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Jimmy
Carter,
39th
president
and
Nobel
Peace
Prize
winner,
dies at
100
Kevin
Sullivan,
Edward
Walsh
washingtonpost.com
PLAINS,
GA -
Jimmy
Carter,
a
no-frills
and
steel-willed
Southern
governor
who was
elected
president
in 1976,
was
rejected
by
disillusioned
voters
after a
single
term and
went on
to an
extraordinary
post-presidential
life
that
included
winning
the
Nobel
Peace
Prize,
died
Sunday
at his
home in
Plains,
Georgia,
according
to his
son
James E.
Carter
III,
known as
Chip. He
was 100
and the
oldest
living
U.S.
president
of all
time.
His son
confirmed
the
death
but did
not
provide
an
immediate
cause.
In a
statement
in
February
2023,
the
Carter
Center
said the
former
president,
after a
series
of
hospital
stays,
would
stop
further
medical
treatment
and
spend
his
remaining
time at
home
under
hospice
care. He
had been
treated
in
recent
years
for an
aggressive
form of
melanoma
skin
cancer,
with
tumors
that
spread
to his
liver
and
brain.
His
wife,
Rosalynn,
died
Nov. 19,
2023, at
96. The
Carters,
who were
close
partners
in
public
life,
had been
married
for more
than 77
years,
the
longest
presidential
marriage
in U.S.
history.
His
final
public
appearance
was at
her
funeral
in
Plains,
where he
sat in
the
front
row in a
wheelchair.
Carter
was last
photographed
outside
his home
with
family
and
friends
as he
watched
a
flyover
on Oct.
1 held
to mark
his
100th
birthday.
Mr.
Carter
is
survived
by his
children
Jack,
Chip,
Jeff and
Amy; 11
grandchildren;
and 14
great-grandchildren,
according
to the
Carter
Center.
“My
father
was a
hero,
not only
to me
but to
everyone
who
believes
in
peace,
human
rights,
and
unselfish
love,”
Chip
Carter
said in
a
statement.
“My
brothers,
sister,
and I
shared
him with
the rest
of the
world
through
these
common
beliefs.
The
world is
our
family
because
of the
way he
brought
people
together,
and we
thank
you for
honoring
his
memory
by
continuing
to live
these
shared
beliefs.”
Mr.
Carter,
a
small-town
peanut
farmer,
U.S.
Navy
veteran,
and
Georgia
governor
from
1971 to
1975,
was the
first
president
from the
Deep
South
since
1837,
and the
only
Democrat
elected
president
between
Lyndon
B.
Johnson’s
and Bill
Clinton’s
terms in
the
White
House.
As the
nation’s
39th
president,
he
governed
with
strong
Democratic
majorities
in
Congress
but in a
country
that was
growing
more
conservative.
Four
years
after
taking
office,
Mr.
Carter
lost his
bid for
reelection,
in a
landslide,
to one
of the
most
conservative
political
figures
of the
era,
Ronald
Reagan.
When Mr.
Carter
left
Washington
in
January
1981, he
was
widely
regarded
as a
mediocre
president,
if not
an
outright
failure.
The list
of what
had gone
wrong
during
his
presidency,
not all
of it
his
fault,
was
long. It
was a
time of
economic
distress,
with a
stagnant
economy
and
stubbornly
high
unemployment
and
inflation.
“Stagflation,”
connoting
both low
growth
and high
inflation,
was a
description
that
critics
used to
attack
Mr.
Carter’s
economic
policies.
In the
summer
of 1979,
Americans
waited
in long
lines at
service
stations
as
gasoline
supplies
dwindled
and
prices
soared
after
revolution
in Iran
disrupted
the
global
oil
supply.
Mr.
Carter
made
energy
his
signature
domestic
policy
initiative,
and he
had some
success,
but
events
outside
his
control
intervened.
In March
1979, a
unit of
the
Three
Mile
Island
nuclear
power
plant
near
Harrisburg,
Pa.,
suffered
a core
meltdown.
The
accident
was the
worst
ever for
the U.S.
nuclear-energy
industry
and a
severe
setback
to hopes
that
nuclear
power
would
provide
a safe
alternative
to oil
and
other
fossil
fuels.
Former
president
Jimmy
Carter
lived
longer
than any
other
U.S.
president.
He won a
Nobel
Peace
Prize
for
conflict
resolution
work.
(Video:
Alice
Li/The
Washington
Post)
Mr.
Carter’s
fortunes
were no
better
overseas.
In
November
1979, an
Iranian
mob
seized
control
of the
U.S.
Embassy
in
Tehran,
taking
52
Americans
as
hostages.
It was
the
beginning
of a
444-day
ordeal
that
played
out
daily on
television
and did
not end
until
Jan. 20,
1981,
the day
Mr.
Carter
left
office,
when the
hostages
were
released.
In the
midst of
the
crisis,
in April
1980,
Mr.
Carter
authorized
a rescue
attempt
that
ended
disastrously
in the
Iranian
desert
when two
U.S.
aircraft
collided
on the
ground,
killing
eight
American
servicemen.
Secretary
of State
Cyrus R.
Vance,
who had
opposed
the
mission,
resigned.
“I may
have
overemphasized
the
plight
of the
hostages
when I
was in
my final
year,”
Mr.
Carter
said in
a 2018
interview
with The
Washington
Post in
Plains.
“But I
was so
obsessed
with
them
personally,
and with
their
families,
that I
wanted
to do
anything
to get
them
home
safely,
which I
did.”
A month
after
the
Iranian
hostage
crisis
erupted,
an
emboldened
Soviet
Union
invaded
Afghanistan.
Mr.
