Rights & liberties
public forum
Government property traditionally open to expression, such as streets, sidewalks, and parks. Speech restrictions there face the strictest review.
In full
Doctrine sorts government property into traditional public forums, designated forums the government has opened, and nonpublic forums such as a military base or an airport terminal, where reasonable content-based rules are allowed. Government social media accounts used for official business have raised the question of whether comment threads are designated forums.
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Browse every term in the glossary, or see the vocabulary in motion in the How government works walkthroughs.
A plain-language explanation for civic education, not legal advice. When in doubt, the official source named above controls.