It's not a step to bring North Carolina into the land of political milk and honey, where campaign contributions by special interests fade from significance. But it might be possible to get a glimpse of that promised land from here.

A bill narrowly approved by the state House on Saturday would expand North Carolina's program of public campaign financing for the first time into the state's executive branch. Candidates for three elective offices -- state auditor, superintendent of public instruction and insurance commissioner -- would be eligible to have a goodly chunk of campaign expenses defrayed by the taxpayers.

While the privilege of subsidizing political campaigns may strike some of those taxpayers as a dubious one, the alternative is even less inviting when it means that officeholders have mainly special interests to thank for footing their campaign expenses. And nobody in their right mind thinks such generosity comes without expectations that the beneficiary, once he or she gains the keys to that nice office in Raleigh, won't remember who "brung 'em" to the dance.

The posts to be decoupled from the traditional fund-raising circus are among eight atop executive agencies that now are filled by election. Along with the governor and lieutenant governor, they constitute the Council of State. North Carolina is at the far end of the spectrum in having a large number of independently elected statewide officeholders.

A practical consequence of that set-up is that campaign fund-raising for these positions tends to be a scramble to find people who are sufficiently interested to write a check. Perhaps their industry is regulated by the agency. Especially given the high costs of running a statewide campaign, that's not a formula for democracy as idealists would like to see it.

North Carolina recently took the plunge into public campaign financing with contests for appellate judgeships. The real challenge -- given a painfully high profile by the campaign-money scandals surrounding former House Speaker Jim Black -- is to give legislative candidates the public financing option.

But Rome wasn't built in a day. Moving to expand public financing within the executive branch should increase the overall comfort level with the concept and help defuse arguments that it amounts to a waste of money. It's not a waste if it enhances public confidence in the electoral system, as it surely would.

There was enough opposition in the House to hold the bill to a 59-57 victory margin. But that will work, provided the Senate goes along. It's important that the Senate do just that, before the current session adjourns, so the new program can be put in place for next year's elections.

Candidates still would have to raise a modest amount of money on their own to qualify, and if they accepted public funds, their spending would be limited. None of that should hinder North Carolinians from choosing good people to head these three important agencies -- people who, if successful, would be beholden chiefly to the public, not contributors who had financed their campaigns out of who knows what mix of motives.