By Brian Stelter, NY Times

A United States appeals court tossed out the indecency policy of the Federal Communications Commission on Tuesday, calling it a violation of the First Amendment.

An appeals panel said the F.C.C. policy was “unconstitutionally vague, creating a chilling effect that goes far beyond the fleeting expletives at issue here.”

The action is rooted in a 2004 decision by the F.C.C. under the Bush administration to step up its enforcement of indecency on the broadcast airwaves. According to Tuesday’s court filing, the F.C.C. policy stated that “a single, nonliteral use of an expletive (a so-called ‘fleeting expletive’) could be actionably indecent.”

Also that year, Congress said that the F.C.C. could fine stations up to $325,000 for each instance of indecent speech, substantially upping the penalties for an un-bleeped curse word. Facing fines into the millions of dollars, the networks first took their fight against the indecency policy to the courts in 2006.

On Tuesday the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals found that “the FCC effectively chills speech because broadcasters have no way of know what the FCC will find offensive.”

“The score for today’s game is First Amendment one, censorship zero,” Andrew Jay Schwartzman, senior vice president for the nonprofit Media Access Project, said in a statement.

The group was among those that opposed the rules and claimed that they “interfere with the creative process.”

“Today’s decision vindicates that argument,” Mr. Schwartzman’s statement said. “The next stop is the Supreme Court, and we’re confident that the Justices will affirm this decision.”