Checkers Drive-In Restaurants, Inc. v. Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks, DRIVE-IN

• Decision Date: 21 April 1995
• Docket Number: No. 94-5027,DRIVE-IN,94-5027
• Citation: 51 F.3d 1078,311 U.S. App. D.C. 188
• Parties: , 63 USLW 2685, 33 Collier Bankr.Cas.2d 592, 27 Bankr.Ct.Dec. 123, Bankr. L. Rep. P 76,486, 34 U.S.P.Q.2d 1574 CHECKERSRESTAURANTS, INC., Appellant, v. COMMISSIONER OF PATENTS AND TRADEMARKS, Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — District of Columbia Circuit

Page 1078

51 F.3d 1078

311 U.S.App.D.C. 188, 63 USLW 2685,

33 Collier Bankr.Cas.2d 592,

27 Bankr.Ct.Dec. 123, Bankr. L. Rep. P 76,486,

34 U.S.P.Q.2d 1574

CHECKERS DRIVE-IN RESTAURANTS, INC., Appellant, v. COMMISSIONER OF PATENTS AND TRADEMARKS, Appellee.

No. 94-5027.

United States Court of Appeals District of Columbia Circuit.

Argued Feb. 17, 1995.

Decided April 21, 1995.

David M. Pitcher argued the cause and filed the briefs, Washington, DC, for appellant.

Nancy C. Slutter, Associate Sol., U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, argued the cause, for appellee. With her on the brief was Albin F. Drost, Deputy Sol., U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Fred E. McKelvey, Washington, DC, entered an appearance.

Before: EDWARDS, Chief Judge, HENDERSON and ROGERS, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Chief Judge EDWARDS.

HARRY T. EDWARDS, Chief Judge:

This appeal concerns the scope of the automatic stay provision under the Bankruptcy Code. This provision, which is found at 11 U.S.C. Sec. 362(a) (1988), generally operates to block legal actions that could affect the property of a debtor in bankruptcy, and it serves both to shelter the debtor from harassment and to prevent creditors from engaging in a race to liquidate the estate's assets.

Appellant, Checkers Drive-In Restaurants, Inc., ("Checkers"), claims the automatic stay barred it from filing an affidavit as normally required to maintain its federal service mark registration pursuant to section 8 of the Lanham Trademark Act, 15 U.S.C. Sec. 1058 (1988) ("Lanham Act"). Under section 8 of the Lanham Act, a service mark registration is canceled at the end of six years following the date of registration, unless the registrant files an affidavit (between the fifth and sixth years) setting forth his or her current use of the mark. Id. Checkers's section 8 filing came due while it was pursuing a petition to cancel a competing service mark registration of a debtor in bankruptcy. Checkers failed to file the required affidavit during the statutory period, allegedly on the assumption that the Bankruptcy Code's automatic stay provision barred the required filing. The United States Patent and Trademark Office then canceled Checkers's service mark registration. Checkers appealed to the Commissioner of Patents and Trademarks ("Commissioner"), arguing that, because the automatic stay barred it from filing the affidavit, its failure to do so did not warrant the cancellation of its service mark registration under the Lanham Act. Rejecting this reasoning, the Commissioner denied Checkers's appeal. When Checkers challenged this decision in the District Court, the trial judge granted the Commissioner's motion for summary judgment. Checkers now appeals from that decision.

We affirm the judgment of the District Court. Although the Bankruptcy Code's automatic stay provision is broad in scope, it does not reach as far as Checkers would stretch it here. Checkers asserts that the section 8 filing requirement was stayed by operation of either of two subsections of the automatic stay provision. The first stays the continuation of any judicial, administrative, or other action against the debtor if the action was begun before the debtor filed its petition for bankruptcy. See 11 U.S.C. Sec. 362(a)(1). The second stays any act to take possession of, or exercise control over, property held by the bankrupt's estate. See id. Sec. 362(a)(3). We find neither to apply. Checkers's filing of a section 8 affidavit was not part of its claim against the debtor, nor would it have affected the debtor's property. Rather, it would have merely maintained the status quo with respect to Checkers's own property. Accordingly, we hold that the Commissioner properly canceled Checkers's registration.

I. BACKGROUND

This case arises from a dispute between two owners of federally registered service marks, both of which employed the word "Checkers" in their design. ¹ Checkers owned, by assignment, a service mark for use in connection with its marketing of restaurant services. Checkers's mark was registered pursuant to the Lanham Act on October 23, 1984. By virtue of this registration, Checkers gained a number of benefits, for federal registration of a trademark or service mark constitutes "prima facie evidence of the validity of the registered mark and of the registration of the mark, of the registrant's ownership of the mark, and of the registrant's exclusive right to use the registered mark in commerce on or in connection with the goods or services specified in the [registration] certificate." 15 U.S.C. Sec. 1057(b) (1988). Moreover, the Lanham Act provides registrants with the opportunity to recover treble damages for violations of their rights, see 15 U.S.C. Sec. 1117(a) (1988), and, after five years of continuous use, permits registrants to make their rights "incontestable"--i.e., to transform their registration into conclusive evidence of their rights--by filing an affidavit setting forth certain information, see id. Secs. 1065, 1115(b) (1988).

