Delta Lambda Phi, a national Greek organization founded in 1986 to promote the interests of gay, bisexual, transgender, and progressive students, recently accused Delta Lambda Psi of trademark infringement. Founded in 2005, Delta Lambda Psi describes itself as "the first gender-neutral Greek club, with a strong commitment to being involved with the GLBTQQIA community." It is also known as "The World's...

As reported by Law360, the Second Circuit last Monday affirmed the dismissal of Jovani Fashion Ltd.'s copyright case against clothing designer Fiesta Fashions . Jovani Fashion, Ltd. v. Fiesta Fashions, 2012 U.S. App. LEXIS 21245 (2d Cir. N.Y. Oct. 15, 2012) [ enhanced version available to lexis.com subscribers ]. The Second Circuit rejected Jovani's claim that its prom dress merited copyright protection. Jovani...

By Allison Torrence, Associate, Jenner & Block As discussed previously in this blog, Federal Appeals Court Strikes Down Cross-State Air Pollution Rule , the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ("D.C. Circuit") vacated the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (the "Transport Rule") on August 21, 2012, in EME Homer City Generation, LP v. Environmental Protection Agency...

By J. Cullen Howe, Environmental Law Specialist, Arnold & Porter LLP In March, The Rockefeller Foundation and DB Climate Change Advisors released a research paper entitled United States Building Energy Efficiency Retrofits: Market Sizing and Financing Models . Among other things, the report makes the following findings with respect to energy efficiency retrofits in terms of energy savings, greenhouses...

In United States v. Jones [ enhanced version available to lexis.com subscribers ], the Supreme Court announced that a warrant is required to track a suspect by attaching a GPS device to the suspect's vehicle, even though the suspects' movements are public and could be fully discovered by simple visual surveillance. The decision not only alters the court's expectation of privacy analysis, but is likely to have...

Plaintiffs filed a complaint challenging the constitutionality of the ban on compensation for human organs in the National Organ Transplant Act ( Flynn v. Holder , No. 10-4009, 6th Circ., 2012 U.S. App. LEXIS 6255). Plaintiffs are comprised of a group of parents with children suffering from leukemia and other diseases that require bone marrow transplants for survival, adults suffering side effects from transplants...

Consumers are attracted to organic products because they are perceived to be healthier than conventional food sources. To borrow a phrase from Porgy & Bess (as I have done in the past), it ain't necessarily so. [See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kP5O_NUhrK0 .] Organic brown rice syrup has become an alternative to high fructose corn syrup as a sweetener in food. High fructose corn syrup has been criticized...

The subject of employer compelled disclosure of employee social media passwords has swept the blog and news worlds. Facebook has weighed in on the subject, and Senators Blumenthal and Schummer have asked the EEOC and the Department of Justice to investigate whether such demands violate current law. Jon Hyman at the Ohio Employer's Law Blog has an excellent analysis of the subject. Given the attention that the NLRB...

First, some good news. Prior posts have noted repeatedly the key role that methane plays in global warming (the longterm trend in temperature, not seasonal or annual variations). Prior posts have also noted the role that particulates-aerosols play in global warming, and their adverse effect on human health. Cutting the amounts of methane and "soot" that are poured into the atmospher would diminish warming...

By Mirela V. Hristova Excerpt from Are Intellectual Property Rights Human Rights? Patent Protection and the Right to Health , 93 J. Pat. & Trademark Off. Soc'y 339 (November 2011) A Burgeoning Conflict Laurence Heifer has famously observed that - while intellectual property and human rights "were once strangers[,]" and have "[f]or decades . . . developed in virtual isolation from each other...

In 1963, Nicholas Kaldor published a paper in Foreign Affairs about the ongoing fiscal problems of poor countries, entitled " Will Underdeveloped Countries Learn to Tax? " It turns out Kaldor should have aimed this advice at his own country, as the rich world, confident in its fiscal advice to the poor throughout the 60s through the 90s, was busy eroding its own ability to finance the needs of the prosperous...

"Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer" is one of the most popular holiday songs around and is played on radio stations across the country every Christmas season. It is also now the subject of contentious copyright litigation after a federal judge ruled recently that litigation over an allegedly unauthorized YouTube video containing audio of the song can continue despite the absence of a co-owner of the copyright...

