Lucasfilm Ltd. v. High Frontier and Lucasfilm v. Committee for a Strong, Peaceful America In March of 1983, the Reagan administration launched a new program known as the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI). It was nicknamed “Star Wars,” which was of great concern to George Lucas’s production company. They did not want their famed film series to be linked with SDI, which had been established to send anti-missile weapons into space. At the time, this idea was very controversial.

So in 1985, Lucasfilm Ltd. filed a lawsuit against both the Committee for a Strong, Peaceful America and High Frontier. These two public interest groups had called SDI “Star Wars” in promotional materials for the program in print and on television. Lucasfilm claimed this violated their trademark for the title Star Wars.

In its ruling, the federal district court determined that interest groups had a right to use the phrase, as long as they were not advertising a product or service for sale. The decision stated, “Since Jonathan Swift’s time, creators of fictional worlds have seen their vocabulary for fantasy appropriated to describe reality.”

What stipulation on the use of Star Wars did the federal district court include in its ruling?

The interest groups could only use the phrase in TV commercials.
The interest groups could not use the phrase without permission.
The interest groups could only use the phrase for nonprofit purposes.
The interest groups could not use the phrase in relation to the film series.