengfu

Four anecdotes from the life of Wang Xizhi

Zhao Mengfu · 1310s

Public domainThe Met
Pinback button advocating for Angela Davis

Pinback button advocating for Angela Davis

Artist not stated in the record · 1971-1972

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Apothecary Jar with Running Hares and a Dog

Apothecary Jar with Running Hares and a Dog

Artist not stated in the record · 12th century

Public domainThe Met
Pinback button advocating for education in Harlem

Pinback button advocating for education in Harlem

Artist not stated in the record · 1950-2000

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Pinback button advocating against child abuse

Pinback button advocating against child abuse

Artist not stated in the record · 1950-2000

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Pinback button for the Milwaukee 14

Pinback button for the Milwaukee 14

Artist not stated in the record · 1968

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Pinback button supporting Keep Biafra Alive

Pinback button supporting Keep Biafra Alive

Artist not stated in the record · 1967-1970

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Pinback Button, "Advisory Councils Yes!"

Pinback Button, "Advisory Councils Yes!"

Artist not stated in the record · ca. 1973

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Pinback button advocating against drugs

Pinback button advocating against drugs

Artist not stated in the record · 1950-2000

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Pinback button supporting African Liberation

Pinback button supporting African Liberation

Artist not stated in the record · October 1973

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
Pinback Button, "Free D.C."

Pinback Button, "Free D.C."

Artist not stated in the record · Late 20th century

CC0 (public-domain equivalent)Smithsonian
What was queried

Where these records came from.

Two archives are wired, and only two. Each one is filtered on its own rights field — never on a title match, and never on the presence of an image file.

  • The Met Collection API (Open Access)Rights field: isPublicDomain. 8 matched · 8 examined · 3 dropped by the rights gate. Kept only where isPublicDomain === true and a file URL was published.5 shown
  • Smithsonian Open Access API (api.si.edu)Rights field: content.descriptiveNonRepeating.metadata_usage.access. 544560 matched · 40 examined · 14 dropped by the rights gate. Kept only where metadata_usage.access === "CC0" and an image resource was published.12 shown

These figures describe the pass run at 2026-09-04 18:17 UTC, during this request. A completed pass is kept for 24 hours and replayed for an identical search, which is what keeps repeated queries inside Smithsonian’s 30-requests-per-hour allowance. A pass in which either archive failed to answer is never kept — an outage must not be replayed as though it were a finding about the catalogue.

Wikimedia Commons and the Library of Congress are deliberately not wired. Wikimedia was confirmed, on a live query, to return CC-BY material inside the same result set as genuine public domain works, and filtering it safely has not been designed yet. loc.gov was blocked by bot detection during the source evaluation, so its rights vocabulary has never been observed — and nothing here is built on a field nobody has read.

An image file is a rights claim. It never travels without its field.