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I knew that there were several, among African-American leaders, who had been put out by me because of my failure or reluctance to endorse Sen. Kerry.

I worked in the Senate in the 1970s. I worked for the Labor, Public Welfare Committee, and we had Ted Kennedy and my old boss, Bill Hathaway, and Walter Mondale.

My tenure in the Senate was really as an independent and whichever, regardless of party label.

I had a white senator call me a rag head, and I had an African-American legislator call me a conservative with a tan.

I actually defeated an incumbent Republican senator who was part of the Jesse Helm's political machine in North Carolina, the result of which is I'm now the senior senator from North Carolina instead of Jesse Helms, which is a very good thing for this country.

We worked very well with Mark Sanford. We stood shoulder to shoulder fighting for the principles that we believe in. But another person that stood there as well was a legislator, State Senator Larry Grooms.

One difficulty in making the Senate work the way it was intended is that America's electorate is increasingly divided into red and blue states, with lawmakers representing just one color or the other.

People may have their opinions about Senator Helms, but he was highly effective and he took care of his constituency. I learned all those lessons from him, and I bring a great deal to the table because of that.

Now I have known Sen. Bill Frist, the Majority Leader of the United States Senate, since he was born.