Editing Jesse Helms (section)

==Fourth Senate term (1991–1997)==
[[File:Senator Jesse Helms holding a watermelon.jpg|thumb|right|Senator Helms holding a watermelon and standing between Miss North Carolina and Miss Watermelon in 1991]]
In the early 1990s, Helms was a vocal opponent of the [[North American Free Trade Agreement]] (NAFTA).<ref>Reno, Robert (September 14, 1993) [https://www.baltimoresun.com/1993/09/14/a-nation-of-ninnies/ A Nation of Ninnies], ''[[The Baltimore Sun]]''</ref>

In August 1991, Helms became one of six Republicans on the Select Senate Committee on POW-MIA Affairs that would investigate the number of Americans still missing in the aftermath of the [[Vietnam War]] following renewed interest.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.upi.com/Archives/1991/08/02/Senate-creates-POW-MIA-panel/7728681105600/|title=Senate creates POW-MIA panel|date=August 2, 1991|publisher=UPI}}</ref>

During this term, Helms was one of three senators to vote against the confirmation of Ruth Bader Ginsburg to the Supreme Court.<ref>{{Cite web |title=U.S. Senate: U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 103rd Congress – 1st Session |url=https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=103&session=1&vote=00232 |access-date=March 24, 2021 |website=www.senate.gov}}</ref>

=== Keating Five investigation ===
On August 5, 1991, Helms made public a special counsel report calling for California Senator [[Alan Cranston]] to be censured by the Senate on charges of reprehensible conduct.<ref name=NYT1991>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1991/08/05/us/cranston-censure-urged-by-counsel.html|title=CRANSTON CENSURE URGED BY COUNSEL|first=Richard L.|last=Burke|newspaper=The New York Times|date=August 5, 1991 }}</ref> The document had been delivered to members of the Senate Ethics Committee the previous month. Helms stated that his move came from the belief that the release would cause the panel to act faster,<ref name=NYT1991/> additionally citing the panel members with being at odds on how much of the report should be released as a reason for not closing an inquiry into [[Charles H. Keating Jr.]] and his role in the [[savings and loan scandal]] of the late 1980s.<ref name=NYT1991/>

The Senate Ethics Committee subsequently voted to investigate Helms for releasing the confidential document.<ref name=NYT19912>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1991/08/07/us/helms-defends-disclosure-of-ethics-panel-report.html|title=Helms Defends Disclosure of Ethics Panel Report|first=Richard L.|last=Berke|newspaper=The New York Times|date=August 7, 1991 }}</ref> Helms issued a statement saying in part that it was "a fascinating suggestion that I may have somehow violated some unspecified 'rule' when I released, over the weekend, my own signed report regarding the Keating Five investigation".<ref name=NYT19912/> Helms welcomed the investigation into himself, along with one into the handling of the [[Keating Five]] case (five senators who received financial contributions from Keating Jr.) by the Senate Ethics Committee, calling the panel's investigation "long, arduous and expensive" and noting a potential public investigation "may disclose that the committee labored and brought forth a mouse".<ref name=NYT19912/>

=== National Endowment for the Arts ===
In 1989, the [[National Endowment for the Arts]] awarded grants for a retrospective of [[Robert Mapplethorpe]] photographs, some of which containing homosexual themes, in addition to a museum in [[Winston-Salem, North Carolina]], supporting an exhibition that featured an image by [[Andres Serrano]] of a crucifix suspended in urine.<ref name=NEA1991/> These images caused an uproar and marked the National Endowment for the Arts becoming "a favorite target for Mr. Helms and other conservative senators who have objected to the work of some of the artists who have received Government grants."<ref name=NEA1991>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1991/09/20/arts/senate-votes-to-limit-arts-grants.html|title=Senate Votes to Limit Arts Grants|date=September 20, 1991|newspaper=The New York Times}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-09-18-ca-2388-story.html|title='NEA Four' Grant Denial Questioned : Arts: ACLU claims transcripts indicate grants were denied on political, not artistic, grounds.|first=Dennis|last=McDougal|date=September 18, 1991}}</ref> In September 1989, Helms met with [[John E. Frohnmayer]], President Bush's appointee for Chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts.<ref name=LATimes1989/> While neither spoke publicly about the meeting, Helms reportedly made it clear that he considered his opposition to certain N.E.A. grants to be an election issue, and his opposition would continue after the next election.<ref name=LATimes1989>{{cite news|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1989-09-22-ca-775-story.html|title=Government and the Arts : The Man Who Would Be Arts King|first=Allan|last=Parachini|date=September 22, 1989|newspaper=Los Angeles Times}}</ref>

