The Red and Black

Issue date: 4/20/09 Section: News

Media Credit: WAITES LASETER Wojciech Kaczkowski, president of NORML, gathers signatures during the Student Activities Fair on September 10, 2008. [Click to enlarge]

Smoked out, baked, blazed or toasted - whatever you call getting high, millions are doing it today. In cannabis culture, April 20 is a holiday for advocates to smoke and campaign for legalizing marijuana.

But for Wojciech Kaczkowski, president of the University's chapter of the National Organization for the Reform for Marijuana Laws, today also is a point of reflection in a semester-long fight to free expression on campus.

NORML faces its second hearing this Tuesday with University Judiciary. The issue came to a head when the University claimed NORML violated a copyright infringement of Hairy Dawg and the Arch in its club T-shirt that depicts a bulldog holding a joint, leaning against the Arch. University officials contested in a hearing earlier this month that NORML did not receive approval for the logos and did not respond to deadlines asking the group to take the image off their Web site and to return unsold T-shirts.

However, Kaczkowski said the group will focus on what it believes to be its own intellectual property.

"When you draw your own image of a bulldog and an arch-like structure, it's the intellectual property of the person who draws it. It's not a copy of the official logo of the University of Georgia, it's the image of [UGA NORML artist] Greg Stone," he said. "We also believe that people who see this image will think it is a parody or satire of Hairy Dawg, but no one would think this is official merchandise of the University of Georgia."

Kaczkowski said if NORML is found formally guilty, the organization plans to appeal.

"The national NORML, based in [Washington,] D.C., offered us support, and we've had a lot of support from local lawyers and politicians," he said. "We believe we're not guilty of anything, and we'll go through the appeals process. But I really hope that the people in the panel will realize and listen to our

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