Cite as: 518 U. S. 727 (1996)
Opinion of Kennedy, J.
cance; it applies no standard, and by this omission loses sight of existing First Amendment doctrine. When confronted with a threat to free speech in the context of an emerging technology, we ought to have the discipline to analyze the case by reference to existing elaborations of constant First Amendment principles. This is the essence of the case-by-case approach to ensuring protection of speech under the First Amendment, even in novel settings. Rather than undertake this task, however, the plurality just declares that, all things considered, § 10(a) seems fine. I think the implications of our past cases for these cases are clearer than the plurality suggests, and they require us to hold § 10(a) invalid. Though I join Part III of the opinion (there for the Court) striking down § 10(b) of the Act, and concur in the judgment that § 10(c) is unconstitutional, with respect I dissent from the remainder.
I
Two provisions of the 1992 Act, §§ 10(a) and (c), authorize the operator of a cable system to exclude certain programming from two different kinds of channels. Section 10(a) concerns leased access channels. These are channels the cable operator is required by federal law to make available to unaffiliated programmers without exercising any control over program content. The statute allows a cable operator to enforce a written and published policy of prohibiting on these channels any programming it "reasonably believes describes or depicts sexual or excretory activities or organs in a patently offensive manner as measured by contemporary community standards," speech we can refer to as "indecent programming."
Section 10(c) involves public, educational, and governmental access channels (or PEG access channels, as they are known). These are channels set aside for use by members of the public, governmental authorities, and local school systems. As interpreted by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), § 10(c) requires the agency to make regu-
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