Carter
ordered
an
embargo
of grain
sales to
the
Soviet
Union,
angering
American
farmers,
and a
U.S.
boycott
of the
1980
Summer
Olympics
in
Moscow,
a step
that was
unpopular
with
many
Americans
and was
widely
seen as
weak and
ineffectual.
As the
years
wore on,
the
judgment
on Mr.
Carter’s
presidency
gradually
gave way
to a
more
positive
view. He
lived
long
enough
to see
his
record
largely
vindicated
by
history,
with a
widespread
acknowledgment
that his
presidency
had been
far more
than
long
lines at
the gas
station
and U.S.
hostages
in Iran.
Near the
end of
Mr.
Carter’s
life,
two
biographies
argued
forcefully
that he
had been
a more
consequential
president
than
most
people
realized
—
“perhaps
the most
misunderstood
president
in
American
history,”
author
Jonathan
Alter
wrote in
his 2020
book,
“His
Very
Best:
Jimmy
Carter,
a Life.”
Both
books —
the
other
was Kai
Bird’s
2021
volume,
“The
Outlier:
The
Unfinished
Presidency
of Jimmy
Carter”
— said
Mr.
Carter
was
often
ahead of
his
time,
especially
with his
early
focus on
reducing
fossil
fuel use
and his
efforts
to
mitigate
the
nation’s
racial
divide,
including
by
expanding
the
number
of
people
of color
in
federal
judgeships.
The
biographies
concluded
that Mr.
Carter’s
reputation
as a
poor
president
was
unfair
and came
largely
from his
stubborn
insistence
on doing
what he
thought
was
correct
even
when it
cost him
politically.
“He
insisted
on
telling
us what
was
wrong
and what
it would
take to
make
things
better,”
Bird
wrote.
“And for
most
Americans,
it was
easier
to label
the
messenger
a
‘failure’
than to
grapple
with the
hard
problems.”
Mr.
Carter,
noted
for his
mile-wide
smile in
public,
was also
tenacious
and
resolute,
and
those
qualities
were
critical
to
achieving
the Camp
David
Accords,
a
signature
success
of his
presidency.
He spent
13 days
at the
presidential
retreat
in
Maryland’s
Catoctin
Mountains
in
September
1978,
shuttling
between
cabins
that
housed
Israeli
Prime
Minister
Menachem
Begin
and
Egyptian
President
Anwar
Sadat.
In a
process
that
almost
collapsed
several
times,
Mr.
Carter
was
instrumental
in
brokering
a
historic
agreement
between
bitter
rivals.
The Camp
David
Accords
led to
the
first
significant
Israeli
withdrawal
from
territory
captured
in the
Six-Day
War of
1967 and
a peace
treaty
that has
endured
between
Israel
and its
largest
Arab
neighbor.
In 1978,
Begin
and
Sadat
were
jointly
awarded
the
Nobel
Peace
Prize,
an honor
conferred
on Mr.
Carter
24 years
later
for a
lifetime
of
working
for
peace.
Against
fierce
conservative
opposition,
Mr.
Carter
pushed
through
the
Panama
Canal
treaties,
which
ultimately
placed
the
economically
and
strategically
critical
waterway
under
Panamanian
control,
a major
step
toward
better
U.S.
relations
with
Latin
American
neighbors.
He
signed a
nuclear-arms-reduction
treaty,
SALT II,
with the
Soviets,
but he
withdrew
it from
Senate
consideration
when
Soviet
forces
invaded
Afghanistan.
Taking
advantage
of the
opening
made by
President
Richard
M.
Nixon,
Mr.
Carter
granted
full
diplomatic
recognition
to
China.
He made
human
rights a
central
theme of
U.S.
foreign
policy,
a sharp
departure
from the
approach
of Nixon
and his
national
security
adviser
and
second
secretary
of
state,
Henry A.
Kissinger.
Two
Cabinet-level
departments
— Energy
and
Education
— were
created
under
Mr.
Carter,
as was
the
Superfund
to clean
up
toxic-waste
sites.
The
Alaska
National
Interest
Lands
Conservation
Act more
than
doubled
the size
of the
national
park and
wildlife
refuge
system.
Mr.
Carter
was
ahead of
his time
on
environmental
issues.
In June
1979, he
installed
32 solar
panels
on the
roof of
the West
Wing of
the
White
House,
telling
reporters
that the
point
was to
harness
“the
power of
the sun
to
enrich
our
lives as
we move
away
from our
crippling
dependence
on
foreign
oil.”
“A
generation
from
now,
this
solar
heater
can
either
be a
curiosity,
a museum
piece,
an
example
of a
road not
taken,
or it
can be a
small
part of
one of
the
greatest
and most
exciting
adventures
ever
undertaken
by the
American
people,”
Mr.
Carter
said.
Reagan
removed
the
panels
in 1986.
His
relations
with
Congress
were
often
strained,
even
though
it was
controlled
by his
party,
but he
had more
success
than
most
modern
presidents
at
winning
passage
of his
legislative
proposals.
With the
deregulation
of the
airline
and
trucking
industries,
Mr.
Carter
set in
motion a
movement
that
picked
up steam
under
Reagan
and his
conservative
allies.
The
military
buildup
under
Reagan
was
often
credited
with
hastening
the
collapse
of the
Soviet
Union,
but that
buildup
began
under
Mr.
Carter.
Inflation
was a
constant
scourge
to his
administration,
but it
was Mr.
Carter
who
appointed
Paul
Volcker
chairman
of the
Federal
Reserve.
Volcker
was
later
hailed
as the
man who
broke
the back
of
inflation
in the
early
1980s,
when
Reagan
was
president.
In the
2018
Post
interview,
Mr.
