International Society for Krishna Consciousness v. Lee

With their ability to perform sankirtan in airport terminals effectively eliminated, the ISKC sought legal recourse. They met with success initially, as the district court held that airport terminals are public fora, and that therefore any state regulation of speech within them must be narrowly drawn to support a "compelling state interest." As such, the ISKC was granted injunctive relief from the port authority's regulation against solicitation and distribution of literature. This ruling was in keeping with the so-called public forum doctrine, which has traditionally been used to evaluate state regulation of speech in government-owned places. Under the public forum doctrine, there are three categories of government (public) property: public fora such as streets, sidewalks, and parks, where communication among citizens has traditionally occurred; designated public fora, such as public university auditoriums, that have been opened for the express purpose of promoting certain types of communication; and nonpublic fora, comprising all government property that does not fall into the first two categories. The legal implications of a property's categorization are vast: the state can only regulate speech in public or designated fora in a narrowly defined manner designed to protect a compelling state interest. In a nonpublic forum, however, the state can only impose regulations on speech that are reasonable and neutral with regard to the speech's content. By ruling that airport terminals were public fora, the district court had to conclude that the port authority's regulation of speech within its terminals was overly broad. The port authority subsequently brought the case before the court of appeals, which reversed the district court's decision. The court of appeals held that airport terminals were not public fora and, as such, that the port authority's regulations met the standard of being reasonable and content neutral with regard to solicitation of funds. The appeals court found, however, that the port authority's ban on distribution of literature was in violation of the First Amendment. Following this partial victory with a partial setback, the ISKC appealed the case to the U.S. Supreme Court, which heard arguments on 25 March 1992.