Seven seconds of naked buttocks that aired on network television in 2003 spurred nearly a decade of litigation over the Federal Communications Commission’s power to fine broadcasters over allegedly indecent programming. In June 2012, Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr was part of a team that persuaded the U.S. Supreme Court that the commission’s regulations were unconstitutionally vague.
Seth Waxman, chairman of the firm’s appellate and U.S. Supreme Court practice, feared the justices would lack the appetite to strike down a regulatory regime without a substitute set of rules on the table. He argued for ABC Inc., which faced a $1.24 million fine. The court’s 8-0 decision left room for the commission to make new guidelines but, according to Waxman, the agency hasn’t jumped back into the fray. "Broadcast networks are not going to be subject to post hoc, idiosyncratic decision-making about sanctions," he said.