Carter
said he
had “a
lot of
regrets”
from his
time in
office,
mainly
over the
Iran
hostage
crisis
and his
not
having
done
more to
unify
the
Democratic
Party.
He said
he was
most
proud of
the Camp
David
Accords,
his work
to
normalize
relations
with
China
and his
focus on
human
rights.
“I kept
our
country
at peace
and
championed
human
rights,
and
that’s a
rare
thing
for
post-World
War II
presidents
to say,”
he said,
adding
that he
was also
proud
that he
“always
told the
truth.”
Roving
ambassador
Mr.
Carter
was a
former
president
for more
than
four
decades
— longer
than
anyone
else in
history
— and he
was only
the
second
to live
to 94,
after
George
H.W.
Bush,
who died
in 2018.
He
dedicated
his
post-presidential
life to
public
service
at home
and
supporting
democracy
and
human
rights
abroad.
It was a
career
that
even
some of
his
supporters
said
seemed
better
suited
to him
than
being
president.
“Nothing
about
the
White
House so
became
Mr.
Carter
as his
having
left
it,”
historian
Douglas
Brinkley
wrote in
“The
Unfinished
Presidency,”
a 1998
account
of Mr.
Carter’s
life
after
the
presidency.
Mr.
Carter
lived
more
modestly
than any
ex-president
since
Harry S.
Truman,
whom Mr.
Carter
called
his
favorite
president.
He and
Rosalynn
lived in
Plains
until
the end
in the
ranch
house
that
they
built
for
themselves
in 1961,
and
where
Mr.
Carter
will be
buried
with her
next to
a shady
willow
tree
near a
pond
that he
helped
dig.
Mr.
Carter
declined
the
corporate
board
memberships
and
lucrative
speaking
engagements
that
have
made
other
ex-presidents
tens of
millions
of
dollars.
He said
in the
2018
interview
that he
didn’t
want to
“capitalize
financially
on being
in the
White
House.”
“I don’t
see
anything
wrong
with it;
I don’t
blame
other
people
for
doing
it,” Mr.
Carter
said.
“It just
never
had been
my
ambition
to be
rich.”
Instead,
he wrote
33 books
on
topics
ranging
from war
to
woodworking,
which
gave him
a
comfortable
retirement
income.
He also
won
three
Grammy
Awards
for his
recordings
of audio
versions
of his
books.
For
decades,
the
Carters
spent a
week a
year
building
homes
with
Habitat
for
Humanity,
the
Georgia-based
nonprofit
organization
that
constructs
housing
for
low-income
people.
Wearing
their
own tool
belts,
they
helped
build or
renovate
about
4,300
homes in
14
countries.
In 1982,
the
Carters
founded
the
Carter
Center
at Emory
University
in
Atlanta.
It
became
the base
from
which
they
traveled
widely
on
peacemaking
and
other
humanitarian
missions.
The
Carter
Center
sponsors
programs
in
education,
agricultural
development
and
health
care and
supports
fair
elections
in
countries
around
the
world.
Mr.
Carter
became
an
unofficial
roving
ambassador,
monitoring
elections,
mediating
disputes
and
promoting
human
rights
and
democracy.
In 1994,
at the
request
of
President
Clinton,
he
helped
forge an
agreement
that
removed
a brutal
military
regime
in Haiti
and
averted
a
possible
U.S.
invasion
of that
country.
Mr.
Carter’s
missions
required
meeting
with
some of
the
world’s
most
notorious
despots,
including
Kim Il
Sung of
North
Korea
and
Moammar
Gaddafi
of
Libya.
Fledgling
democracies
trusted
him, and
he was
asked to
monitor
elections
in
Panama,
Nicaragua,
Haiti,
the
Dominican
Republic,
Zambia,
the West
Bank and
Gaza.
The
Carter
Center
has
monitored
115
elections
in 40
countries,
according
to its
website.
He was
not
always
successful,
but Mr.
Carter
never
seemed
discouraged
about
his
efforts
to
resolve
conflicts.
He spent
the days
leading
up to
the 1994
Christmas
holiday
in the
Balkans,
engaging
in
negotiations
that
included
a
shouted
conversation
by
shortwave
radio
with
Serbian
strongman
Radovan
Karadzic,
who in
2016 was
convicted
of
genocide
by the
International
Criminal
Tribunal
for the
former
Yugoslavia.
Mr.
Carter’s
efforts
resulted
in a
four-month
ceasefire
in the
bloody
conflict.
From
Atlanta,
the
Carter
Center
coordinated
dozens
of
initiatives,
including
a
decades-long
effort
that
helped
to
virtually
eradicate
Guinea
worm
disease,
a
painful
and
disabling
condition
that
once
afflicted
millions
of
people
in some
of
Africa's
poorest
countries.
Mr.
Carter’s
freelance
diplomacy,
which at
times
included
outspoken
criticism
of U.S.
policies,
could
provoke
outrage.
He
angered
Clinton
in 1994
by
thrusting
himself
into a
dispute
over
U.N.
inspections
of North
Korea’s
nuclear
facilities.
In his
book
“Palestine:
Peace
Not
Apartheid”
(2006),
Mr.
Carter
set off
a storm
of
criticism
by
seeming
to
equate
Israeli
occupation
of
Palestinian
territories
with the
former
apartheid
regime
in South
Africa.
Over the
years,
Mr.
Carter
was a
constant
source
of
irritation
to
conservative
critics.
In a
book
about
Mr.
Carter’s
life
after
the
White
House —
a book
whose
subtitle
called
him “Our
Worst
Ex-President”
—
conservative
political
commentator
Steven
F.
Hayward
accused
him of
engaging
in
“usually
embarrassing
and
often
disastrous
peace
missions
around
the
world.”
The far
more
common
judgment
was that
Mr.
