Abstract:
Chronicling the tumultuous birth of federal trademark law in America from 1860 through 1882, In Search of the Trade-Mark Cases examines how understandings of the Treaty Power, Commerce Clause, and Intellectual Property clause shifted through that period. While focused on the Supreme Court's 1879 decision holding the federal trademark code unconstitutional, the history of the acts found unconstitutional and the acts enacted subsequent to the decision for trademarks are likewise examined. Among the discoveries this yields is a greater appreciation for the importance of international treaties in the development of American trademark law, and a clearer picture of how the Supreme Court arrived at its decision that trademarks were not "writings" for purposes of the Constitution
Abstract: When criticism is made of the operation of the federal system in Australia, the answer often proposed is 'regionalism'. Sometimes what is meant is the introduction of a fourth tier of regional governments, but more often what is proposed is the abolition of State and local governments and the creation instead of a two-tiered system of national and regional governments. A third alternative that has been raised is the creation of a number of new States so that each region becomes a State, as this may be constitutionally easier to achieve than the abolition of the existing states. This article examines these various proposals, assessing whether they are likely to achieve their purported aims and raising the many practical problems that would arise if they were to be implemented. It ends by noting the difficulty in assessing regionalism proposals due to their lack of clarity and detail and concludes that the case for regionalism as an alternative to federalism or as a means of reforming it has not yet been made out.
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