There is no question that the term “redskin” has been used as a racial slur for American Indians for hundreds of years and is on par with offensive terms used to denigrate blacks and Hispanics. And it is also clear that federal law prohibits the Patent and Trademark Office from registering trademarks that disparage people or bring them “into contempt, or disrepute.”

That is why the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board was right in ruling on Wednesday that six trademarks granted to the owners of the Washington Redskins football team should be canceled because the name is disparaging to many American Indians.

The 2-to-1 ruling has no immediate effect on the team, which says it will appeal the decision. That would be a mistake. The team’s owner, Daniel Snyder, should reconsider his obstinate refusal to change the name, which he has preposterously argued was a “badge of honor” for American Indians.

The appeal board, part of the United States Patent and Trademark Office, was swayed by evidence that the National Congress of American Indians had objected to and tried to get the team to change its name since the 1960s, before registrations for the six trademarks were renewed. The board also found that there was a “near complete drop-off in usage of ‘redskins’ as a reference to Native Americans beginning in the 1960s.” And starting in 1966, American dictionaries consulted by an expert witness hired by the team’s owner began labeling the term as offensive; by 1986 all dictionaries did so.