754
Syllabus
cific dispute. The fact that this injunction did not prohibit activities by persons demonstrating in favor of abortion is justly attributable to the lack of such demonstrations and of any consequent request for relief. Moreover, none of the restrictions at issue were directed at the content of petitioners' antiabortion message. The principal inquiry in determining content neutrality is whether the government has regulated speech without reference to its content. See, e. g., Ward v. Rock Against Racism, 491 U. S. 781, 791. The government's purpose is therefore the threshold consideration. Here, the injunction imposed incidental restrictions on petitioners' message because they repeatedly violated the original injunction. That the injunction covers people who all share the same viewpoint suggests only that those in the group whose conduct violated the court's order happen to share that viewpoint. Pp. 762-764. 2. In evaluating a content-neutral injunction, the governing standard is whether the injunction's challenged provisions burden no more speech than necessary to serve a significant government interest. See, e. g., Carroll v. President and Comm'rs of Princess Anne, 393 U. S. 175, 184. Thus, the injunction must be couched in the narrowest terms that will accomplish its pinpointed objective. See id., at 183. Although the forum around the clinic is a traditional public forum, the obvious differences between a generally applicable ordinance—which represents a legislative choice to promote particular societal interests—and an injunction—which remedies an actual or threatened violation of a legislative or judicial decree, and carries greater risks of censorship and discriminatory application than an ordinance, but can be tailored to afford greater relief where a violation of law has already occurred—require a somewhat more stringent application of general First Amendment principles in this context than traditional time, place, and manner analysis allows. The combination of the governmental interests identified by the Florida Supreme Court—protecting a pregnant woman's freedom to seek lawful medical or counseling services, ensuring public safety and order, promoting the free flow of traffic on public streets and sidewalks, protecting citizens' property rights, and assuring residential privacy— is quite sufficient to justify an appropriately tailored injunction. Pp. 764-768. 3. Given the focus of the picketing on patients and clinic staff, the narrowness of the confines around the clinic, the fact that protesters could still be seen and heard from the clinic parking lots, and the failure of the first injunction to accomplish its purpose, the 36-foot buffer zone around the clinic entrances and driveway, on balance, burdens no more speech than necessary to accomplish the governmental interests in protecting access to the clinic and facilitating an orderly traffic flow on the
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