A group of Mainers recently got a close look at Eliot Spitzer, the New York attorney general, when he gave the annual Frank M. Coffin lecture at the University of Southern Maine. The audience of Maine lawyers, business leaders, judges, law students and faculty gathers every fall for the lecture honoring Judge Coffin, a former Maine congressman, an official of the U.S. Agency for International Development and chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First District. He currently is senior judge of that court.

The occasion gave the audience an opportunity appraise not only Mr. Spitzer’s method of operation in prosecuting white-collar crime, but also his vision of what is needed to combat excesses and shortcomings of modern capitalism and make it better serve the public good.

As for his investigative strategy, Mr. Spitzer told with relish how he responded when top officials of a certain corporation (probably Enron) told him they had “friends in high places.” He said, “I did what I do. I dropped a few subpoenas.”

When he called corporation officials on the carpet, some gave him what turned out to be a standard response: Why pick on us? and, besides, others are worse. He observed, “Everybody has descended to a common denominator.” Another of his observations was that minor fraudulent missteps, if not caught and punished, can lead incrementally to major felonious crime.

His broader vision was worth hearing about, too, since he is running for governor of New York. He supports the market system, but believes that conservative Republicans have made a mistake in relying so heavily on it and on self-regulation. He said that the market system requires constant supervision, regulation and investigation where necessary. His reasoning was that there are certain things the market system cannot do, such as inculcate honesty, protect child labor and come up with an adequate minimum wage. He could have added, for a Maine audience, prevent discrimination based on sexual orientation.

Since the conservative doctrine was that most regulation had to be shifted to the states, he took this as a mandate for state regulation, although he sometimes encountered roadblocks when defendants reversed the field and invoked federal preemption.

Eliot Spitzer has made his name as a prosecutor and influenced other prosecutors along the way. Now he hopes to go on to be governor. He is someone a lot of other candidates will be watching.