However, section 8 of the Lanham Act provides that, to maintain these benefits, all registrants must file, between the fifth and sixth years after initial registration, an affidavit setting forth the continued use of the registered mark in commerce "on or in connection with" the goods or services listed in the registration statement for the mark, or providing an adequate explanation for nonuse of the mark. 15 U.S.C. Sec. 1058(a). If a registrant fails to file the required affidavit, the Commissioner by law must cancel its registration at the end of the sixth year. ² Id. Thus, Checkers was required to file its section 8 affidavit no later than October 23, 1990, to maintain the registration of its service mark.

On March 16, 1988, another service mark registrant, Checkers Restaurant Group, Inc., ("CRG"), petitioned the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board ("TTAB") to cancel Checkers's registration pursuant to 15 U.S.C. Sec. 1064 (1988), which provides for the filing of such a cancellation petition "by any person who believes that he is or will be damaged by the registration of a mark on the principal register." In support of its petition, CRG argued, inter alia, that Checkers's registration interfered with CRG's federally guaranteed right to use its service mark "in other than its existing geographic area." Appendix for Appellant ("App.") 18. Checkers answered this cancellation petition and counterclaimed, seeking to cancel CRG's own service mark on essentially the same grounds.

In August 1989, before these competing cancellation claims could be resolved, CRG filed a petition for relief under Chapter 11 of the federal Bankruptcy Code, 11 U.S.C. Sec. 1101 et seq. (1988 & Supp. V 1993), in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of New York. In so doing, CRG triggered the application of the automatic stay provision, 11 U.S.C. Sec. 362(a), which provides that the filing of a bankruptcy petition "operates as a stay, applicable to all entities," of eight different categories of conduct encompassing a wide swath of legal actions, including litigation, lien enforcement, and administrative proceedings, that could affect or interfere with the property of the bankrupt's estate. Accordingly, on January 8, 1990, CRG petitioned the TTAB to stay all proceedings relating to the cross-cancellation petitions filed by itself and Checkers. The TTAB responded on February 16, 1990, with an order staying the cancellation proceeding "since petitioner's registration is the subject of a counterclaim." Checkers Restaurant Group, Inc. v. Checkers of North America, Inc., Cancellation No. 17,053, slip op. at 1-2 (Feb. 16, 1990), reprinted in App. 31-32.

Checkers and CRG then negotiated a settlement agreement by which CRG transferred all rights to its service mark to Checkers in exchange for $42,500, and Checkers granted CRG a license to use its service mark at CRG's two existing restaurants in New York City. On November 30, 1990, the Bankruptcy Court approved this settlement. Accordingly, on December 19, 1990, Checkers moved the TTAB to lift the stay it had imposed on the cancellation proceedings, dismiss those proceedings as moot, and accept a section 8 affidavit filed concurrently. In response, the TTAB dismissed the parties' cancellation petitions with prejudice, and forwarded Checkers's section 8 affidavit to the Post-Registration Section of the Patent and Trademark Office for consideration.

However, because Checkers filed the affidavit after October 23, 1990, that Office's Affidavit/Renewal Examiner rejected it as untimely and canceled Checkers's service mark registration. Checkers sought relief from the Commissioner, arguing that the automatic stay imposed by 11 U.S.C. Sec. 362(a) prevented it from filing a section 8 affidavit during the pendency of the cancellation proceedings, and that, after the stay was lifted, its section 8 affidavit was timely filed pursuant to 11 U.S.C. Sec. 108(c) (1988), which extends periods fixed by nonbankruptcy law "for commencing or continuing a civil action in a court other than a bankruptcy court on a claim against the debtor" until 30 days after a stay is terminated, if the period fixed by nonbankruptcy law already has run. ³ The Commissioner rejected Checkers's argument, reasoning that

this petitioner was not the party in bankruptcy and the filing of a Section 8 affidavit in relation to its [service mark registration] would not have been an exercise of control over a debtor in bankruptcy nor would it have furthered any claim against the debtor. The Section 8 filing would have spoken only to the petitioner's own continued use of its own registration.

In re Trademark Registration of Checkers of North America, Inc., No. 91-272(R), slip op. at 3 (Feb. 11, 1993) (footnote omitted), reprinted in App. 129. Checkers sought judicial review of the Commissioner's decision by filing suit in the District Court. On January 7, 1994, the...