Carter’s
tireless
pursuit
of peace
and
human
rights
was
admirable
and set
a new
standard
for
ex-presidents.
In
awarding
him the
Nobel
Peace
Prize in
2002,
the
Nobel
committee
lauded
him “for
his
decades
of
untiring
effort
to find
peaceful
solutions
to
international
conflicts,
to
advance
democracy
and
human
rights,
and to
promote
economic
and
social
development.”
Introducing
the 2002
Peace
Prize
laureate
in Oslo,
Gunnar
Berge, a
member
of the
Nobel
committee,
said:
“Jimmy
Carter
will
probably
not go
down in
American
history
as the
most
effective
president.
But he
is
certainly
the best
ex-president
the
country
ever
had.”
The
Carter
image
That Mr.
Carter
became
president
was
something
of a
historical
accident,
one that
followed
an
unprecedented
chain of
events.
The
progression
began in
1973
with the
resignation
of Vice
President
Spiro T.
Agnew,
who was
caught
in a web
of
corruption
dating
from his
time as
a
Maryland
politician.
That led
to the
appointment
of
then-Minority
Leader
Gerald
Ford, a
respected
but
relatively
little-known
U.S.
House
member
from
Michigan,
as
Agnew’s
successor.
And,
finally,
in 1974,
there
was the
resignation
of Nixon
to avoid
impeachment
stemming
from the
Watergate
scandal.
Two
years
later,
Mr.
Carter
narrowly
defeated
Ford,
but the
person
he
really
campaigned
against
was
Nixon.
Mr.
Carter
was the
peanut
farmer
from
Georgia,
the
candidate
who
carried
his own
garment
bag off
the
aircraft
and
promised
to bring
an open
and
honest
style of
leadership
to the
nation’s
capital.
It later
became
commonplace
for
presidential
candidates,
and most
challengers
to
incumbents,
to run
“against
Washington.”
Mr.
Carter
was
among
the
first of
the
modern
era to
do so.
Mr.
Carter
signaled
his
disdain
for the
“imperial”
trappings
of the
presidency
on
Inauguration
Day in
1977,
when he,
Rosalynn
and
their
daughter,
Amy,
stepped
out of
the
presidential
limousine
on
Pennsylvania
Avenue
and
walked
the
parade
route to
the
White
House.
“He
didn’t
feel
suited
to the
grandeur,”
Stuart
E.
Eizenstat,
a Carter
aide and
biographer,
said in
2018.
While
that
seemed
refreshing
to many
people
after
the
Nixon
years,
it
ultimately
grated
on those
who
thought
that Mr.
Carter’s
style —
refusing,
for
example,
to have
“Hail to
the
Chief”
played
when he
entered
rooms —
demeaned
and
diminished
the
presidency.
Eizenstat
said Mr.
Carter’s
order
eliminating
drivers
for top
staff
members
was
meant to
signal a
more
frugal
approach
to
governing.
Instead,
he said,
it meant
that
busy
officials
were
driving
instead
of
reading
and
working
for an
hour or
two
every
day.
Two
years
later,
in 1979,
Americans
were in
a sour
mood,
and Mr.
Carter’s
response
to
events
seemed
to make
matters
worse.
In July,
he
abruptly
canceled
a speech
on
energy
and
retreated
to Camp
David,
where he
held a
series
of
intense
discussions
with a
cross
section
of
guests.
When he
emerged
July 15,
he
delivered
a
nationally
televised
address
that was
soon
dubbed
the
“malaise”
speech,
although
Mr.
Carter
never
used
that
word in
his
address.
In the
speech,
Mr.
Carter
spoke of
a
“crisis
of the
American
spirit”
and,
before
setting
out a
series
of
energy
policy
proposals,
warned
that “we
are at a
turning
point in
our
history.”
“There
are two
paths to
choose,”
he
continued.
“One is
a path
I've
warned
about
tonight,
the path
that
leads to
fragmentation
and
self-interest.
Down
that
road
lies a
mistaken
idea of
freedom,
the
right to
grasp
for
ourselves
some
advantage
over
others.
That
path
would be
one of
constant
conflict
between
narrow
interests
ending
in chaos
and
immobility.
It is a
certain
route to
failure.”
The
speech,
initially
well
received,
was soon
turned
against
Mr.
Carter,
who was
accused
of
blaming
the
American
people
for the
failures
of his
administration.
Mr.
Carter
did not
help his
cause
when,
two days
later,
he
demanded
the
resignation
of his
entire
Cabinet
and
fired
five of
the
secretaries.
Then
came the
takeover
of the
U.S.
Embassy
by
Iranian
student
protesters.
By the
early
21st
century,
Mr.
Carter’s
warning
about
the
fragmentation
of
American
society
leading
to
political
paralysis
appeared
prescient
to many.
So, too,
did his
emphasis
on
concerns
then
only
dimly
perceived
as
threats
—
foremost
among
them,
the
spread
of
nuclear
weapons
to
unfriendly
and
unstable
regimes.
But
hindsight
was of
no
benefit
to him
then.
Mr.
Carter’s
dignity
was
ruthlessly
assailed
by
reports
in
August
1979 of
his
encounter
with a
“killer
rabbit”
a few
months
before
while
fishing
in
Georgia.
“President
Attacked
by
Rabbit,”
a
front-page
headline
in The
Post
proclaimed.
His use
of a
paddle
to fend
off a
rabbit
swimming
toward
his
small
boat was
widely
lampooned
as a
desperate
struggle.
The
story,
inconsequential
in
itself,
reinforced
an
impression,
cultivated
by his
political
opponents,
that Mr.
Carter
was a
hapless
bumbler
unequal
to his
office.