In September 1991, Helms charged the National Endowment for the Arts with financing art that would turn "the stomach of any normal person" while proposing an amendment to an appropriations bill forbidding the usage of the grants for the N.E.A. in promoting material that would be deemed as depicting "sexual or excretory activities or organs" in an "offensive way".<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1991/10/27/opinion/corn-porn-and-the-nea.html|title=Corn, Porn and the N.E.A.|date=October 27, 1991|newspaper=The New York Times}}</ref> On September 20, the Senate voted 68 to 28 in favor of the amendment.<ref name=NEA1991/> The same night, Helms withdrew another amendment that changed the financing formula of the N.E.A. to funneling over half of its grant money through states as opposed to the Washington headquarters and would see a reduction in the New York fiscal year appropriation from its 26 million to just over 7 million.<ref name=NEA1991/>

===Remarks regarding Moseley Braun and Clinton===
In a widely publicized incident on July 22, 1993, [[Carol Moseley Braun]], the first black woman in the Senate and the only black senator at the time, reported that Helms deliberately sought to offend her by whistling the song "[[Dixie (song)|Dixie]]" as the two shared an elevator.<ref name="Helms Whistling Dix">{{cite news |title=Is Jesse Helms Whistling 'Dixie' Over Nomination? |author=Jessica Reaves |newspaper=[[Time (magazine)|Time]] |date=October 27, 1999 |url=https://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,33306,00.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080710072730/http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,33306,00.html |url-status=live|archive-date=July 10, 2008 }}</ref><ref name="fair1">{{cite web |publisher=FAIR |title=End of Racism? |url=http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=1346 |date=March 1, 1996}}</ref><ref name="Winston-Salem 5 Jy">{{cite web|title=The End of Racism?: Somebody tell Marge Schott|work=[[Winston-Salem Journal]] |date=July 5, 2008|url=https://fair.org/extra/the-end-of-racism/|archive-url=https://archive.today/20081006183516/http://www2.journalnow.com/content/2008/jul/05/jesse-helms-oct-18-1921-july-4-2008/|url-status=live|archive-date=October 6, 2008|access-date=July 8, 2008 }}</ref> After Moseley Braun persuaded the Senate to vote against Helms's amendment to extend the patent of the [[United Daughters of the Confederacy]] insignia, which included the [[Confederate flag]], Moseley Braun claims that Helms ran into her in an elevator.<ref name="Helms Whistling Dix" /> Helms allegedly turned to [[Orrin Hatch|Senator Orrin Hatch]] and said, "Watch me make her cry. I'm going to make her cry. I'm going to sing 'Dixie' until she cries."<ref>''Chicago Sun-Times'', August 5, 1993</ref> He then allegedly proceeded to sing the song about "the good life" during [[slavery]] to Moseley Braun.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2008/07/helms-subtly-ca.html |title=Helms subtly carried torch of white supremacy |work=USA Today |author=Wickham, DeWayne |date=July 8, 2008 |access-date=August 29, 2008 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080802025535/http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2008/07/helms-subtly-ca.html |archive-date=August 2, 2008 }}</ref><ref name="John Nichols 4 Jy">{{cite journal | first = John | last = Nichols | title= Jesse Helms, John McCain and the Mark of the White Hands | journal=The Nation | date=July 5, 2008 | url=https://www.thenation.com/article/jesse-helms-john-mccain-and-mark-white-hands/ | access-date=August 29, 2008}}</ref> In 1999, Helms unsuccessfully attempted to block Moseley Braun's nomination to be [[United States Ambassador to New Zealand]].<ref name="Helms Whistling Dix"/>

In 1994, Helms created a sensation when he told broadcasters [[Rowland Evans]] and [[Robert Novak]] that Clinton was "not up" to the tasks of being commander-in-chief, and suggested two days later, on the anniversary of [[John F. Kennedy]]'s assassination, "Mr. Clinton better watch out if he comes down here. He'd better have a bodyguard." Helms said Clinton was unpopular and that he had not meant it as a threat.<ref>{{Cite news | url=https://www.nytimes.com/1994/11/23/us/helms-takes-new-swipe-at-clinton-then-calls-it-mistake.html |title = Helms Takes New Swipe at Clinton, then Calls It Mistake|newspaper = The New York Times|date = November 23, 1994|last1 = Greenhouse|first1 = Steven}}</ref> Clinton addressed the comments when asked about them by a reporter at a press conference the following day: "I think the remarks were unwise and inappropriate. The President oversees the foreign policy of the United States. And the Republicans will decide in whom they will repose their trust and confidence; that's a decision for them to make, not for me."<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/PPP-1994-book2/html/PPP-1994-book2-doc-pg2113.htm|title=The President's News Conference With President Kuchma of Ukraine|date=November 22, 1994|first=Bill|last=Clinton|author-link=Bill Clinton|publisher=Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States}}</ref>

===Republican majority===
Republicans regained control of Congress after the 1994 elections and Helms finally became the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He was the first North Carolinian to chair the committee since [[Nathaniel Macon]]. In that role, Helms pushed for reform of the UN and blocked payment of the United States' dues. Helms secured sufficient reforms that a colleague, future [[President of the United States|President]] [[Joe Biden]] of [[Delaware]] said that "As only Nixon could go to China, only Helms could fix the U.N."<ref>Poster at Jesse Helms Center, [[Wingate, North Carolina]]</ref>