By Tiana Leia Russell* *J.D., 2005, New York University of Law; M.A., 2009, Aarhus University Excerpt from Unlocking the Genome: The Legal Case against Genetic Diagnostic Patents , 16 Marq. Intell. Prop. L. Rev. 81 (Winter 2012) I. Introduction We are on the leading edge of a true revolution in medicine, one that promises to transform the traditional "one size fits all' approach into a much more powerful...

By Sarah M. Wong* * J.D. Candidate, 2012, Marquette University Law School. Excerpt from Environmental Initiatives and the Role of the USPTO'S Green Technology Pilot Program , 16 Marq. Intell. Prop. L. Rev. 233 (Winter 2012) I. Introduction The United States (U.S.) has entered a heightened state of environmental awareness. America's history of industrialization and consumerism in the early 1900s resulted...

- Compiled by KOREY CLARK More than a dozen states have passed new voting laws that supporters say were necessary to deter fraud and opponents say will dampen minority voter turnout in next year's elections. Last week the Obama administration placed itself squarely if circumspectly in the latter camp, with Attorney General Eric Holder's announcement that the Justice Department would be aggressively reviewing...

By Jay Shapiro, Partner Katten Muchin Rosenman LLP In one of its first decisions of the new Term, the Supreme Court seized the opportunity to restate and clarify and restate three important rules in interrogation cases. Bobby v. Dixon, a decision issued on November 7, 2011, involved a state murder case from Ohio. The Supreme Court in its per curium reversal of a Sixth Circuit ruling that granted the petitioner habeas...

By Aya Eguchi* *B.S.E., Duke University, Pratt School of Engineering, 2005; J.D. Candidate, Cornell Law School, 2012; Editor, Cornell Law Review, Volume 97. Excerpt from Curtailing Copycat Couture: The Merits of the Innovative Design Protection and Piracy Prevention Act and a Licensing Scheme for the Fashion Industry, 97 Cornell L. Rev. 131 (November, 2011) Introduction Forever 21, a "cheap-chic" fashion...

By Joel S. Newman In the late 1940s and early 1950s, Robert Paxton McCulloch almost built a steam-powered automobile, but abandoned the project in 1954. A foreman with his company claimed that the abandonment was caused by unfavorable tax laws. Perhaps the most ironic thing is that the same complaints about the state of the R&D tax laws pre-1954 still exist to this day. Things were complex and uncertain then;...

The Obama Administration's housing finance reform proposal sets forth 3 options for the restructuring of long-term housing finance. In this Analysis, Kenneth E. Kohler , Melissa Beck , Anna T. Pinedo and Jerry R. Marlatt , of Morrison & Foerster LLP, discuss the three options in detail. They write: The Proposal Ending months of suspense, on February 11, 2011, the Department of the Treasury and the Department...

AMATEUR SPORTS SYMPOSIUM: THE DEATH OF AMATEURISM: IMPLICATIONS FOR SPORT AND HEALTH Parents and athletes feel the pressure now to compete at all costs. Sports injuries to our youth are particularly important because minor youth sports injuries carry a significant risk factor for more severe injury during their youth and particularly during their adulthood. Thirty to fifty percent of all youth sports injuries are...

Recently, I wrote about how far we've come since 1943. Today, I bring you another reminder of how far yet we have to go. The EEOC has announced a lawsuit it filed against Bass Pro Outdoor World, LLC, for failing to hire African-American and Hispanic applicants for positions in its nationwide retail stores. According to the EEOC : Bass Pro has been discriminating in its hiring since at least November 2005. The...

President Obama has sent the American Jobs Act to Congress and it includes some noteworthy provisions that affect employers. In particular, the Act prohibits discrimination in employment on the basis of an individual's status as unemployed. This prohibition is within the subsection titled the Fair Employment Opportunity Act of 2011. The Act makes it unlawful for an employer to publish a job announcement stating that...

Our friends at the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission recently scored another big win in a pregnancy discrimination case -- actually got summary judgment against the employer, which is unusual. In this case, the employer apparently knew it had messed up and failed to contest the EEOC's motion with respect to two women's liability claims but did contest the liability claim of a third woman. The third...

by Ronald Weikers, Leslie Spasser and Rebecca Conner The laws governing data security impose varying obligations on businesses that maintain data, and courts are starting to weigh in as to the duties that exist between business customers and their vendors. This article summarizes recent legal developments in this area of the law, and provides practical pointers to assist counsel in negotiating contracts that minimize...