Confederate Flag Ignites Helms’ Opposition to Nominee

Six years after then-Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun (D-Ill.) bested him in a legislative battle over the symbolism of the Confederate flag, Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.) is threatening to settle the score by withholding support for her nomination to be ambassador to New Zealand.

“I don’t think she should hold her breath until she becomes an ambassador,” Helms is quoted as saying in Roll Call, a Capitol Hill newspaper. “She should look for another line of work.”

Helms went on to say that he has bitter feelings toward his former colleague because she blocked his 1993 bill to renew a design patent for the United Daughters of the Confederacy.

Every 14 years since 1898, the Senate had rubber-stamped the group’s application for patent rights on its emblem. But Moseley-Braun, whose 1992 election made her the first and only black woman to serve in the Senate, objected to granting the patent because the group uses the Confederate flag in the emblem.

Her action prompted a spirited floor debate on the symbolism of slavery. After an emotional fight, she persuaded 75 senators to reject the patent.

Moseley-Braun failed in her 1998 reelection bid amid allegations of unethical behavior. Among the issues raised during a bitter reelection campaign by her successor, Republican Peter Fitzgerald, was a visit to a Nigerian dictator in 1996 and never-proved allegations that she spent campaign funds on personal items.

Since leaving the Senate, she has kept her ties to Washington by serving as a consultant to the Department of Education. Clinton nominated her for the ambassadorship earlier this month.

Helms’ comments to Roll Call suggested that he has set a price for his support of her nomination. “At a very minimum, she has got to apologize for the display that she provoked over a little symbol for a wonderful group of little old ladies,” Helms is quoted as telling Roll Call.

But Helms’ office made clear Monday that questions about Moseley-Braun’s ethics will be center stage.

In a statement issued by his office, Helms cited “reports in the New Zealand press” for suggesting that “even the government of New Zealand is concerned by these allegations against her.”

Helms’ office said that his Foreign Relations Committee will conduct confirmation hearings examining her record “carefully and objectively.” Making no promises on the outcome of those hearings, Helms chastised the White House for nominating her and hinted at his line of attack during the confirmation process.

“This nomination comes to the Senate with an ethical cloud hanging over Ms. Moseley-Braun,” the statement said. “Indeed, I wonder if the president and his associates even examined her record before submitting it to the Senate.”

Clinton, asked about Helms’ threat to block the nomination unless Moseley-Braun apologizes, expressed hope that Helms would not do that. “There has been an unprecedented amount of playing politics with ambassadors,” he said during a briefing with reporters. The Senate is holding up “four other ambassadors that no one has questioned anything about their qualifications, for a totally irrelevant reason,” he added.

Mark Thiessen, a Helms spokesman, said that the senator’s comments about the Confederate flag issue were a “half joke.” He refused to rule out whether the senator would demand an apology or allow his personal feelings to affect his consideration of Moseley-Braun’s nomination. “It is true he didn’t appreciate her” blocking the patent design, he said. But he added that “the hearings and nomination will be based on her ethics matters. There is enough in the ethics hearing to evaluate her. All other issues are secondary.”

This is the latest round in a series of racially charged dust-ups between the liberal Moseley-Braun and the conservative Helms.

Not long after winning the vote on the United Daughters of the Confederacy, Moseley-Braun delivered a speech before the National Urban League and recounted a verbal exchange with Helms. She said that Helms began to sing “Dixie” when she entered a Senate elevator and told Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah): “I’m going to make her cry.”

Moseley-Braun said she was unfazed. “I looked at him and said: ‘Sen. Helms, your singing would make me cry if you sang “Rock of Ages.” ’ “