A Judicial Perspective on Using Technology at Oral Argument | Judge John Owens | Texas Appellate Law Podcast
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit will likely weigh in soon on the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) approval of Nasdaq’s board diversity rule that will require listed companies to disclose...more
Federal Appeals Court Rejects Government Bid To Reinstate Travel Ban - After hearing an emergency oral argument late Tuesday, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with a lower federal court judge and late today upheld...more
No reason to keep checking the SCOTUS website for the SEC’s cert petition in Natl Assoc. of Manufacturers v. SEC, the conflict minerals case. According to this letter from Attorney General Loretta Lynch to House Speaker Paul...more
As part of our continuing monitoring of this issue, we bring you the latest chapter in the saga over the registration of THE SLANTS trademark. After the en banc Federal Circuit struck down Section 2(a) as facially...more
The Federal Circuit sitting en banc recently held in Tam that Section 2(a) of the Lanham Act, which prohibits the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office from registering trademarks that “may disparage” persons, institutions, or...more
In the last several decades, the disparagement provision of § 2(a) of the Lanham Act has become a more frequent basis for rejection or cancellation of trademarks by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (PTO) and the...more
Federal Circuit Holds Refusal to Register Disparaging Trademarks is Unconstitutional - The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, sitting en banc, issued a ruling that Section 2(a) of the Lanham Act violates the...more
In September, we discussed In re Tam and the potential for a showdown over the constitutionality of Section 2(a) of the Lanham Act. At that time, a panel of the Federal Circuit had recently upheld the PTO’s refusal to...more
In the last several decades, the disparagement provision of § 2(a) of the Lanham Act has become a more frequent basis for rejection or cancellation of trademarks by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) and...more
The "Dancing Baby" Case—Ninth Circuit Rules That "Fair Use" Must First Be Considered Before Sending Takedown Notices Under the DMCA - Why it matters: On September 14, 2015, the Ninth Circuit ruled in Lenz v. Universal...more
The WSJ is reporting that, contrary to all expectations (including my own), “the U.S. Chamber of Commerce isn’t planning to mount a legal challenge to the Securities and Exchange Commission’s pay ratio rule.”...more
An amicus brief filed in the conflict minerals case, National Association of Manufacturers, Inc. v. SEC, was submitted this week by a group of anti-smoking and other organizations dedicated to protecting public health: Truth...more
On Friday, the SEC and Amnesty International each filed petitions seeking a rehearing en banc of the August 2015 panel opinion of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit regarding the conflict minerals...more
To no one’s surprise, on Friday, the SEC and Amnesty International filed petitions for en banc rehearing in the conflict minerals case, National Association of Manufacturers, Inc. v. SEC. That case, decided two-to-one in...more
Both the SEC, the loser in the most recent conflict minerals rehearing decision, and Amnesty International, an intervenor on the losing rehearing side, have asked for an en banc rehearing on the recent rehearing of the...more
On August 18, 2015, the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, in likely the first majority opinion citing Charles Dickens (A Tale of Two Cities) and George Orwell (Nineteen Eighty-Four), re-affirmed its...more
In a long-awaited decision, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (DC Circuit) reaffirmed its prior decision, striking down one aspect of the SEC’s conflict minerals disclosure...more
The Slants is a Portland-based band composed of musicians of Asian-American descent who characterize their genre as “Chinatown Dance Rock.” The band’s bassist, Simon Tam, filed a trademark application for THE SLANTS for...more
FEDERAL CIRCUIT CASES - Subjective Term Not Indefinite when Intrinsic Record Provides Reasonably Certain Scope - On remand from the Supreme Court, on April 27, 2015, the Federal Circuit reassessed whether...more
In the final week of 2014, appellants National Association of Manufacturers, U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Business Roundtable filed their supplemental brief in the conflict minerals case, National Association of...more
On August 15, 2014, in the conflict minerals case, National Association of Manufacturers v. Securities and Exchange Commission (D.C. Cir. 2014), Intervenors-Appellees Amnesty International filed a brief in support of its...more
As we have discussed over the last few months, the fate of the conflict minerals rule has been uncertain. In April 2014, in the National Association of Manufacturers (“NAM”) case, the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit...more
Section 1502 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (2010) added Section 13(p) to the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the Exchange Act), mandating that the SEC adopt regulations relating...more