NFL Team Can Keep 'Redskins' Trademark

Yahoo! News (AP) ^ | 10/1/2003 | Sam Hananel

[Pyro7480]

NFL Team Can Keep 'Redskins' Trademark

By SAM HANANEL, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - A federal judge has overturned a ruling revoking the Washington Redskins trademark, finding there was insufficient evidence to conclude that the name is disparaging to American Indians.

U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly issued the ruling in connection with a 1999 decision by a panel of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. But she also made clear that her ruling does not address the issue of whether the name "Redskins" actually is offensive to Indians.

Redskins spokesman Karl Swanson said the team hadn't reviewed the entire ruling but "from what we've been told by our attorneys, we are pleased."

If the team lost, it could have been stripped of the exclusive rights to market the Redskins name.

The lawsuit began in 1992 when seven American Indians, led by Suzan Shown Harjo, asked the trademark office to cancel six trademarks containing the word "Redskin." In 1999, the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board granted a petition to cancel the team's trademark registrations because of a federal law, the Lanham Act, prohibiting registering "disparaging" names.

In her 84-page decision, issued late Tuesday, Kollar-Kotelly also found that the plaintiffs waited too long to make their claims under the law, which was in effect when the Redskins trademarks were registered in 1967.

[mitchbert]

Actually, I have always believed that the name was disparaging as well as the Canucks.

Searching my Canuck memory as much as I can, I am unable to recall one time I ever heard anyone suggest that the name was disparaging in the least. Now, if we had a team called the Labrador Newfies, that may be a different story, :-)

[Mad Dawgg]

"A group of Native American and non-Indian students of the University of Northern Colorado came up with the "Fighting Whites" to deliver a simple, sincere, message about ethnic stereotyping."

Yeah, I tried to order a Fighting Whities T-shirt but they ran out!

[DaughterOfAnIwoJimaVet]

You can get them now. : ) (I have one.)

[Hatteras]

"At least they don't call themselves the "Washington Savages," or the "Washington Firewater Drinkers."

...or the Washington Wizards.

[Mad Dawgg]

"You can get them now. : )"

Oh Joy, Oh Joy, it will indeed be a Merry Christmas for me!

[CounterCounterCulture]

I find it offensive. Whities, in general, don't fight. They roll over.

Hear comes Jesse Hi-Jackson! Better give the master extortionist millions of dollars so he don't hollah.

[smith288]

Miami University (OH) used to be the Redskins. But they bend like a wet noodle and changed to the Redhawks. Which, from my general guess is a red hawk. Though I did a quick search and there is hundreds of Indians sites related to the name "Redhawk". THIS IS AN OUTRAGE!!! Jk.

[Dante3]

I guess the Vikings now need not worry about changing their name. I myself would have no problems with a team being named Palefaces.

These lawsuits are absurd. Naming these teams is actually a compliment. Even the Irish have not objected to "Fighting Irish." No one would name a team "The Fighting Pedophiles" or "Raging Rapists."

[quark]

All this controversy makes me hungry. Think I'll go get some Oriental food, and after debate the judge's decision with my Negro neighbors.

[CounterCounterCulture]

No one would name a team "The Fighting Pedophiles" or "Raging Rapists."

The ACLU wouldn't have a problem with those.

[Hatteras]

"The lawsuit began in 1992 when seven American Indians, led by Suzan Shown Harjo...."

also known as the Thinskins...

[Carry_Okie]

Interesting. I still believe it is a disparaging mascot, but the courts have spoken. back to work....

What's disparaging about it? Teams don't take names with the intent to disparage but to emulate, in this case the strength, endurance, and heroism of Indian tribes.

What's wrong with that?

[TheBigB]

We should just refer to them as Gregg Easterbrook at ESPN.com does...the "Potomac Drainage Basin Indiginous Persons"

[Billthedrill]

Heck, I think it's a shame. Think of all the fun we could have had thinking up a more, er, "topical" name. I'm thinking the Fighting Kennedy Scubadivers, maybe...

[.cnI redruM]

Somehow a match of The Cowboys vs. The Chesapeak Watershed Region Indigenous Peoples loses some of its luster.

[Steve_Seattle]

A few years ago I saw an obviously Native American man standing in line at the store wearing a Redskins jacket. I think this anti-Indian-nickname thing is more of a Leftist cause than a grass-roots Indian cause.

[HenryLeeII]

No, Spurrier doesn't suck, he's just getting started. Just be glad he's no longer in the SEC to bedevil your Crimson Tide...

[DaughterOfAnIwoJimaVet]

Well, while I personally find the term "redskin" as offensive as if someone called blacks "BlackSkins"...

But, you see, that would never happen. People know better than to say things like that. For some reason, many people seem oblivious to ethnic slurs when it comes to American Indians. They don't even seem to be aware of what they're saying. I see it all the time on FreeRepublic, and it drives me crazy.

[69ConvertibleFirebird]

Being a season ticket holder of the Redskins I wouldn't have renewed next year if they cave to liberal special interests and changed ther name.

A local High School in Montgomery County, MD was forced to change their name from the Poolsville Indians to something different. How is Indian offensive? Only a liberal would know.

The head of the county school board is Jerry Weast. Many people are offended by his first name (Jerry - nickname for Nazi in WWII ) but he refused to change it. The nerve of those liberals!!!