Tuesday, December 31, 2024
Year : 2, Issue: 18
by Stewart D. McLaurin
As we mourn the death of President Jimmy Carter, one of only 45 people to serve as our chief executive, we can celebrate an extraordinary life. More than 100 years spanning 17 presidencies from Calvin Coolidge to Joe Biden, President Carter’s sense of justice and faith called him to a life of service – before, during and after his four years in the White House.
James Earl Carter Jr. was born in 1924, a short, shy child (nicknamed Peewee) who was formed by his childhood in the tiny rural communities of Plains and Archery.
Although Georgia was deeply segregated, his mother, Lillian, was a nurse who provided free care for local Black sharecroppers and brought her son along to visit Black churches. A Black farmhand named Rachel Clark taught him much of his faith.
“Much more than my parents,” Carter later wrote, “she talked to me about the religious and moral values that shaped a person’s life.”
Jimmy Carter starts down his path of leadership
President Carter’s father was a businessman, farmer, blacksmith and cobbler – and later a state representative – but his support of racial segregation was a source of estrangement with his son. Jimmy Carter was the only student from his high school to go to college, and during World War II, he enrolled at the Naval Academy. (He is the only president who attended Annapolis.)
In the early 1950s, Carter interviewed for the Navy’s new nuclear submarine service, where its legendary founder, Adm. Hyman Rickover grilled him on everything from Shakespeare and opera to Carter’s time at the Naval Academy. “Did you always do your best?” he asked.
Carter entered into politics and the presidency as the ‘outsider’
When his father died of pancreatic cancer, Carter quit the Navy to save the family’s peanut farm from bankruptcy. He entered politics at the school board level and then as a state senator in the early 1960s, and by 1970 was elected governor of Georgia.
Carter ran for president in 1976 as an outsider – “My name is Jimmy Carter, and I’m running for president,” he would begin his speeches – and bested 16 other candidates to win the Democratic nomination.
After defeating President Gerald Ford, Carter became America’s 39th president, sworn in as “Jimmy” instead of “James.” He was the first president to walk 40 minutes from the Capitol to the White House during the inaugural parade, holding hands with first lady Rosalynn Carter as their 9-year-old daughter Amy traced the median strip with her feet.
He gave Vice President Walter Mondale historic new responsibilities, created the Departments of Energy and Education, deregulated the trucking and airline industries, and doubled the land area protected by the National Park Service.
In foreign policy, President Carter achieved an unprecedented peace treaty that ended a cycle of wars between Israel and Egypt, signed after the president shuttled between the delegations for two weeks at Camp David.
“It was the Jimmy Carter conference,” insisted Israeli leader Menachem Begin. “I think he worked harder than our forefathers did in Egypt building the pyramids.”
Carter also recognized and established formal diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China, signed a major nuclear arms agreement with the Soviet Union and set in motion the return of the Panama Canal to Panama.
Bringing technology and religion to the White House
Carter brought new trends to the White House itself. When oil production dropped after the Iranian Islamic Revolution in 1979, the president had 32 thermal solar collectors installed on the roof of the West Wing to heat water for the staff cafeteria. He introduced computer automation to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue (including an 8-foot-long, water-cooled IBM laser printer). President Carter loved music, and befriended contemporary musicians like Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, Jimmy Buffett, Wayland Jennings and the Allman Brothers.
The Carters also brought their deep religious faith to the nation’s capital. They joined the First Baptist Church a mile from the White House, where Amy was baptized and the president occasionally taught Sunday School and a class for couples (always preparing the night before). As president, he prayed many times a day.
Carter later said of the Camp David Accords, “We finally got an agreement because we all shared faith in the same God – we all considered ourselves the sons of Abraham.”
