In the wake of the death of former US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Friday, Sept. 18, a lot of North Carolina political leaders – Republicans and Democrats alike – were praising Ginsburg and her life story.
However, it’s interesting to remember that, at the beginning of her Supreme Court career, one famous North Carolina political leader – former Sen. Jesse Helms – was one of her biggest critics ideologically and one of only three Senate votes against her nomination.
The highly conservative Helms stated during the debate over her nomination in 1993: “This lady, whom I have regarded as a pleasant, intellectual liberal, is, in fact, a woman whose beliefs are 180 degrees in opposition to some fundamental principles that are important not only to me but, I believe, to the majority of other Americans.”
According to a Washington Post article covering that nomination process nearly three decades ago, Helms criticized Ginsburg’s abortion rights stance as well her support for what he called her “homosexual agenda.”
The Post noted that Ginsburg refused to comment in her testimony before the Senate on “whether it was illegal or unconstitutional to deny people benefits based on their sexual orientation.”
When Ginsburg gave a speech in Raleigh late last year, Ginsburg brought up that no vote from Helms and she stated that the politicization of the Supreme Court needs to stop. During that speech, she referred to Helms’ vote and pointed out that back then there was an attempt to get a broad consensus from members of both parties.
Ginsburg stated in Raleigh that the politicization of the Supreme Court is a trend that needs to stop.
According to the News and Observer, she said, “I hope I live to see the day when we go back to the way it was, and the way it should be.”
Ginsburg did not get her wish.
‘at’s a fact, Jack.
Justice Ginsberg openly vented her hatred of President Trump. As a Justice, she is supposed to be impartial. Oh, yeah, I forgot. The days of approving a President’s choice is no longer a courtesy, it is now a battle for control of a branch of the Government.
She tried to stay alive until November, but she didn’t make it. Now the President must ram his choice through. He should not cower to the mobs on the street, or to the hatred from the media.
Read up on ole Jesse, what a fine example of Republican values:
Racist – And long after die-hard segregationists like George Wallace and Strom Thurmond began courting black voters, Helms fueled white fears by opposing a national holiday in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., whistling “Dixie” while standing next to Senator Carol Moseley-Braun, and supporting apartheid in South Africa. s hat.
Campaign Finance Fraud – But respect only goes so far—so the Helms campaign hedges its bets by cheating. In 1986, the Federal Election Commission penalized the North Carolina Congressional Club $10,000 and ordered it to reorganize, saying it had illegally subsidized Helms’ 1984 campaign. Last year, a decade after the race, the FEC penalized the Helms for Senate committee $25,000 for accepting $700,000 in illegal contributions. And in 1992, the Helms campaign and the Congressional Club settled a Justice Department complaint over a pre-election mailing of postcards falsely threatening 125,000 black voters with jail if they went to the polls.
Useless to NC Constituents – If Helms the landlord neglects some of his tenants, Helms the senator fails to provide for many North Carolinians. Only four states receive less per capita in federal funds; only eight have more residents living in poverty. The state currently ranks 42nd in the release of cancer-causing toxins, 43rd in manufacturing wages, and 44th in infant mortality.
But the real Jesse Helms oozed out nearly every time he opened his mouth to slander those who didn’t agree with him. He claimed “crime rates and irresponsibility among Negroes are a fact of life which must be faced” in a 1981 New York Times interview, and in 1963 asked, “Are civil rights only for Negroes? White women in Washington who have been raped and mugged on the streets in broad daylight have experienced the most revolting sort of violation of their civil rights.”
Helms reserved his full disgust for gays and lesbians, who he called “weak, morally sick wretches” (1994), accused of engaging in “incredibly offensive and revolting conduct” (1990), and warned his constituents to beware “homosexuals, lesbians, disgusting people marching in the streets, demanding all sorts of things, including the right to marry each other” (1990).
Fear mongering and divisive, sounds just like our current WH occupant.
Lizzy’s in a tizzy!
Mr Helms values were and are not representative of all Republicans . If so, then someone needs to send authorities to your house and get rid of all the fireworks, Molotov cocktails, frozen water bottles, black outfits and other paraphernalia that you possess for your next venture out to “save democracy”
Calling the current WH occupant fear mongering and divisive is laughable and of course hypocritical. Just tune in CNN or MSNBC if you want to wallow in fear mongering and divisiveness. Our country would be so much better if only Republicans could be as perfect and as self-righteous as democrats.
Well actually, our black police Chief just recently confirmed that criminality in Greensboro is predominantly inthe black areas.
So I guess Jesse wasn’t so mistaken, eh?
The ‘conservative’ (reactionary) political worldview of the late former (U. S.) Sen. Jesse Helms were truly antithetical to mainstream American ‘values,’ which have been brazenly perverted by the far-right for their extremely insidious political ends.