False Claims Act Insights - The Mathematics of Nuclear FCA Verdicts
Podcast - Diamond Alternative Energy, LLC v. EPA: The Intersection of Constitutional and Environmental Law
Solicitors General Insights: The Tale of Two Washingtons — Regulatory Oversight Podcast
The Presumption of Innocence Podcast: Episode 65 -The Power of Interpretation: Constitutional Meaning in the Modern World
The Presumption of Innocence Podcast: Episode 64 - Cages We Built: The Making of Mass Incarceration in America
Solicitors General Insights: The Legal Frontlines in Iowa and Indiana — Regulatory Oversight Podcast
Ampliación del fuero de paternidad
Consumer Finance Monitor Podcast Episode: The Impact of the Election on the FTC
Solicitors General Insights: A Deep Dive With Mississippi and Tennessee Solicitors General — Regulatory Oversight Podcast
Consumer Finance Monitor Podcast Episode: Everything You Want to Know About the CFPB as Things Stand Today, and Lots More - Part 2
Podcast - FTC Commissioner Dismissals: Background and Implications
FCPA Compliance Report: Death of CTA
Consumer Finance Monitor Podcast Episode: Prominent Journalist, David Dayen, Describes his Reporting on the Efforts of Trump 2.0 to Curb CFPB
Consumer Finance Monitor Podcast Episode: Prof. Hal Scott Doubles Down on His Argument That CFPB is Unlawfully Funded Because of Combined Losses at Federal Reserve Banks
The Presumption of Innocence Podcast: Episode 55 - The Power of the Presidential Pardon: Traditions and Turning Points
False Claims Act Insights - Are the FCA’s Qui Tam Provisions Unconstitutional? One Federal Judge Says “Yes"
In That Case: Alexander v. South Carolina State Conference of the NAACP
#WorkforceWednesday® - SpaceX Victory: Court Questions NLRB's Constitutional Authority - Employment Law This Week®
#WorkforceWednesday: Can FTC’s Non-Compete Ban Survive Without Chevron Deference? - Spilling Secrets Podcast
Down Goes Chevron: A 40-Year Precedent Overturned by the Supreme Court – Diagnosing Health Care
Recent Supreme Court decisions underscore how viewpoint-based refusals of trademark applications are unconstitutional. But can these viewpoint-based refusals survive under the "failure-to-function" doctrine instead?...more
To guide potential trademark owners and to foster strong protection for trademarks under U.S. law, the Lanham Act; 15 U.S.C. §1052, defines the types of trademarks and service which marks can be registered by whittling away...more
Referred to as the “names clause”, the Lanham Act prohibits registration of a mark that consists of or comprises a name that identifies a particular living individual without written consent.1 This includes full names,...more
On June 13, 2024, the Supreme Court handed down its decision in Vidal v. Elster, a case that pitted trademark law against the First Amendment’s free speech protections. While the Court unanimously upheld the Patent and...more
In Vidal v. Elster, a unanimous Supreme Court of the United States reversed the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit’s decision, holding that the Lanham Act’s names clause does not violate the First Amendment or...more
In a landmark decision written by Justice Clarence Thomas, the Supreme Court has unanimously upheld the constitutionality of the Lanham Act’s provision that prohibits the registration of trademarks consisting of, or...more
Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court decided in Vidal v. Ester, 602 U.S. ___ (2024) that the federal prohibition on registering trademarks that identify a living individual without their consent does not violate the First...more
The June 13, 2024, U.S. Supreme Court decision in Vidal v. Elster made waves in the trademark community. All of the Court’s decisions are significant, and this matter was of particular interest because the decision marked the...more
During the 2016 presidential debate, Senator Marco Rubio taunted Donald Trump for having “small hands.” Now, more than seven years later, progressive activist Steve Elster is continuing his fight to trademark the phrase...more
The U.S. Supreme Court continues to show interest in trademark issues with its recent grant of certiorari in another case pitting the Lanham Act against the First Amendment....more
The question of whether a would-be trademark, “TRUMP TOO SMALL,” warrants a First Amendment exception to the Lanham Act’s prohibition on registering a living person’s name as a trademark without that person’s permission has...more
The Supreme Court granted certiorari and will review the Federal Circuit’s opinion that Section 2(c) of the Lanham Act is unconstitutional as applied to a trademark for the term TRUMP TOO SMALL. The TRUMP TOO SMALL trademark...more
Revisiting jurisprudence touching on the Lanham Act and the First Amendment from the Supreme Court’s decisions in Matal v. Tam and Iancu v. Brunetti, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit held that applying Sec....more
IN RE STEVE ELSTER - Before Dyk, Taranto, and Chen. Appeal from the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board. Summary: The Patent and Trademark Office violated the First Amendment by refusing to register the trademark TRUMP...more
On June 24, 2019, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Iancu v. Brunetti, struck down the Lanham Act’s prohibition on the registration of “immoral” or “scandalous” trademarks. Justice Kagan wrote for the 6-3 majority, holding that the...more
In a 6–3 opinion, the Supreme Court of the United States affirmed a 2017 US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit decision holding the ban on registration of immoral or scandalous trademarks under the Lanham Act to be an...more
“FUCT.” You can pronounce it as four letters, one after the other. Or you can pronounce it like Justice Kagan as the “past participle form of a well-known word of profanity.” Either way, the word can be registered as a...more
Last week, on June 24, 2019, the United States Supreme Court ruled that the Lanham Act’s “immoral or scandalous” bar to trademark registration constitutes viewpoint discrimination in violation of the First Amendment, and thus...more
In a decision that is likely to trigger a rush to register trademarks that may be seen as obscene, vulgar, or profane, the U.S. Supreme Court recently determined, in a 6-3 opinion authored by Justice Elena Kagan, that a...more
In permitting the registration of the “vulgar” term FUCT, the Supreme Court recently extended its 2016 ruling from Matal v. Tam, which allowed the registration of the trademark THE SLANTS for an Asian-American rock band...more
The road to permitting the registration of George Carlin's "seven dirty words" began in 2017, with the Supreme Court holding unconstitutional the Trademark Act's prohibition against registration of trademarks which are...more
On June 24, 2019, the United States Supreme Court, in Iancu v. Brunetti, reviewing the trademark application for “FUCT”, held that the Lanham’s Act’s provision, prohibiting the registration of “immoral[] or scandalous”...more
In our prior blog entries... we followed the course of Matal v. Tam, the case involving the mark “THE SLANTS.” In that case, the Supreme Court struck down a portion of Section 2(a) of the Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. § 1052(a), on...more
On Monday, the Supreme Court held that the ban on “immoral or scandalous” trademarks was unconstitutional under the First Amendment. The Court found that, as with the recently struck down ban on “disparaging” marks, the ban...more
The U.S. Supreme Court this week officially pulled the plug on the Lanham Act’s prohibition on the registration of trademarks that comprise “immoral” or “scandalous” matter on First Amendment grounds. The prohibition, found...more