Law Commons^™

Locke-Ing Down Nonsense Trademarks: Applying The Property Theory Of John Locke To The Issue Of Nonsense Trademarks, Jake H. Howell

Catholic University Journal of Law and Technology

In 2019, the United States Patent and Trademark Office received almost half a million trademark applications. This was the tenth year in a row in which the number of applications received broke the record from the previous year. Since 2015 there has been a marked increase in the number of applications for trademarks that are unusual. These applications are for trademarks that consist of an apparently random string of letters unpronounceable in English and with no meaning in another language. These unusual trademarks have come to be known as nonsense trademarks. Nonsense trademarks are a growing problem in intellectual property. …

American Star Chamber: Online Misinformation, Government Intervention, And The Intellectual Matrix Of The First Amendment, Emily E. Burton

Catholic University Journal of Law and Technology

Just as monarchs and clerical authorities struggled to respond to seditious and heretical writings enabled by the invention of the printing press, twenty-first century governments are experiencing a similar information revolution as a result of the digital age and a rising tide of what the United States has labeled online misinformation. Like the printing press, the Internet has enabled the spread of information at an exponentially lower cost and an exponentially higher speed as it extends the ability to publish thoughts and opinions to an increasingly diverse array of individuals. Although this was largely celebrated during the first two decades …

Whose Highest And Best? Including Economic Development And Individual Landownership In The Highest And Best Use Standard, Brigid Sawyer

Catholic University Law Review

Real property is a finite resource. As a result, two theories of land use most frequently in tension are economic development and individual land ownership. In tracing key places in American history where these two theories conflict, it is seen that economic development is often prioritized over individual land ownership. This Comment analyzes the connections between the Founding Era philosophy on property law, Native American land takings, and eminent domain takings and proposes a new definition of the highest and best use valuation standard, one that accounts for both economic development and individual land ownership. This new standard allows both …

De Libero Conscientia: Martin Luther’S Rediscovery Of Liberty Of Conscience And Its Synthesis Of The Ancients And The Influence Of The Moderns, Bessie S. Blackburn

Liberty University Journal of Statesmanship & Public Policy

One fateful day on March 26, 1521, a lowly Augustinian monk was cited to appear before the Diet of Worms.[1] His habit trailed behind him as he braced for the questioning. He was firm, yet troubled. He boldly proclaimed: “If I am not convinced by proofs from Scripture, or clear theological reasons, I remain convinced by the passages which I have quoted from Scripture, and my conscience is held captive by the Word of God. I cannot and will not retract, for it is neither prudent nor right to go against one’s conscience. So help me God, …

Public Law, Precarity, And Access To Justice, Amnon Lev

Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies

In the first part, I examine Thomas Hobbes' theory of commonwealth to see how it situates subjects in relation to justice. Hobbes famously founds his commonwealth on the equal subjection of all to the Leviathan, which is the equal subjection of all to law. We need to understand why he nevertheless needs to accommodate the diversity of society-the basic fact that some are weak while others are not-into the operation of the public law machine. As we shall see, the accommodation of social diversity is tied to a proto-liberal distinction between social spheres that relegates much of human life to …

Access To Justice For Collective And Diffuse Rights: Theoretical Challenges And Opportunities For Social Contract Theory, Colin Crawford

Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies

This analysis consists of three principal parts. First, it briefly reviews the classical contract account that explains how and why individuals enter civil society, found in the writings of both Hobbes and Locke. The analysis then examines the limited extent to which classical contract theory treats questions of rights vindication or, in more modern terms, with questions of access to justice. Second, the analysis examines the nature of collective and diffuse rights claims and will make a case for their importance in the modern world. Third, the analysis seeks to identify arguments from the classical account that might be useful …

A Georgist Perspective Of Petroleum Taxation, Joseph Leeson

Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies

Over a century ago, the town of Arden, Delaware, was founded on a unique single-tax-community system that radically altered the popular concept of land ownership. This system was premised on concepts developed by a man few know today but who was a major figure in economics during the 1800s, Henry George. George's public finance theory has been described as having received "intermittent attention over the years, with many eminent names in economics making at least a passing comment, but it has seen comparably little action in the policy debate arena and has been largely ignored by the modern era of …

