Over the past several years the seamier side of political fundraising campaign financing in Hawai'i has been put under a bright light, primarily through the efforts of the State Campaign Spending Commission.

The pattern, always understood and often appallingly accepted, was this: Companies who did, or wanted to, work for state or county government would go out of their way — and often beyond legal limits — to make generous campaign contributions to key political figures.

The standard approach was to distribute money to friends, employees and relations, who would then donate under their own name.

This clearly violated the spirit of the law limiting campaign contributions and — judged by the recent rash of fines and misdemeanor guilty pleas — equally violated the letter of the law.

The latest insult came this week when a prominent Ho-nolulu engineering firm was fined $100,000 for filing false federal income tax forms, which disguised campaign contributions.

The firm, Thermal Engineering Corp., would distribute money to employees who would in turn contribute it to candidates. The company then listed the pass-along money as a legitimate business expense against its taxes.

All told, some $59,000 in donations were falsely reported as employee compensation, according to court documents.

Sadly, the best defense this firm or others in a similar situation can offer is that this is the way the game was played at the time.

To the degree this is the case, there is much work ahead for both federal and state authorities. It is hard to believe that Thermal Engineering was the only company deducting pass-along contributions as a business expense.

It is equally difficult to believe that they made the claim only on their federal returns.

There is a wealth of information now available about companies who found a way to skate around the limits of the campaign spending law. Many companies have paid fines to the Spending Commission, the court, or both.

Now it is time to review tax records of those caught violating campaign spending laws to see how badly the state and the federal government were shortchanged through this cynical system.