NEW YORK – Yesterday, New York State’s highest court refused to reinstate New York City’s controversial limits on sales of jumbo sugary drinks, exhausting the city’s final appeal and handing a major victory to the American soft-drink industry, which bitterly opposed the plan.

According to the New York Times, in a 20-page opinion, Judge Eugene F. Pigott Jr. wrote that the city’s Board of Health “exceeded the scope of its regulatory authority” in enacting the proposal, which was championed by former Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg.

Two lower courts had already ruled against the city, saying it overreached in attempting to prohibit the purchase of sugared drinks in containers larger than 16 ounces, about the size of a medium coffee cup. By a 4-to-2 vote, the justices Thursday upheld the earlier rulings.

The decision most likely will be seen as a significant defeat for public health advocates who have urged state and local governments to actively discourage the consumption of high-calorie beverages, saying the drinks are prime drivers of a nationwide epidemic of obesity. And it could also have long-term implications for the powers of the city’s Board of Health, the agency that has been the primary engine behind high-profile health initiatives like banning trans fats in restaurants and posting calorie counts on menus.

In a dissenting opinion, Judge Susan P. Read wrote that the ruling ignored decades of precedent in which the Board of Health was given broad purview to address public health matters, such as regulating the city’s water supply and banning the use of lead paint in homes. The opinion, Judge Read wrote, “misapprehends, mischaracterizes and thereby curtails the powers of the New York City Board of Health to address the public health threats of the early 21st century.”

But questions about the workability of the city’s plan were raised from the start. Only some eating establishments would have been affected, like fast-food franchises, delis and movie theaters; convenience stores and grocery markets would have been exempt.

The American Beverage Association said in a statement after the ruling that it was “pleased,” saying the proposal “would have created an uneven playing field for thousands of small businesses in the city and limited New Yorkers’ freedom of choice.”