He also
had been
mocked
for
wearing
a
cardigan
in
February
1977
while
sitting
next to
a fire
to
deliver
his
first
speech
on
energy,
in which
he
called
the
nation’s
response
to a
growing
energy
crisis
“the
moral
equivalent
of war.”
But his
energy
policies
led to a
reduction
in U.S.
consumption
of
foreign
oil.
Long
after he
left
public
office,
there
was a
public
outcry
over
congressional
“earmarks”
and
other
forms of
pork-barrel
spending
because
of the
soaring
federal
budget
deficit.
One of
Mr.
Carter’s
first
acts as
president
was to
veto a
bill
authorizing
a number
of
federal
water
projects
he
considered
wasteful,
incurring
the
lasting
enmity
of some
of the
Democratic
barons
of
Capitol
Hill.
“If you
are
president
and
you’re
going to
diagnose
a
problem,
you
better
have a
solution
to it,”
journalist
Hendrik
Hertzberg,
who as a
White
House
speechwriter
worked
on the
“malaise”
speech,
later
observed.
“While
he
turned
out to
be a
true
prophet,
he
turned
out not
to be a
savior.”
To many
who were
sympathetic
to Mr.
Carter
and
considered
his
presidency
underrated,
his
shortcomings
stemmed
largely
from the
way he
defined
the role
more in
moral
than
political
terms,
which
reflected
his deep
religious
faith.
Jimmy
Carter:
Keeping
the
faith
Subscribe
He
craved
political
power to
do good
as he
saw it,
and he
was
adept at
gaining
power.
But he
was not
a
natural
politician,
and he
was
never at
home in
the
messy
world of
politics
and
governing
in an
unruly
democracy.
He was
always
far more
at home
in
Plains,
the
speck of
a town
in South
Georgia
that he
never
really
left.
Until
late in
their
lives,
he and
Mrs.
Carter
frequently
were
seen
walking
hand in
hand
along
Church
Street
on their
way home
from
Saturday
dinners
at the
home of
their
friend
Jill
Stuckey.
Mr.
Carter
was a
champion
for the
town,
which is
essentially
a living
museum
of his
life,
with
old-fashioned
storefronts
and
shops
selling
everything
from
Carter
Christmas
ornaments
to
campaign
memorabilia.
He
helped
woo a
Dollar
General
store to
Plains,
then
shopped
for his
clothes
there.
In the
2018
interview,
Mr.
Carter
said he
and Mrs.
Carter
wanted
to be
buried
in
Plains
partly
because
they
knew
their
gravesite
would
draw
tourists
and
provide
a
much-needed
economic
boost to
their
hometown.
They
celebrated
their
75th
wedding
anniversary
in 2021
with a
party
for more
than 300
people
at
Plains
High
School,
which
they
both had
attended
about
eight
decades
earlier.
The
guests
included
country
music
stars
Garth
Brooks
and
Trisha
Yearwood,
a
married
couple
who had
worked
with the
Carters
for
years
building
homes
for
Habitat
for
Humanity.
(Brooks
and
Yearwood
quietly
presented
the
Carters
with a
1946
Ford
Super
Deluxe
convertible,
in honor
of the
year
they
were
married.)
House
Speaker
Nancy
Pelosi
came to
the
party,
as did
billionaire
and CNN
founder
Ted
Turner,
who was
Mr.
Carter’s
longtime
friend
and
fly-fishing
buddy,
and
civil
rights
leader
Andrew
Young,
whom
President
Carter
appointed
U.S.
ambassador
to the
United
Nations
and who
later
served
as mayor
of
Atlanta.
Also
there
was Mary
Prince,
an
African
American
woman
who was
wrongfully
convicted
of
murder
in 1970.
She met
the
Carters
when she
was a
prisoner
assigned
to work
at the
Georgia
governor’s
mansion.
Rosalynn
Carter
was
convinced
of her
innocence
and
hired
her to
be Amy
Carter’s
nanny.
After he
became
president,
Mr.
Carter
persuaded
the
parole
board to
let him
be
Prince’s
parole
officer.
She
moved
into the
White
House
and
lived
there
for all
of Mr.
Carter’s
presidency,
looking
after
Amy. She
later
received
a full
pardon.
She
still
lives in
Plains
and
sometimes
cares
for the
Carters’
grandchildren
and
great-grandchildren.
Most
notably,
Bill and
Hillary
Clinton
made the
long
trip to
Plains.
The
Carters
and the
Clintons
had
tense
relations
for
decades
but
seemed
ready to
set
their
differences
aside in
the
twilight
of
Carter’s
life.
Onstage,
Mr.
Carter,
who was
then 96,
spoke
haltingly,
showing
the
combined
effects
of his
age and
many
health
problems,
including
brain
cancer
that
appeared
to have
been
treated
successfully
in 2015.
Seated
next to
his
wife,
Mr.
Carter
expressed
“particular
gratitude”
to her
for
“being
the
right
woman.”
Then he
flashed
his
trademark
toothy
grin,
looked
out at
an
auditorium
jammed
with
family
and
friends,
many of
them
choking
up, and
declared,
“I love
you all
very
much.”
Friends
said it
felt
like a
goodbye.
The next
morning,
an
exhausted
Mr.
Carter
was
wheeled
into the
Baptist
church
where he
had
until
recently
taught
Sunday
school.
He
kissed
Pelosi’s
hand
when she
walked
in.
“I
thought
he was a
great
president
because
he was a
president
of
values,
and he
acted
upon the
values,”
Pelosi
said
later.
She
admired
him for
his
vision,
for his
striving
to help
free the
world of
nuclear
weapons,
and for
the way
he
inspired
people
by his
good
works in
his
post-presidency.
“He went
from the
White
House to
building
houses
for poor
people,”
she
said.
