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It serves as a fitting metaphor that, in an effort to avoid tainting the jury in the trial of disgraced former Ald. Edward Burke, a rogues’ gallery of corrupt Illinois politicians hanging in the courtroom will be hidden from view.

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The fact that the images will be hidden behind brown paper is a decorating touch that has a certain symmetry to it. Five years ago this month, federal agents covered the windows of Burke’s City Hall office with similar paper, in an effort to keep prying eyes from surveying the scene as they searched for evidence of Burke’s alleged corruption.

The rogues’ gallery at the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse is itself a reminder of Illinois’ deplorable record of public corruption. Four of the past seven Illinois governors and dozens of Chicago aldermen have served time for corruption over the years.

The culture of corruption persists. The Burke trial marks the second major federal case to go before a federal jury in Chicago this year alone. The “ComEd Four” already had their weeks in court: A team of once-estimable civic figures all were found guilty for illegally seeking influence over Michael Madigan, the longest-serving statehouse speaker in U.S. history.

With that history in mind, it’s confounding to see lawyers lining up, yet again, to claim that their clients’ alleged illegal deeds are “just politics.”

The unsavory workings of government in Springfield or City Hall absolutely can have a certain stench about them, but there’s a difference between legal and illegal behavior. And the record shows juries have a pretty good eye for seeing where the line is drawn — and when it has been crossed.

Rod Blagojevich’s “just politics” defense didn’t fool his jury. As governor, Blago had what he memorably described as a golden ticket: the power to name a successor in the U.S. Senate after Barack Obama became president.

When federal recordings caught Blago putting that Senate seat up for auction — not to mention withholding a state payment as he tried to squeeze campaign contributions out of a hospital CEO or refusing to sign a bill in order to apply similar pressure on a racetrack owner — Blago’s misdeeds bought him a ticket to the federal pen.

The “just politics” defense didn’t work for the ComEd Four, either.

The guilty group included Anne Pramaggiore, ComEd’s CEO and a fixture in civic life, who had billions at stake and no legal guardrails, apparently, when it came to fixing the outcomes of matters before the Madigan-controlled legislature; John Hooker, a ComEd lobbyist, who greased the workings of power, politics and pay-as-you-go government in Springfield, and Jay Doherty, whose lobbying firm established itself as a source for no-show jobs.

Intermixed among it all was Michael McClain, a Springfield fixture as the speaker’s go-to fixer. Trading on his access to power, McClain set the quid pro quos with Pramaggiore, Doherty and others, scrambling to provide a layer of insulation between Madigan and those willing to curry illegal influence.

And it all seemed to work — until recorded evidence and an unrelenting stream of corroborating witnesses proved just how dirty the ComEd Four deeds were in the end.

The jurors didn’t buy the “just politics” defense in the ComEd Four trial or from Blago. But that apparently won’t stop Burke’s lawyers from taking a similar approach this time.

In Burke’s case, the dean of the City Council was a walking conflict of interest — partner in one of the city’s biggest real estate law firms at the same time he held virtually unchecked power as head of the council’s finance committee.

Evidence put forward in the indictment and pretrial motions seems powerful. Transcripts of secretly created recordings seem to show quid pro quos aplenty as Burke wheels and deals for private law work from businesspeople who had matters before City Council: the owners of a Burger King restaurant and developers of the Old Post Office building.

Was it “just politics” when Burke made clear that the straightest path toward council approval was through engaging the legal services of his Klafter & Burke law firm? Will the recordings captured by a City Council confederate, then-Ald. Danny Solis, who flipped and wore a wire for the feds, really prove as damning as the transcripts make them sound?

The answers won’t be clear until the case is heard, of course, and Burke is entitled to his day in court. And as proceedings get underway, there are always points that give cause for doubt. It seems odd, for example, that the feds are declining to call Solis as a witness — and that the defense is so eager to put him on the witness stand.

History shows that the “just politics” defense rarely works in public corruption cases. Perhaps that’s because, in a city with Chicago’s track record for public corruption, “just politics” can be just awful — and downright illegal in the end.

David Greising is president and CEO of the Better Government Association.

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