Gift For A Nation

Jesse Helms died today. President Bush was quoted as saying that America has lost a "great patriot."

I began to think about the word patriot. Patriot is a word with a simple definition. It means one who loves his country. But how can one be a patriot, without believing in what a country stands for?

Even before there was a Constitution, or a Bill of Rights, there was the Declaration of Independence. This document explains clearly what the United States stands for. "We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal ..." All of us, every last one, has the right to be treated equally and fairly under the laws of our country.

Was Jesse Helms a patriot? I have lifted this passage from the comments posted today by a reader of the New York Times. I trust the dates and quotes are correct.

Over the years Helms has declared homosexuality “degenerate,” and homosexuals “weak, morally sick wretches.” (Newsweek, 12/5/94) In a tirade highlighting his routine opposition to AIDS research funding, Helms lashed out at the Kennedy-Hatch AIDS bill in 1988: “There is not one single case of AIDS in this country that cannot be traced in origin to sodomy.” (States News Service, 5/17/88)

Helms remonstrated ten female members of the House of Representatives to “act like ladies” when they interrupted a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing to demand support of a U.N. treaty against gender discrimination, and subsequently had them removed from the hearing by Capitol police. (St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 10/28/99)

And the man ABC News now describes as a “conservative icon” in 1993 sang “Dixie” in an elevator to Carol Moseley-Braun, the first African-American woman elected to the Senate, bragging, “I’m going to make her cry. I’m going to sing Dixie until she cries.” (Chicago Sun-Times, 8/5/93)

More recently, when a caller to CNN’s Larry King Live show praised guest Jesse Helms for “everything you’ve done to help keep down the niggers,” Helms’ response was to salute the camera and say, “Well, thank you, I think.” (Wilmington Star-News, 9/16/95)

Jesse Helms was no patriot. He was an embarassment to our country and I'm glad he's gone. May he find as much eternal peace in death as he provided to minorities and seekers of equal rights while he was alive.

Today, on this Independence Day we have once again been liberated. This time from a mean spirited, intolerant bigot named Jesse Helms.