“He
glorified
that
work.
Others
wanted
to do it
because
he did
it.
That’s
powerful.”
Despite
the
feeling
of
farewell
in
Plains
that
summer
weekend,
Mr.
Carter
did not
fade
completely
from
public
view.
Nearly
five
months
later,
on the
eve of
the
first
anniversary
of the
Jan. 6,
2021,
attack
on the
U.S.
Capitol
by a mob
of Trump
supporters,
he wrote
an op-ed
for the
New York
Times
decrying
“unscrupulous
politicians”
who
guided
the mob
and the
“lie”
that the
2020
election
had been
stolen.
He
called
on
Americans
to
reject
political
violence,
polarization,
disinformation
and
embrace
“fairness,
civility
and
respect
for the
rule of
law.”
“Our
great
nation
now
teeters
on the
brink of
a
widening
abyss,”
Mr.
Carter
warned.
“Without
immediate
action,
we are
at
genuine
risk of
civil
conflict
and
losing
our
precious
democracy.
Americans
must set
aside
differences
and work
together
before
it is
too
late.”
The man
from
Plains
James
Earl L.
“Buddy”
Carter
Jr., the
eldest
of four
children,
was born
Oct. 1,
1924, in
Plains,
a
farming
town
about
150
miles
south of
Atlanta.
The
Carters
lived on
the
family
farm in
Archery,
Georgia,
about
two
miles
west of
Plains,
in a
house
with no
electricity
or
running
water.
But that
was not
uncommon
in the
rural
South of
the
time,
and the
Carters,
though
not
wealthy,
were not
poor. As
they
prospered,
the
Carters
eventually
moved to
a larger
and more
modern,
although
still
modest,
home in
Plains.
Mr.
Carter’s
father,
who was
known as
Earl,
was
ambitious,
hardworking
and
shrewd.
Over the
years,
he
enlarged
his farm
holdings
in the
region
and
branched
into
other
business
ventures,
including
a peanut
warehouse.
Running
for
president,
Jimmy
Carter
was
often
described,
and
described
himself,
as a
peanut
farmer,
but that
label
did not
capture
the full
extent
of the
family’s
business
interests.
By the
time he
entered
state
politics
in the
early
1960s,
Mr.
Carter
was an
affluent
agribusinessman,
the head
of a
sizable
and
thriving
commercial
enterprise.
It was
his
mother
who
probably
had the
most
influence
on the
future
president.
A nurse
by
training,
Lillian
Gordy
Carter
was
talkative,
outgoing,
at times
irrepressible.
In 1966,
at the
age of
68,
“Miss
Lillian,”
as she
came to
be
known,
decided
to join
the
Peace
Corps,
and she
spent
nearly
two
years
serving
in
India.
She
slipped
quietly
out of
town to
begin
her
training
because,
she said
later,
the
family
thought
her
joining
the
Peace
Corps
might
arouse
conservative
suspicions
about
her
son’s
campaign
for
governor.
Mr.
Carter
grew up
in the
rigidly
segregated
South of
the
1920s
and
’30s.
But
unlike
in much
of the
North,
which
was
segregated
in fact
if not
in law,
contact
between
Black
and
White
people
was part
of
everyday
life in
much of
the
South.
There
was only
one
other
White
family
in
Archery,
and many
of Mr.
Carter’s
boyhood
friends
were
Black.
His
mother
turned
the
family
home
into a
social
center
where
Black
and
White
people
were
welcome
and
where
she
dispensed
medical
treatment
and
advice
to the
sharecropper
families
who
worked
the
Carter
land.
In his
youth,
Mr.
Carter
made no
attempt
to
conceal
his
ambition.
Perhaps
influenced
by an
uncle,
Tom
Watson
Gordy, a
Navy
enlisted
man who
sent
messages
to the
family
from
exotic
places,
he
declared
at an
early
age that
he
intended
to enter
the U.S.
Naval
Academy
in
Annapolis,
Md., and
eventually
become
chief of
naval
operations.
He also
told a
friend
that one
day he
would be
governor
of
Georgia.
Mr.
Carter
graduated
from
Plains
High
School
in 1941.
To
qualify
for the
Naval
Academy,
he
enrolled
at
Georgia
Southwestern
College
in
nearby
Americus,
and he
later
spent a
year
studying
at the
Georgia
Institute
of
Technology
in
Atlanta.
In 1943,
as World
War II
raged,
he was
admitted
to the
Naval
Academy.
He was a
good
student,
a quick
study
who
seemed
to move
through
the
academy’s
rigorous
academic
schedule
with
ease. He
was also
popular
with his
classmates,
viewed
as a
“nice
guy,”
but not
necessarily
destined
to be a
leader.
He was
officially
a member
of the
Class of
1947,
but
under
the
Navy’s
accelerated
wartime
schedule,
he
graduated
in 1946,
ranking
59th in
a class
of more
than
800.
Shortly
after
his
graduation,
Mr.
Carter
married
Eleanor
Rosalynn
Smith of
Plains,
a close
friend
of his
sister
Ruth’s.
The new
Mrs.
Carter,
three
years
younger
than her
husband,
was from
a
respectable
Plains
family
and
shared
Mr.
Carter’s
values
and
outlook.
After
graduating
from the
Naval
Academy,
Mr.
Carter
spent
two
compulsory
years on
Navy
surface
ships
and then
applied
for the
submarine
service.
He was
accepted
and soon
won
entry to
the
Navy’s
newest
and most
glamorous
program,
which
was
developing
the
nation’s
first
nuclear-powered
submarines
under
the
ironfisted
direction
of a
captain
(later
admiral)
named
Hyman G.
Rickover.
Rickover
was a
cold man
who
drove
his
subordinates
relentlessly.
