A new front in the attack on reporters’ ability to aggressively seek the truth could make journalists pine for the days when all they needed fear for refusing to give up a confidential source was jail.

A federal judge has ordered a former USA Today reporter to pay $5,000 for each day she doesn’t cough up the names of sources she may or may not have consulted for stories about a 2001 anthrax mailing controversy.

The kicker is that the money must come from Toni Locy’s own pocket. The judge has ordered her to accept help from no one – not her family or her former employer or the journalism students who wanted to hold a bake sale for her.

If the order holds, Locy is facing personal financial ruin. Journalists on the whole are a public-minded (not to mention stubborn) sort, but they have their limits. For some, avoiding bankruptcy could trump the sanctity of promises made to sources.

The public has a big stake in ensuring that the government cannot exploit that breaking point. Compelling journalists to break confidences undermines their ability to protect vulnerable sources from retribution and to uncover information the public needs to know.

In Washington, the Legislature passed a shield law last year to prevent judges from forcing reporters into the role of private investigators. Forty-eight other states plus the District of Columbia have similar protections. But the defense is not complete until Congress acts.

A proposed federal shield law passed the House last fall, but has yet to clear the Senate. This week, the three members of the Senate running for president all voiced support for the bill, boosting compromise legislation under negotiation. Members of Congress are working to narrow the scope of the privilege to answer concerns that it could extend to non-journalists or compromise classified information.

It’s about time the federal government followed the states’ lead and acknowledged that journalists’ ability to shine the halogen searchlight of public attention on corruption, injustice or official misfeasance is vital to a healthy democracy. The proposed federal shield law deserves passage – not to protect reporters, but to ensure that the public gets news it might otherwise never see.