Cities, Government, Law, And Civil Society, Heidi Li Feldman

Florida State University Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Light Of Nature: John Locke, Natural Rights, And The Origins Of American Religious Liberty, Steven J. Heyman

Marquette Law Review

This Article explores John Locke’s theory of religious liberty, which deeply influenced the adoption of the First Amendment and the first state bills of rights. Locke sharply criticized the religious and political order of Restoration England—a regime in which the king claimed to hold absolute power by divine right and in which individuals were required by law to conform to the established church.

In opposition to this regime, Locke developed a powerful theory of human beings as rational creatures who were entitled to think for themselves, to direct their own actions, and to pursue their own happiness within the bounds …

Intellectual Property And The Prisoner’S Dilemma: A Game Theory Justification Of Copyrights, Patents, And Trade Secrets, Adam D. Moore

Fordham Intellectual Property, Media and Entertainment Law Journal

In this article, I will offer an argument for the protection of intellectual property based on individual self-interest and prudence. In large part, this argument will parallel considerations that arise in a prisoner’s dilemma game. In brief, allowing content to be unprotected in terms of free access leads to a sub-optimal outcome where creation and innovation are suppressed. Adopting the institutions of copyright, patent, and trade secret is one way to avoid these sub-optimal results.

Conceptions Of Religion In The Secular State: Evolving Turkish Secularism, Seval Yildirim

Pepperdine Law Review

The article focuses on the concepts of religion in secular states such as Republic of Turkey. Topics discussed include distinction between secularism and religion, views of philosopher of liberalism John Locke on delegation of matters of faith to the Church and matters of public good to the state along with the relationship of modernization and secularism.

The Tragedy Of The Commons: A Hybrid Approach To Trade Secret Legal Theory, Jonathan R.K. Stroud

Chicago-Kent Journal of Intellectual Property

Current theories governing trade secrets law incompletely and inadequately protect substantial investment in innovation, rendering them inefficient, reactionary, and largely illusory. Trade secret law exists to fill a gap between other forms of intellectual property and to encourage substantial investment in innovation and to recoup the time and money expended pursuing it, to the long-term benefit of the greater public good. Without strong trade secret protections, the “tragedy of the commons” would lead to the unfair destruction of the fruits of capital and labor and discourage investment in activities calculated to benefit the public, thus hurting our society. I propose …

Toward A Lockean Moral Justification Of Legal Protection Of Intellectual Property, Kenneth Einar Himma

San Diego Law Review

This Article attempts to provide the beginnings of a viable moral justification for recognizing and providing legal protection of intellectual property. The argument follows a line of arguments that is fairly characterized as “inspired” by John Locke’s attempt to justify legal protection of what he took to be a natural, objective, moral right to material property. That is to say, it is Lockean in spirit in the following sense: Locke grounds his argument for original acquisition in the idea that a person is justified in acquiring something from the commons in virtue of an investment he makes of something that …

The Relationship Between Foundations And Principles In Ip Law, Robert P. Merges

San Diego Law Review

In my book Justifying Intellectual Property (JIP), I wrote about what I call the “foundations” of the field of intellectual property (IP) law. I tried to distinguish between a foundational level of discourse and another level, the level of basic principles. In the San Diego conference at which my book was discussed—and in several other settings as well—the most frequent and persistent line of questioning about my book centered on the relationship between these two levels. That is what this brief Article is about.

