THE ISSUE:

A campaign finance reform commission's work is subverted by the governor's political agenda.

THE STAKES:

Will New Yorkers get the reform they were promised, or was this all a ruse?

For years, New Yorkers have been waiting for campaign finance reform to clean some of the corruption out of the electoral process. Now, here's Gov. Andrew Cuomo corrupting the process of creating those very reforms.

With the help of state Democratic Chairman Jay Jacobs, Mr. Cuomo seems intent on using the state Public Financing Commission to weaken if not obliterate third parties in New York, including the liberal Working Families Party that has been a particular thorn in his side.

And all the while, with the drama swirling about these Machiavellian moves, what the commission is doing is a far cry from the kind of reform New York needs to get big money out of politics.

What an insulting shell game.

This past session, Democrats who control the Legislature seemed to have followed through on a major promise with the creation of a commission to design a public financing system by Dec. 1. The centerpiece, most people assumed, would be a program of matching public funds for small donations, and lower limits on contributions.

But Mr. Jacobs — whom Mr. Cuomo installed as de facto commission chair — seems to have had quite another agenda: Crushing competition from third parties. He's been pushing for a ban on fusion voting — under which parties can cross-endorse candidates — and for raising the threshold for third parties to earn a ballot line. Currently, if a party's gubernatorial nominee gets at least 50,000 votes, it's guaranteed a ballot line for the next four years, relieving it of the chore of gathering petitions to qualify for ballot lines for all its candidates. Mr. Jacobs urges raising that to 250,000 votes, which only the state's Conservative Party achieved last year, barely.

We happen to support ending fusion voting. While we recognize that the power of an endorsement can make third parties and their causes more relevant in the political process, it has too often been more about patronage than principle. But this is a matter for the Legislature to debate, not for the governor and a party chairman to try to slip into the work of an appointed commission under the guise of campaign finance reform.

And while this intrigue has the spotlight, the commission is poised to create a weak system of public finance that enhances, not diminishes, the role of big donors. It's talking about capping qualifying contributions at $4,000 for Assembly races, $8,000 for Senate races, and $12,000 for governor and other statewide races — far more than the $2,800 limit for congressional and presidential races. And rather than just match small donations of up to, say, $250, the committee is talking about matching the first $250 of even large donations. So taxpayers would be making big contributions bigger. That's not how this should work.

What a wasted opportunity. What a corruption of a worthy goal.

There is still time to get this right — for the commission to take the third party issues off the table and design a credible public financing system. If it won't, then all this is about is settling Mr. Cuomo's scores, empowering the two major parties and making sure wealthy donors remain as powerful as ever. If that's the case, then the commission ought to admit this was all a waste of time, close shop without submitting a plan at all, and let the Legislature write a better bill next year.