From the It's-not-a-principle-unless-it-costs-you-something Department

newsobserver.com | He quit rather than lower flag for Helms

RALEIGH - L.F. Eason III gave up the only job he'd ever had rather than lower a flag to honor former U.S. Sen. Jesse Helms.

Eason, a 29-year veteran of the state Department of Agriculture, instructed his staff at a small Raleigh lab not to fly the U.S. or North Carolina flags at half-staff Monday, as called for in a directive to all state agencies by Gov. Mike Easley.

When a superior ordered the lab to follow the directive, Eason decided to retire rather than pay tribute to Helms. After several hours' delay, one of Eason's employees hung the flags at half-staff.

The brouhaha began late Sunday night, when Eason e-mailed eight of his employees in the state standards lab, which calibrates measuring equipment used on things as widely varied as gasoline and hamburgers.

"Regardless of any executive proclamation, I do not want the flags at the North Carolina Standards Laboratory flown at half staff to honor Jesse Helms any time this week," Eason wrote just after midnight, according to e-mail messages released in response to a public records request.

He told his staff that he did not think it was appropriate to honor Helms because of his "doctrine of negativity, hate, and prejudice" and his opposition to civil rights bills and the federal Martin Luther King Jr. holiday...

A man who can fairly be called principled. I'm sure plenty will find reasons to diminish Eason's choice. Would Helms? We'll never know. But unless words mean nothing--and there's compelling evidence to support in too many professional situations--surely Helms' own words make a pretty decent firewall:

'Being remembered isn't important. What is important is standing up for what you believe to be right, hoping that you have done everything you can to preserve the moral and spiritual principles that made America great in the first place.'

Helms' Farewell Senate Speech

We'll leave discussing the a la carte application of "moral and spiritual" principles for another day.