=== Bankers Association to Capital Broadcasting ===
Helms early work in politics lead him to become the Executive director of the North Carolina Bankers Association and later the Raleigh City Council where he opposed excessive taxation and supported limiting the growth of government.<ref>http://www.answers.com/topic/jesse-helms</ref> By the mid-1960's1960s, Helms became the executive Vice President for Capitol Broadcasting in Raleigh. He directed the news operation and delivered over-the-air commentaries. Helms developed a following due to his firebrand but perceptive political commentary<ref>http://www.jessehelmscenter.org/jessehelms/biography.asp</ref> which often attacked the decline of morality, liberal trends in society of the time, the Federal government's dubious social engineering in the southern states and Judicial activism.<ref>http://www.answers.com/topic/jesse-helms</ref>
== Senate career ==
=== Senator No ===
Helms' opposition to increasing the role of the federal government in the lives of every day citizens earned him the title "Senator No". From his first term to his last Helms rejected nominations of unqualified liberal candidates, against federal spending (except millitary military spending and federal aid for farmers),<ref>http://www.answers.com/topic/jesse-helms</ref> and opposed naming a holiday for Dr. [[Martin Luther King]].<ref>[http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/07/04/obit.helms/index.html]</ref> Helms supported and befriended qualified candidates regardless of party affiliation whom he felt would better the country, such as [[Madeline Albright]] for US Ambassador to the United Nations and later Secretary of State (ref: Madam Secretary, Madeline Albright). Helms was known for his bipartisan friendships despite ideological differences. However, Helms was broadminded and tolerant of contrary views, and unafraid to be proven in error. For instance Helms originally stood against increased funding to stop the devastation caused by [[AIDS]] in Africa. Helms change of heart on this issue in his own words: "It had been my feeling that AIDS was a disease largely spread by reckless and voluntary sexual and drug-abusing behavior, and that it would probably be confined to those in high risk populations. I was wrong."<ref>Jesse Helms, ''Here's Where I Stand: A Memoir'' (2005)</ref>
=== Standing on principle ===
Helms challenged the Republican party to promote the socially and economically conservative values of the American People. Helms's conservative values won him a 100% rating from the American Conservative Union for the entire last decade he was in office and never more than 10% according to similar liberal groups. Terry O'Neill—of the far left [[feminist]] group, the [[National Organization for Women]]—on hearing of Helms ill health and planned retirement reacted gleefully with the statement "It's a very good thing for the country that he's leaving the Senate."
Helms stated his disbelief in the old adage that "morality cannot be legislated". Helms took an active role in campaigning and in helping the Republican party to engage these values. First in his early work for Smith, then locally and eventually in early 1980 played a key role in helping the father of modern conservative, Ronald Reagan, win the Republican primary and take the White House back from the liberal president Jimmy Carter. Helms's political action committee spent over $4.6 million dollars to help Reagan capture the white house.<ref>http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3b8990d63719.htm</ref> Until recently, when Helms became incapacitated, in his home state of North Carolina few Conservative Republican candidates would run for state or national office without an endorsement from Helms.
=== Foreign Policy ===