He never
praised
his men;
he
signaled
his
approval
by
allowing
them to
remain
in their
jobs.
Years
later,
Mr.
Carter
would
say, “I
think,
second
to my
own
father,
Rickover
had more
effect
on my
life
than any
other
man.”
The
title of
his 1975
presidential
campaign
autobiography,
“Why Not
the
Best?”
was
based on
his
first
encounter
with
Rickover,
who
asked
him
whether
he had
always
done his
best at
the
Naval
Academy.
The
young
lieutenant
junior
grade
answered
honestly
that,
no, he
had not
always
done his
best.
After a
long
pause,
Rickover
asked
icily,
“Why
not?”
Rickover
was not
a man
who
cultivated
friendships,
and his
influence
on Mr.
Carter
might
have
reinforced
the same
tendency
in the
future
president.
Supremely
self-confident,
Mr.
Carter,
too, was
a
taskmaster,
and he
was not
a
favorite
president
among
those
who
served
on the
permanent
White
House
staff
and saw
chief
executives
come and
go.
When Mr.
Carter
came to
Washington
as the
newly
elected
“outsider”
president,
he had
few real
friends
in the
capital,
even
among
members
of his
own
party.
In four
years,
he did
little
to forge
the
bonds of
friendship
and
loyalty
that can
help
carry a
president
through
times of
turmoil.
He
alienated
potential
allies,
and the
engineer
in him
was
given to
micromanagement.
Early in
his
term,
Mr.
Carter
personally
controlled
access
to the
White
House
tennis
court.
“Although
most
considered
Mr.
Carter a
kind,
amiable
man, he
could
turn
nasty in
an
instant,”
Brinkley
wrote in
“The
Unfinished
Presidency.”
He
added,
“At
times he
was
downright
vicious;
in fact,
his
trademark
steely,
laser-sharp
stare
usually
preceded
a
hurtful
put-down.
Even in
the most
informal
settings,
Mr.
Carter
had to
let
everybody
know he
was in
charge.”
Mr.
Carter,
however,
did
develop
deep
friendships.
One of
them,
surprisingly,
was with
Ford,
the man
he
defeated
in 1976.
Out of
office,
the two
men saw
each
other
frequently
and
collaborated
on
various
projects.
Mr.
Carter
delivered
a eulogy
at
Ford’s
funeral
in Grand
Rapids,
Mich.,
in 2007.
Mr.
Carter
never
stopped
taking
positions
on
personally
and
politically
difficult
issues.
He cut
ties
with the
Southern
Baptist
Convention
in 2000,
citing
its
“increasingly
rigid”
views,
especially
on the
role of
women in
society.
“I’ve
made
this
decision
with a
great
deal of
pain and
reluctance,”
Mr.
Carter
told the
Associated
Press at
the
time.
“For me,
being a
Southern
Baptist
has
always
been
like
being an
American.
… My
father
and his
father
were
deacons
and
Sunday
school
teachers.
It’s
something
that’s
just
like
breathing
for us.”
But he
added:
“I
personally
feel the
Bible
says all
people
are
equal in
the eyes
of God.
I
personally
feel
that
women
should
play an
absolutely
equal
role in
service
of Jesus
in the
church.”
The
political
life
By 1952,
promoted
to
lieutenant
and
assigned
as the
engineering
officer
on the
USS Sea
Wolf,
the
fleet’s
second
nuclear
submarine,
Mr.
Carter’s
Navy
career
was off
to a
good
start.
But his
father
died in
July
1953,
leaving
the farm
and
other
family
business
interests
in shaky
financial
condition.
As the
oldest
of the
Carter
siblings,
the
young
naval
officer
felt a
duty to
return
to
Georgia
and take
his
place as
head of
the
family.
And his
mother
wanted
him at
home to
hold
things
together
through
a
challenging
time. He
resigned
from the
Navy on
Oct. 9,
1953,
and
headed
home.
His
return
to
Plains
reunited
him with
his
sisters,
Gloria
and
Ruth,
and his
brother,
Billy,
who
became a
well-known
figure
during
the
Carter
presidency.
Always
the
family
rebel,
Billy
Carter
reveled
in the
role of
Georgia
good ol’
boy at
the gas
station
he owned
in
Plains.
He also
marketed
a beer —
Billy
Beer —
under
his own
name.
But he
became
an
embarrassment
to his
brother
when it
was
disclosed
that he
had
accepted
a
$220,000
loan
from
Libya
and
registered
as a
foreign
agent of
the
Libyan
government.
Mr.
Carter’s
siblings
all died
before
him —
all from
pancreatic
cancer.
Mr.
Carter’s
Navy
resignation
was a
difficult
decision,
especially
for
Rosalynn.
She
enjoyed
the
adventure
and
security
of
military
life,
and as a
young
girl,
she had
yearned
to leave
the
confines
of
Plains
for the
wider
world.
Now, at
26, with
three
small
children,
she
headed
back to
the
small
town
amid the
dusty
farm
fields
of
southwest
Georgia
and a
life she
thought
she had
escaped.
But the
Carters
soon
found
their
footing
in their
native
region.
They
formed
an
effective
business
partnership,
with
Rosalynn
handling
the
bookkeeping
and
other
managerial
duties
at the
warehouse
and her
husband
immersing
himself
in the
technical
and
scientific
details
of
modern
farming.
They
began to
prosper.
The
Carters
remained
partners
in all
facets
of life.
At the
White
House,
Rosalynn
Carter
was an
unusually
activist
first
lady,
regularly
attending
Cabinet
meetings
and
policy
sessions
and
serving
as a
trusted
adviser
to the
president.
