ABSTRACT
In Arkansas Educational Television Commission v. Forbes, 523 US 666, the US Supreme Court held six–three that a public television station did not violate the First Amendment when it decided to exclude a minor-party candidate from a televised debate in a race for the US House of Representatives from Arkansas's third congressional district. The US District Court had rejected Ralph Forbes's plea for in- junctive relieve, but had been overturned by the US Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals, which had remanded the case. In assessing Forbes's claims, Justice Anthony M. Kennedy rejected the idea that the public-forum doctrine-which required that speech in such public settings must be available equally for all-should be mechanically applied to cases involving public television. Justice John Paul Stevens's dissent focused on what he considered to be the "ad hoc" and "standardless" character of the decision that the station made to exclude Forbes.
