11/03/2020
Let’s get political…
Trust, goodwill, reliance, exclusivity...these things are required in the realm of trademarks and should be demanded of in the realm of political candidates. While we can’t say much for the latter, we can offer some content for consumption that’s on theme while (hopefully) is also an indulgently educational reprise from the real happenings of this Election Day 2020.
Trademarks are, at their most rudimentary level, source identifiers. A political candidate, at *some* level, is like a design mark for a party. They represent that party, and the party is the *source*. Candidates symbolize a particular party to voters and voters rely on them to uphold certain values, beliefs and policies.
Since we drew this parallel from political parties and candidates to trademarks, we wondered if the parties had sought registrations. Turns out, many parties have both successfully and unsuccessfully applied for various marks.
Trademark 101: A trademark registration grants you the right to exclusively use your mark to signify the source of your goods or services. Consumers rely on these every single day to choose brands that they trust. We call this trust “goodwill.”
Trademark 102: To register a trademark, you must identify the goods and services you offer in interstate commerce in connection with the mark.
Curious what our two main political parties think they offer the American public? We were too, so we checked it out. Here are a few of both major parties’ current trademark registrations:
• Reg. No. 2423459 - LIBERTARIAN PARTY (word mark) for political party services, namely, promoting the interests of a political party
• Reg No. 1892445 - Elephant (stylized mark) for legal services and association services, namely giving legal advice to candidates and state parties and promoting the goods, services and interests of Republican political party
• Reg. No. 4139881 - D (stylized mark) for a plethora of goods, including: Jewelry, lapel pins, bumper stickers; lapel stickers; printed publications, namely, pamphlets providing information regarding political candidates
Some more political party trademark stats:
• DNC - owns 5 live registrations and 1 application
• RNC - owns 14 live registrations and 5 applications
• Libertarians - own 3 live registrations
Finally, this isn’t legal advice, but please go out and vote today if you haven’t already.
PS - We found blog post from 2018 that goes into much more granular details on the makings of a political party trademark. If you’re wondering why only the Libertarian Party has it’s full party name for political services, then this article is for you! You can find it using the link in our bio.
#2020