Helms passed few laws of his own in part because of this bridge-burning style. [[Hedrick Smith]]'s ''The Power Game'' portrays Helms as a "devastatingly effective power broker".<ref>{{cite news |first=Alan |last=Brinkley |author-link=Alan Brinkley |title=Where the Big Wheels Spin |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1988/03/27/books/where-the-big-wheels-spin.html |series=[[New York Times Book Review]] |work=[[The New York Times]] |date=March 27, 1988 |access-date=July 8, 2009}}</ref>

Helms tried to block the refunding of the Ryan White Care Act in 1995, saying that those with AIDS [[Victim blaming|were responsible for the disease]], because they had contracted it because of their "deliberate, disgusting, revolting conduct", and that the reason AIDS existed in the first place was because it was "God's punishment for homosexuals".{{Citation needed|reason=Reliable source needed for quote that he believed AIDS was "God's punishment for homosexuals"|date=April 2020}} Helms also claimed that more federal dollars were spent on AIDS than heart disease or cancer, despite this not being borne out by the [[Public Health Service]] statistics.<ref>{{cite news |work=The New York Times |url= https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=990CE4DA1230F936A35754C0A963958260 |title= Helms Puts the Brakes to a Bill Financing AIDS Treatment |date=July 5, 1995 |first=Katharine Q|last=Seelye}}</ref>

===Helms–Burton Act===
{{Main|Helms–Burton Act}}

Soon after becoming the chair of the [[United States Senate Committee on Foreign Relations|Senate Foreign Relations Committee]], in February 1995, Helms announced that he wished to strengthen the spirit of the 1992 [[Torricelli Act]] with new legislation.<ref name="Roy 29">Roy (2000), p. 29</ref> Its companion sponsored through the [[United States House of Representatives|House]] by [[Dan Burton]] of [[Indiana]],<ref name="Roy 29" /> it would strengthen the [[United States embargo against Cuba|embargo against Cuba]]: further codifying the [[embargo]], instructing United States diplomats to vote in favor of sanctions on Cuba, stripping the [[President of the United States|President]] of the option of ending the embargo by [[Executive order (United States)|executive order]] until [[Fidel Castro|Fidel]] and [[Raúl Castro]] leave power and a prescribed course of transition is followed.<ref name="Congress and Cuba">{{cite journal |last=Lowenfeld |first=Andreas F. |date=July 1996 |title=Congress and Cuba: the Helms-Burton Act |journal=[[American Journal of International Law]] |volume=90 |issue=3 |pages=419–34 |doi=10.2307/2204066 |publisher=American Society of International Law |jstor=2204066 |s2cid=146904252 }}</ref> The bill also, controversially explicitly overruling the [[Act of State Doctrine]],<ref name="Congress and Cuba" /> allowed foreign companies to be sued in American courts if, in dealings with the regime of [[Fidel Castro]], they acquired assets formerly owned by Americans.

Passing the House comfortably, the Senate was far more cautious, under pressure from the Clinton administration. The debate was [[filibuster]]ed, with a motion of [[cloture]] falling four votes short.<ref name="Congress and Cuba" /> Helms reintroduced the bill without Titles III and IV, which detailed the penalties on investors, and it passed by 74 to 24 on October 19, 1995.<ref>Roy (2000), p. 30</ref> A [[United States congressional conference committee|conference committee]] was scheduled to convene, but did not until February 28, 1996, by which time external events had taken over. On February 24, Cuba shot down two small [[Brothers to the Rescue]] planes piloted by anti-Castro Cuban-Americans. When the conference committee met, the tougher House version, with all four titles, won out on most substantive points.<ref name="Congress and Cuba" /> It was passed by the Senate 74–22 and the House 336–86, and President Clinton signed the [[Helms-Burton Act]] into law on March 12, 1996.<ref>Roy (2000), p. 31</ref> For years after its passing, Helms criticized the corporate interests that sought to lift the sanctions on Cuba, writing an article in 1999 for ''[[Foreign Affairs]]'', at whose publisher, the [[Council on Foreign Relations]], also drew Helms's ire for its softer approach to Cuba.<ref>Roy (2000), p. 192</ref>

===1996 re-election campaign===
{{Main|1996 United States Senate election in North Carolina}}

In 1996, Helms drew 1,345,833 (52.6 percent) to Gantt's 1,173,875 (45.9 percent). Helms supported his former Senate colleague [[Bob Dole]] for president, while Gantt endorsed [[Bill Clinton]]. Although Helms is generally credited with being the most successful Republican politician in North Carolina history, his largest proportion of the vote in any of his five elections was 54.5 percent. In North Carolina, Helms was a polarizing figure, and he freely admitted that many people in the state strongly disliked him: "[The Democrats] could nominate [[Mortimer Snerd]] and he'd automatically get 45 percent of the vote." Helms was particularly popular among older, conservative constituents, and was considered one of the last "[[Old South]]" politicians to have served in the Senate. However, he also considered himself a voice of conservative youth, whom he hailed in the dedication of his autobiography.