Managing The Intellectual Property Sprawl, Shubha Ghosh

San Diego Law Review

Professor Merges, despite the centrality of creative persons to his argument, organizes a set of ideas that are conducive to refocusing intellectual property law on users. I present this user-focused argument in this Article through the following five Parts. Part II explains my suggested approach to questions about the design of intellectual property law—an approach based on the new institutional economics and the work of Ronald Coase. Part II also addresses objections to this approach. Part III identifies the user in Professor Merges’s high-level principles grounded in Locke, Kant, and Rawls. Part IV follows this argument with a closer examination …

A Lockean Theory Of Intellectual Property Revisited, Adam D. Moore

San Diego Law Review

The primary, and perhaps sole, function of government according to Locke was to secure and protect the lives, liberties, and property of individuals who consented, explicitly or tacitly, to a specific political union. The question that I will address in this Article, and one that I took up over fifteen years ago, is: should we consider intellectual works to be the proper subjects of Lockean property claims? My answer then and now is “yes,” with the acknowledgement that such a view may require substantial revisions to Anglo-American systems of intellectual property. I will argue that intellectual property rights are no …

Possessing Trademarks: Can Blackstone Or Locke Apply To Fast Food, Grocery Stores, And Virtual Sex Toys?, Jesse R. Dill

Marquette Intellectual Property Law Review

Trademark law has evolved extensively over time and is justified today for different reasons than when American law first recognized it. Scholars today question whether trademarks should now be accepted as a form of real property. Two examples of trademark problems in the global economy demonstrate that the time has come for marks to be recognized as property. Whether business entities are entering new territories or consumers are crossing borders to new jurisdictions with greater ease than ever before, trademark must adapt to the demands of modern commercial competitors. This Comment takes the position that these demands require treating trademarks …

Counting The Dragon's Teeth And Claws: The Definition Of Hard Paternalism, Thaddeus Pope

Georgia State University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Reason To Ratify: The Influence Of John Locke's Religious Beliefs On The Creation And Adoption Of The United States Constitution, David L. Wardle

Seattle University Law Review

The pervasive influence of Lockean religious convictions motivated the framers of the Constitution to establish a new form of government, provided the theoretical basis for the document itself, and inspired its popular ratification. Part II will lay the groundwork for this thesis by outlining Locke's life and sources of his religious beliefs. Part III will undertake a more substantive examination of Locke's opinions and the writings that memorialized them. Establishing how Lockean ideas of natural law, social contract, and reason are related to the inspiration, drafting, and acceptance of the Constitution takes place in Part IV, before the article's conclusion …

Religious Tolerance And Its Limits In Early America, George Dargo

Northern Illinois University Law Review

This article posits that religious toleration in early America was rooted in practical considerations amid the necessities of settlement. The British colonies in North America achieved an unparalleled degree of religious liberty. Even groups that were on the social margins of American life--e.g., Roman Catholics, Jews, African Americans--gained a measure of social recognition and religious toleration because they found a role or served certain necessary functions in a developing society. Native Americans were not similarly treated because they were never able to establish equivalent functional utility. Philosophical advocates of Religious Toleration and Freedom of Conscience--principally Roger Williams and John Locke--envisaged …

Machiavellian Jurisprudence: The United States Supreme Court's Doctrinal Approach To Political Speech Under The First Amendment, Garth Molander

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Why The Reagan Administration Resists Radical Transformation Of The Constitution, Gary C. Leedes

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

No abstract provided.

The History Of Legal Education In Virginia, W. Hamilton Bryson

University of Richmond Law Review

The English Inns of Court in London had ceased to perform their educational functions in the middle of the seventeenth century. For the next hundred years or so, there was no formal or organized instruction of the English common law. Lawyers, both barristers and solicitors in England and in America, learned their profession as best they could in unstructured situations. They learned by serving as apprentices or clerks to practicing lawyers, by the independent reading of law books, and by observation in the courtroom itself.

John Locke And The Declaration Of Independence, Kenneth D. Stern

Cleveland State Law Review

In an article published in the Journal of the American Bar Association in 1949, Dean Clarence Manion, then Dean of the College of Law of the University of Notre Dame, stated, "It is misleading to attribute the philosophy of the Declaration (of Independence) to the writings of John Locke." Dean Manion feels that Locke implies that the rights of minority groups and even of individuals are subordinated to the dictates of the majority. Manion concluded that Jefferson's philosophy contrasts sharply with the Lockian creed. A more thorough examination of Locke's writings, however, tends to lead to the opposite conclusion.