‘Georgia on my Mind’ enters public domain on Jan. 1

ATLANTA, Ga. (Atlanta News First) — The music and lyrics to Georgia’s official state song entered into public domain on Jan. 1, 2026.

But if anyone is thinking about hijacking Ray Charles’ timeless rendition, forget about it. That masterpiece is still under copyright protection.

Public Domain Day saw the release of thousands of copyrighted works that were first published in 1930 that still had active copyrights. Under U.S. law, published works get a term of 95 years from publication.

“And then the public can do things with it,” said Atlanta-based intellectual property attorney Doug Weinstein. “They can do promotions, commercials, they can do things that would be highly offensive to the original author. But that’s okay, the author got their cut and now it’s out in the public. Anyone can do anything they want to with it.”

In 1998, Sonny Bono - one half of the group Sonny and Cher - lobbied Congress to extend what used to be a 75-year copyright expiration date, extending it to 95 years through the “Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act of 1998.”

The music to “Georgia on My Mind” was composed by Hoagy Carmichael; its lyrics were written by Stuart Gorrell. The 1960 Ray Charles version of the song was adopted by the Georgia General Assembly as the official state song in 1979.

Charles was a Georgia native and the song is widely used as the state’s musical emblem.

Weinstein notes there’s a distinction between copyright and trademark.

“Copyrights protect the expression of an idea,” he said. “Trademarks are an indicator of the source of goods or services. Trademarks are actually there to protect the public, whereas copyrights are there to incentivize authors.”

Weinstein said copyright was adopted in the U.S. to incentivize creators of literature, art, music and entertainment by offering a level of legal ownership and protection.

According to Duke University, here are some of the other notable works first published in 1930 that entered the public domain Thursday:

Books and novels

• William Faulkner, As I Lay Dying
• Dashiell Hammett, The Maltese Falcon (the full book version)
• Agatha Christie, The Murder at the Vicarage (the first novel featuring Miss Marple)
• Carolyn Keene (pseudonym for Mildred Benson), the first four Nancy Drew books, beginning with The Secret of the Old Clock
• Watty Piper (pen name of Arnold Munk), The Little Engine That Could (the popular illustrated version, with drawings by Lois Lenski)
• William H. Elson, Elson Basic Readers (the first appearances of Dick and Jane)
• Noël Coward, Private Lives
• T.S. Eliot, Ash Wednesday
• John Dos Passos, The 42nd Parallel
• Edna Ferber, Cimarron
• Sigmund Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents (in the original German, Das Unbehagen in der Kultur)
• Bertrand Russell, The Conquest of Happiness

Characters and comics

• Betty Boop from Fleischer Studios’ Dizzy Dishes and other cartoons
• Rover (later renamed Pluto) from Disney’s The Chain Gang (as an unnamed bloodhound) and The Picnic (as Rover)
• Blondie and Dagwood from the Blondie comic strips by Chic Young
• Flip the Frog from Fiddlesticks and other cartoons, by Ub Iwerks after he left Disney
• Nine new Mickey Mouse cartoons, the initial week of Mickey Mouse comic strips, and 10 new Silly Symphonies cartoons from Disney

Films

• All Quiet on the Western Front, directed by Lewis Milestone (winner of the Academy Award for Best Picture)
• King of Jazz, directed by John Murray Anderson (musical revue featuring Paul Whiteman and Bing Crosby’s first feature-film appearance)
• Cimarron, directed by Wesley Ruggles (winner of the Academy Award for Best Picture, registered for copyright in 1930)
• Animal Crackers, directed by Victor Heerman (starring the Marx Brothers)
• Soup to Nuts, directed by Benjamin Stoloff (written by Rube Goldberg, featuring later members of The Three Stooges)
• Morocco, directed by Josef von Sternberg (starring Gary Cooper, Marlene Dietrich, and Adolphe Menjou)
• The Blue Angel (Der blaue Engel), directed by Josef von Sternberg (starring Marlene Dietrich)
• Anna Christie, directed by Clarence Brown (Greta Garbo’s first talkie)
• Hell’s Angels, directed by Howard Hughes (Jean Harlow’s film debut)
• The Big Trail, directed by Raoul Walsh (John Wayne’s first leading role)
• Murder!, directed by Alfred Hitchcock
• Free and Easy, directed by Edward Sedgwick (Buster Keaton’s first speaking role)

Musical compositions

• Four Songs - I Got Rhythm, I’ve Got a Crush on You, But Not for Me, and Embraceable You - with lyrics by Ira Gershwin, music by George Gershwin
• Dream a Little Dream of Me, lyrics by Gus Kahn, music by Fabian Andre and Wilbur Schwandt
• Beyond the Blue Horizon, lyrics by Leo Robin, music by Richard A. Whiting and W. Franke Harling (possible inspiration for the Star Trek theme song)
• The Royal Welch Fusiliers, by John Philip Sousa

Sound recordings

• Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen, recorded by Marian Anderson
• Yes Sir, That’s My Baby, recorded by Gene Austin
• Sweet Georgia Brown, recorded by Ben Bernie and His Hotel Roosevelt Orchestra
• You’ve Been A Good Old Wagon, recorded by Bessie Smith
• The St. Louis Blues, recorded by Bessie Smith, featuring Louis Armstrong
• Fascinating Rhythm, recorded by the Paul Whiteman Orchestra
• I’ll See You in My Dreams, recorded by Isham Jones, with Ray Miller’s Orchestra
• Everybody Loves My Baby (but My Baby Don’t Love Nobody but Me), recorded by Clarence Williams’ Blue Five
• If I Lose, Let me Lose (Mama Don’t Mind), recorded by Louis Armstrong, Fletcher Henderson, and Maggie Jones
• Manhattan, recorded by The Knickerbockers (Ben Selvin and his Orchestra)

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