TO KNOW SACRAMENTO is to appreciate the chip on its shoulder. Nearly a decade ago, I moved to California’s capital to write speeches for former Governor Pete Wilson. The best my colleagues could say about the place was that it’s a quick drive to Lake Tahoe and wine country and a quick flight to Los Angeles or Las Vegas. Yesterday, Sacramento’s second-class status was on display again. With the nation fixated on San Francisco and the 9th Circuit’s hearing on the recall delay, a Sacramento superior court dropped its own bombshell. Judge Loren McMaster blocked Cruz Bustamante from using millions in donations from California’s gambling tribes to finance television ads against Proposition 54, which would ban the state from collecting racial data. If the ruling stands, it’s a serious blow to both the No on 54 effort and the star of those ads, Cruz Bustamante. And it could adversely affect Gray Davis. The lower the turnout against Prop. 54, presumably the fewer the votes there’ll be against the recall.

Here’s why the court came down hard on Bustamante: The lieutenant governor was playing fast and loose with state campaign finance laws. He had accepted nearly $4 million from the gambling tribes, but had parked the money in a campaign committee established before California’s Proposition 34 went into effect after last November’s election. That allowed Bustamante to circumvent recall’s $21,200 individual donor limit. When the press figured this out and his poll numbers began to slide, the lieutenant governor changed tactics. Instead of spending the tribes’ money on his recall campaign, Bustamante created two new accounts and said he’d commit the tribes’ money to Prop. 54’s defeat. Since last Wednesday, a 30-second spot featuring the lieutenant governor railing against the ballot measure has saturated California’s airwaves.