Lawmakers, Mr. Paterson charged, had too often bowed to the wishes of powerful special interests, feeding an “addiction to spending, power and approval” and plunging the state into economic catastrophe.

“No longer are we going to run New York like a payday loan operation,” the governor vowed.

Referring to industry and labor lobbyists in the chamber, he declared, “The moneyed interests  many are here today as guests  have got to understand that their days of influence in this town are numbered.”

But after warning lawmakers for months of the state’s impending fiscal ruin, Mr. Paterson seemed determined to offer hope as well as caution, suggesting that state officials now had an opportunity to restore New York to glory.

“There is still time to rebuild the Empire State,” Mr. Paterson told the lawmakers. “Work with me, follow me, so that New York can turn the corner.”

Mr. Paterson’s ethics proposals are the most ambitious ever offered by a New York governor, and would not only set term limits for all lawmakers and statewide officials, but also ban corporate campaign contributions, reduce individual contribution limits from a maximum of $55,900 to $1,000, and require all lawmakers to disclose all their outside sources of income.

The governor also proposed new policies aimed at spurring job creation and economic development, especially in the beleaguered upstate region. Chief among Mr. Paterson’s goals is scrapping the scandal-plagued Empire Zone program of business tax breaks and replacing it with new one, called the Excelsior Jobs program, that would focus on high-tech development and so-called green jobs.

With statewide elections less than a year away, and his own future as uncertain as New York’s finances, Mr. Paterson’s speech carried an inevitable subtext  not least because he delivered his remarks with Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo, his likely challenger in the Democratic primary, standing just a few feet away on the dais.