In the indictment on Wednesday, prosecutors essentially accused Mr. DeLay and his aides of engineering their 2002 victory in Texas through money laundering - specifically, by violating a state law that bars companies from donating to individual candidates. The law is a legacy of struggles at the turn of the last century between farmers and ranchers on the one hand and so-called corporate robber barons eager to seize their lands.

The indictment charged that $155,000 in donations to the committee from six companies, including Sears Roebuck and Bacardi, the rum maker, were put into a bank account along with other money raised by Texans for a Republican Majority.


In September 2002, the indictment shows, the committee sent a check for $190,000 drawn from that account to the Republican National Committee in Washington. The check, which is reproduced in the indictment, was made out to the Republican National State Elections Committee, which oversees state races for the national party.

The indictment charged that Mr. Ellis, Mr. DeLay's aide, then provided Terry Nelson, President Bush's political director in his 2004 campaign and a Republican National Committee official, with a list of state Republican candidates in Texas who were to receive money, along with the amount of money for each.

The indictment suggests that the proceeds from the $190,000 check were then laundered back to Texas in the form of donations to the seven Republican candidates, in violation of the state's corporate money ban.