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From your link:

Johnson said the plate is offensive to close to 40 percent of the population, which is the percentage of African-Americans in the state. But supporters of the plate believe Forrest should not be dismissed because of that one time in history. "It's been said he disavowed the Klan later in life and that puts him in the same category as former Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black and former West Virginia Sen. Robert Byrd," said Greg Stewart, a Sons of Confederate Veterans member.

From my own knowledge, although I checked the details to make sure I got them right:

Nathan Bedford Forrest was also an above average strategic leader and a tactical genius, not to mention a man of indescribable courage. As one example of the latter, he led a cavalry charge at Fallen Timbers, but his men stopped when they encountered opposition, leaving him alone as he continued the charge. While surrounded and without support, he fired his pistols until out of ammunition, then drew his sword and fought with that weapon until he was shot in the side/back (the bullet lodged at his spine and was removed a week later without anesthesia), which made it difficult for him to continue attacking. At that point, he grabbed a union soldier, pulled him up onto the horse as a shield, and rode back to his own lines. All told, in that battle and others, he lost about 30 horses that were shot while under him and personally killed about as many me in combat.

As I read the Constitution, the Confederacy was legally right - the North had no legal authority to prevent secession (see the 10th Amendment). Had they simply been allowed to depart peacefully, I believe that they would have eliminated slavery within a few years for a combination of economic and moral reasons, and we would have reunified in less time than the fifteen years that the war and reconstruction required. The Klan was a terrible thing, but he later regretted that. Forrest is not my personal hero, but he had a profound sense of honor (remember, he was phenomenally wealthy as a self-made man and could have stayed out of the war and remained rich) and loyalty to his men. I can fully understand the descendents of his soldiers honoring his memory - and the same for descendents of his slaves given that his former slaves remained loyal to him and were willing to fight to protect him from attack. If we taught history honestly, I imagine many of that African American 40% who are represented as "offended" would see this as a much more complex issue than simply dumping on the founder of the Klan - after all, they had no problem with Robert Byrd who, like Forrest, led the Klan and then changed his views.

I'm not one of the limp-wrist liberals who says, "oh, dear, Forrest wasn't politically correct, I'll faint or get the vapors if I have to look at a license plate honoring him." Let's get the history right in our discussion, and perhaps we could even let those interested in such a plate choose for themselves. I would not choose such a plate, but I wouldn't deny others that option. If libs were sincere in anything they ever say, they would recognize my position as tolerance and theirs as ignorance blended with hate.