Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/22-704_4246.pdf
Page Number: 17.0

Cite as:  602 U. S. ____ (2024) 

13 

Opinion of the Court 

Chemical  Co.  v.  Meyer,  139  U. S.  540,  544  (1891).    It  is 
therefore “an elementary principle that every man is enti-
tled  to  the  use  of  his  own  name  in  his  own  business.”    F. 
Treadway,  Personal  Trade-Names,  6  Yale  L.  J.  141,  143–
144 (1897) (Treadway); see also A. Greeley, Foreign Patent
and Trademark Laws §138, p. 135 (1899) (“The right of any 
one to place his own name on goods sold by him is recog-
nized  as  a  natural  right  and  cannot  be  interfered  with”).
“The  notion  that  people  should  be  able  to  use  their  own 
name to identify their goods or business is deeply rooted in 
American  mores.”    B.  Pattishall,  D.  Hilliard,  &  J.  Welch, 
Trademarks and Unfair Competition §2.06 (2001). 

Recognizing a person’s ownership over his name, the com-
mon  law  restricted  the  trademarking  of  names.    It  pre-
vented  a  person  from  trademarking  any  name—even  his 
own—by  itself.    In  “the  early  years  of  trademark  law,”
courts recognized that “ there can be no trade-mark in the 
name of a person, because . . . every person has the right to 
use his own name for the purposes of trade.”  2 McCarthy
§13:5 (internal quotation marks omitted); see also Restate-
ment §14, Comment e (“[A]t early common law, the recogni-
tion of an unencumbered right to use one’s name in trade 
effectively  precluded  the  existence  of  trademark  or  trade
name rights in personal names”); W. Browne, Law of Trade-
Marks §206, p. 219 (2d ed. 1885) (“The rule is, that a man
cannot turn his mere name into a trade-mark”); McLean v. 
Fleming, 96 U. S. 245, 252 (1878) (explaining that a person 
cannot obtain “the exclusive use of a name, merely as such,
without more”).

The common law did, however, allow a person to obtain a 
trademark containing his own name—with a caveat: A per-
son could not use a mark containing his name to the exclu-
sion  of  a  person  with  the  same  name.    “A  corollary  of  the 
right  to  use  one’s  own  name  and  identity  in  trade  is  the
right to stop others from doing so—at least those who don’t