Copyright (c) 1997 The Charlotte Observer

Bill James' wife, Julie, suggested a headline for this story:

``BILL JAMES: He can't help it, he was born this way.''

The nature versus nurture debate is an appropriate one for James, the Mecklenburg County commissioner who in just five months since taking office has polarized the community over homosexuality, arts funding, neighborhood schools and other topics.

James didn't spark the recent debates single-handedly. But he has tapped into a conservative and religious constituency that until now has had a limited voice in Charlotte-Mecklenburg politics. His bluntness, and his refusal to let political correctness deter his moral absolutism, repeatedly ruffles the feathers of everyone from liberal Democrats to conservative fellow Republicans.

And he's loving it.

``I thrive on the debate,'' James said last week at his upscale home south of the Arboretum in south Charlotte. ``The other side likes to see vigorous and healthy debate as somehow divisive. I don't see it as divisive. I see it as vigorous and healthy. We are debating things that many people in the public want to debate.''

His critics, though, say his verbal barbs and his attacks on homosexuality have ripped Charlotte's fabric of civility.

``His narrow vision of what is socially and religiously acceptable . . . has been disruptive and divisive and it has created a crisis of credibility,'' said Parks Helms, the Democratic chairman of the county commissioners.

Truth is, Bill James is probably not the savior who received a standing ovation during a service at Calvary Church recently, nor the ``devil incarnate'' that his critics say he is.

He is simply a husband and father, the product of a tight-knit and religious family, who believes the Bible sets out strict standards that should be enforced through public policy.

``He feels that God has called him to do what he's doing,'' his mother, Jane James, said. ``If somebody doesn't stand up for righteousness, who will?''

He is a mix of intellect and moral rigidity, with strong opinions and a love of expressing them. All that adds up to a man who has the potential to deal effectively with the intricacies of public policymaking, but is prone to offend.

``I know him as a good dad and a good husband. . . . He is a very gentle, tender-hearted individual,'' said fellow Republican commissioner Tom Bush, who was the conservatives' standard-bearer after being elected in 1994.

James fancies himself another in a long line of family members who stood up for what was right, regardless of the cost. His great-great-great-grandfather from Kentucky was killed, James says, for standing up against slavery and for fighting for the Union in the Civil War. Two other ancestors were killed for standing up for rural folks' rights against coal companies, he says. His mother was heckled for standing up for blacks' rights in 1950s Lexington, Ky.

Now, James says, he is simply standing up for what is right.

``I know from whence I came,'' he says. ``I know that my family stood up and did the right thing, sometimes at tremendous personal cost. It gives me some degree of comfort to know, if they can do it 100 or 200 years ago, I can do it today.''

James is obsessed with his ancestry. His home is filled with reminders: his great-grandmother's certificate from the Daughters of the American Revolution. A framed article about his great-grandfather, Kentucky's insurance commissioner in the 1920s. A framed collection of clippings and awards for his maternal grandfather, Arch Mainous.

Mainous, a banker and community leader in Lexington, helped raise young Bill, and influenced him tremendously. So much so, James says, that he wants his epitaph to match what the Lexington Herald-Leader wrote of Mainous when he died at 91 in 1990: ``The city is the richer for his life and the poorer for his passing.''

Epitaphs on his mind

The talk of an epitaph is on James' mind. He was diagnosed two years ago with a liver disease that has no cure other than a liver transplant.

His medication, which costs $250 a month, is paid for by taxpayers in the form of county insurance, which all commissioners can receive. He sees no irony between his fiscal conservatism and accepting $3,000 a year from taxpayers for his medicine. It's fair compensation, he says, for the service he offers.

People commonly live with the disease for 20 to 30 years, but it still makes James, 40, think about the importance of making his mark while he can.

``It is better to stand up for what is just and what is right than to sit on the sidelines and say, I wish I had,' `` James said.

What is right, to James, is indisputable. The Bible says so, and he has studied it since he was a child. He met his best friend in church 20 years ago. He and wife Julie first struck up a conversation because she saw a Bible on his car seat and took an interest. Their first date was a concert at Prestonwood Baptist Church in Dallas.

His unbendable moral beliefs, combined with the feisty opining he learned as a child at the dinner table, led to the politician you see today. Less than a month after taking office, he tried to end county funding for any group that acknowledges homosexuality without condemning it as a sin. With budget season approaching, he vows to cut off any group that counsels children about homosexuality.

``You don't teach safe drunk-driving, you don't teach safe prostitution, and you ought not be teaching safe sexual perversity,'' James said.

Job loss adds to stress

Bill James talks too much. Even his biggest fans, including his mother, say so.

``I think that's true. I can't argue with that,'' said Jane James, who moved to Charlotte five years ago with her husband, Bill Sr. ``I think it's very easy to do when you're in the heat of battle. Sometimes people speak before they think.''

James contends that his strong political views got him fired in November after 10 years as a certified public accountant with Price Waterhouse. He is negotiating a settlement now, he says. (Price Waterhouse has declined comment.)

In the meantime, he struggles to find another job, and to continue his family's lifestyle on income from his wife, who is the director of finance at the Rev. Harry Reeder's Christ Covenant Church in Matthews.

``My son came home last night crying, worried that we might have to sell the house,'' James said Friday. ``We tried to explain I'm just going to keep plugging away trying to find a job, and we have some money set aside. We'll just see how long it goes.''

Whether his outspoken nature had anything to do with losing his job, it certainly helps define his politics.

Says commissioner Bush: ``He is in some ways very naive. I don't think he understands yet that words have consequences. . . . I would like to see him start leaning toward the concept of being a statesman instead of a bomb thrower.''

But it's hard to imagine Bill James any other way. He has deeply held convictions, taught to him and formulated over a lifetime.

He has received a bullet in the mail. He regularly receives hate mail.

James doesn't hate anybody, he says. He just has definite beliefs about right and wrong. And now he has a platform from which to preach.

``I have let the voters know exactly where I stand and what I believe,'' James said. ``I'm not going to compromise my principles or my morals or my faith on the altar of political correctness. I'm just not going to do it.''