Lawsuit Filed After U.S. Department Of Defense Bans Private Company

Well I'm sure most of you read that other thread where the DOD ordered this private company to stop producing religious based dog tags (the military ones worn around the neck).

It seems the company has filed a lawsuit against the DOD for violation of their constitutional rights. I think we seen this coming.

The complaint states that the Department of Defense (DoD) violated several clauses of the U.S. Constitution when it abruptly prevented SoS from making or selling its licensed, religious-themed products.
First Liberty Institute is a nonprofit public interest law firm that focuses on defending religious freedom for Americans.
According to First Liberty Institute’s press release, SoS has been making replica, military-themed dog tags and jewelry with encouraging Bible verses on them for various branches of service for over 20 years.

SOURCE

a reply to: Alien Abduct

As I recall, my government issued dog tags specified my religion.

a reply to: Alien Abduct Would like to see them try that with other religious groups. Not going to happen. Wouldn't be surprised to see the army claim these tags are "radicalizing" troops.

a reply to: Alien Abduct

The lawsuit has been in the works since 2019. From what I've seen of their argument, SoS and First Liberty don't have a leg to stand on.

This isn't the DoD saying that SoS can't produce religious dog tags. They just can't use the DoD's trademarked images alongside religious iconography.

SoS agreed to the DoD's usage policies when they applied for their license to use the trademarked material. By using Bible passages alongside DoD trademarked images they violated their license agreement with the DoD.

If these images weren't trademarked then the DoD would not be able to prevent SoS from using them anyway they see fit. But they are trademarked and SoS has a contract with the DoD to use the trademarked images.

In the end this is a clear cut case of breach of contract by SoS. They're lucky all the DoD did was send a cease & desist letter.

a reply to: Logarock

The issue isn't that they're religious dog tags. The issue is that they're religious dog tags that are also using images trademarked by the DoD.

The DoD has strict guidelines about how their trademarked materials can be used by their licensees. Using these images alongside anything religious violates these guidelines.

Mine too. Back in the day it was important.