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Jesse Helms
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Jesse Alexander Helms, Jr. (October 18, 1921 - July 4, 2008[1]) was a five-term Republican U.S. Senator from North Carolina, and a former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

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Senatorial service

As a senator, Helms became one of the leaders of the increasingly influential conservative movement within the Republican Party, giving Ronald Reagan crucial support in 1976 in the pivotal North Carolina GOP primary that paved the way for Reagan's presidential election in 1980.

Helms became chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee in the 1980s. He was also an advocate of the tobacco industry in Congress, since much of North Carolina's rural economy relies on tobacco. (Hubert Humphrey once said that, "I'll trade Jesse Helms his tobacco vote for my wheat support any day.") Tobacco companies such as R. J. Reynolds and Philip Morris have supported him, both directly and through donations to the Jesse Helms Center at Wingate University.

Helms led the Senatorial opposition to the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday in 1983.[5]

When Republicans regained control of Congress after the 1994 elections, Helms became chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. In that role, he pushed for reform of the United Nations and blocked payment of UN dues by the United States. As he gained seniority and clout, Helms became known as "Senator No" because he would obstruct a variety of Democratic bills and presidential appointments. Helms reportedly delighted in the nickname. But Helms passed few laws of his own in part because of his bridge-burning style. Hedrik Smith's The Power Game depicts several senators specifically blocking Helms' goals as result of his intransigence.

Helms vehemently opposed granting MFN to China, citing human rights concerns.

Though a chairman of a major Senate committee, he regularly eschewed invitations to go on Sunday interview programs, claiming his constituents did not watch them. He also advised a young press aide not to write a letter to the New York Times after one of its editorials condemned Helms: again, since most of the constituency did not subscribe to the paper, there was no need for him to engage the paper in a dispute.

Senator Helms was instrumental in obtaining the previously withheld black box to KAL 007 by writing to Russian president Boris Yeltsin. He also condemned the forced labour camps established by the USSR.

Controversies

Helms was particularly vitriolic when speaking of blacks,gays and lesbians, blaming them for "the proliferation of AIDS," and stating that he disliked using the word "gay" to refer to them since, "...there's nothing gay about them."

Helms opposed the Martin Luther King Day bill in 1983 on grounds that King had two associates with communist ties, Stanley Levison and Jack O'Dell; as well, he voiced disapproval of King's alleged philandering.

Of civil rights protests Helms wrote, "The Negro cannot count forever on the kind of restraint that's thus far left him free to clog the streets, disrupt traffic, and interfere with other men's rights." (WRAL-TV commentary, 1963) He also wrote, "Crime rates and irresponsibility among Negroes are a fact of life which must be faced." (New York Times, 2/8/81)

Helms' referred to the University of North Carolina (UNC) as the "University of Negroes and Communists." (Charleston Gazette, 9/15/95) [2]

Helms once deeply offended a black colleague, Democratic Senator Carol Moseley-Braun of Illinois, by singing part of "Dixie" on a Capitol elevator.

Soon after the Senate vote on the Confederate flag insignia, Sen. Jesse Helms (R.-N.C.) ran into Mosely-Braun in a Capitol elevator. Helms turned to his friend, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R.-Utah), and said, "Watch me make her cry. I'm going to make her cry. I'm going to sing 'Dixie' until she cries." He then proceeded to sing the song about the good life during slavery to Mosely-Braun (Gannett News Service, 9/2/93; Time, 8/16/93).[3]

At this time, his press secretary was Claude Allen, an African American. James Meredith, who earned fame as the first African American student admitted to the University of Mississippi, also served on Helms' staff.[citation needed]

While working on the 1950 campaign of Republican Willis Smith against Democrat Frank Porter Graham, Helms helped create an ad that read "White people, wake up before it is too late. Do you want Negroes working beside you, your wife and your daughters, in your mills and factories? Frank Graham favors mingling of the races." Another ad featured photographs Helms himself had doctored to illustrate the allegation that Graham's wife had danced with a black man. (FAIR 9/1/01, The News and Observer 8/26/01)

Helms was an ardent supporter of the late Chile dictator Augusto Pinochet. [4]

When Roberta Achtenberg was appointed Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in 1993 by President Bill Clinton, Helms attempted to block her confirmation, stating that he refused to vote for "that damned lesbian".

After a protest during his 1986 visit to Mexico, Helms opined: "All Latins are volatile people. Hence, I was not surprised at the volatile reaction." [5]

In 1994 Helms spoke out against metal industrial singer Marilyn Manson. Manson responded by painting an anti-gay slur on his chest during a show in Winston-Salem, in a sarcastic and critical display against Helms's social viewpoints.

Hendrik Hertzberg of The New Yorker noted in his memoirs that Helms had "the 'humorous habit'" of calling all black people "Fred".

Helms used race issues in many elections; for instance, in 1990, he ran the famous "Hands" television ad in a tough re-election race. The ad has become legendary in Southern political circles as the most direct appeal to white backlash in modern American politics. The ad played upon white voters' ideas that affirmative action might lead to a job going to a less-qualified candidate ("Gantt supports Ted Kennedy's racial quota law, that makes the color of your skin more important than your qualifications.") (watch the ad).

Helms opposed an amendment offering War reparations#Japan to Japanese-Americans who had been interned during World War II; he proposed an amendment stipulating that no reparations would be made unless the Japanese government compensated the families of Americans killed at Pearl Harbor.

In 1994, Helms created a sensation when, on the anniversary of John F. Kennedy's assassination, he told broadcasters Rowland Evans, Jr., and Robert Novak that Clinton was "not up" to the tasks of being commander-in-chief and suggested that Clinton had "better not show up around here [Fort Bragg] without a bodyguard."[6]

Helms was a strong supporter of drug prohibition, and opposed former Massachusetts Governor Bill Weld's nomination as Ambassador to Mexico because Weld supported medical marijuana.[7] Helms proposed several bills as part of the war on drugs.[8].

Helms once claimed that "The New York Times and Washington Post are both infested with homosexuals themselves. Just about every person down there is a homosexual or lesbian." [9]

Link:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_Helms

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