Differences From Related Laws
Unlike copyright law which provides for criminal penalties as well as civil damages, trademark law in the United States is almost entirely enforced through private lawsuits. The exception is in the case of criminal counterfeiting of goods. Otherwise, the responsibility is entirely on the mark owner to file suit in either state or federal civil court in order to restrict an infringing use. Failure to "police" a mark by stopping infringing uses can result in the loss of protection.
Also in contrast to copyright or patent law, trademark protection has no expiration. As long as the mark is continually used, it can be protected from infringement indefinitely.
Because federal trademark law is derived from Congress' Commerce Clause power, and not a specific clause in the U.S. Constitution (like copyrights and patents), there must be some degree of interstate commerce present for a trademark to receive Lanham Act protection. The U.S. Supreme Court invalidated the first federal trademark law by finding that Congress could not stretch the Copyright Clause to cover trademarks, so Congress had to fall back to only those trademarks used in interstate commerce instead.
Read more about this topic: United States Trademark Law
Famous quotes containing the words differences, related and/or laws:
“The extent to which a parent is able to see a child’s world through that child’s eyes depends very much on the parent’s ability to appreciate the differences between herself and her child and to respect those differences. Your own children need you to accept them for who they are, not who you would like them to be.”
—Lawrence Balter (20th century)
“There is nothing but is related to us, nothing that does not interest us,—kingdom, college, tree, horse, or iron show,—the roots of all things are in man.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“What comes over a man, is it soul or mind
That to no limits and bounds he can stay confined?
You would say his ambition was to extend the reach
Clear to the Arctic of every living kind.
Why is his nature forever so hard to teach
That though there is no fixed line between wrong and right,
There are roughly zones whose laws must be obeyed?”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)