She
placed
special
emphasis
on
mental
health
issues
and
served
as the
active
honorary
chairman
of the
President’s
Commission
on
Mental
Health.
After
the
White
House
years,
she
accompanied
her
husband
on his
global
missions.
Like his
father
before
him, Mr.
Carter
became
an
active
member
in
community
institutions
— Plains
Baptist
Church,
the
Lions
Club,
the
local
school
and
library
boards,
and the
county
planning
commission.
Earl L.
“Buddy”
Carter
had been
elected
to the
Georgia
legislature
the year
before
his
death,
and in
1962,
his
elder
son
embarked
on a
political
career.
He ran
for a
state
Senate
seat
representing
Sumter
and six
other
counties.
Mr.
Carter
ran an
energetic
campaign
for the
Democratic
primary,
the only
election
that
counted
at that
time in
the Deep
South,
but he
came up
just
short
against
the
incumbent.
On the
day of
the
primary,
however,
his
operatives
in the
small
city of
Quitman
witnessed
widespread
voting
irregularities,
including
ballot
stuffing.
It was
the way
things
had been
done in
Quitman
for
years.
Mr.
Carter
convinced
John
Pennington,
a young
investigative
reporter
for the
Atlanta
Journal,
that
there
was a
good
story to
be had
in
Quitman.
Pennington’s
subsequent
stories
exposed
the
extent
of voter
fraud in
the
county
and
brought
Mr.
Carter
statewide
attention.
Through
intermediaries,
including
Griffin
Bell,
who
became
attorney
general
in the
Carter
administration,
Mr.
Carter
made
contact
with
Charles
Kirbo, a
partner
in a
prestigious
Atlanta
law
firm.
Kirbo,
who had
never
met the
Georgia
peanut
farmer,
agreed
to
represent
him in a
challenge
to the
primary
election’s
outcome.
Kirbo
remained
a friend
and
trusted
adviser.
Mr.
Carter
prevailed,
and in
January
1963 he
took his
seat in
the
Georgia
Senate.
He
served
four
years,
his only
legislative
experience,
generally
keeping
a low
profile
while
achieving
a
reputation
for
diligence
and hard
work. He
promised
to read
every
bill
introduced
in the
legislature,
and when
he had
trouble
keeping
up, he
took a
speed-reading
course.
In 1966,
Mr.
Carter
announced
that he
was
running
for the
congressional
seat
held by
Howard
“Bo”
Calloway,
a
wealthy
Republican
and
graduate
of the
U.S.
Military
Academy
at West
Point.
When
Calloway
unexpectedly
dropped
his
reelection
bid and
entered
the race
for the
Republican
nomination
for
governor,
Mr.
Carter
jumped
into the
race for
the
Democratic
nomination.
His
primary
opponents
included
Ellis
Arnall,
a former
governor
who was
regarded
as a
progressive,
and
Lester
Maddox,
an
Atlanta
restaurant
owner
who
dispensed
ax
handles
to
patrons
as a
symbol
of his
resistance
to the
civil
rights
advances
of the
1960s.
Mr.
Carter
finished
third in
the
primary,
which
was won
by
Maddox.
The 1966
defeat
affected
Mr.
Carter
profoundly.
It was
then, he
later
wrote,
that he
underwent
a deep
religious
transformation,
a
“born-again”
experience
that
guided
him for
the rest
of his
life.
From
then on,
he
pursued
a moral
as much
as a
political
agenda
and
tended
to
define
issues
in terms
of right
and
wrong.
When he
ran for
president,
he
described
himself
as a
“born-again
Christian,”
at the
time a
new and
somewhat
jarring
term in
the
lexicon
of
presidential
politics.
He
almost
immediately
began
planning
to run a
second
campaign
for
governor
in 1970.
His main
rival in
the
Democratic
primary
was Carl
Sanders,
a
well-regarded
former
governor
with a
moderate
record
on race.
Mr.
Carter
had
taken
courageous
stands
on the
issue of
race,
although
he was
never in
the
forefront
of the
civil
rights
movement,
which
was
gathering
momentum
and
tearing
the
South
apart.
In the
1950s,
he
withstood
intense
pressure
from his
neighbors
and
threats
to the
family
business
as one
of the
few
White
men in
Plains
who
would
not join
the
local
chapter
of the
White
Citizens
Council,
an
organization
whose
thinly
veiled
purpose
was the
continued
subjugation
of Black
people.
In 1965,
he and
other
members
of his
family
stood
virtually
alone in
opposing
a
resolution
barring
Black
people
from
Plains
Baptist
Church.
But in
the 1970
campaign,
Mr.
Carter
aggressively
courted
the
state’s
conservative,
rural
voters,
kept his
distance
from the
African
American
community
and
relentlessly
attacked
Sanders
as the
wealthy
crony of
the
“bigwigs”
of
Atlanta’s
business
establishment.
Sanders
had
refused
to allow
Alabama
Gov.
George
C.
Wallace
(D), the
most
prominent
segregationist
politician
in the
country,
to
address
the
Georgia
legislature.
Mr.
Carter
promised
repeatedly
to
invite
Wallace
to the
state.
Mr.
Carter
was
endorsed
by some
of
Georgia’s
leading
segregationists,
but the
1970
campaign
cost him
the
support
of some
old
allies.
Mr.
Carter
defeated
Sanders
in a
primary
runoff
and
easily
won the
general
election.
He then
executed
a
stunning
political
pivot.
On Jan.
12,
1971,
Mr.
Carter
delivered
his
inaugural
address
in front
of the
Georgia
Capitol,
declaring
that
“the
time for
racial
discrimination
is over.
… No
poor,
rural,
weak or
Black
person
should
ever
have to
bear the
additional
burden
of being
deprived
of the
opportunity
of an
education,
a job or
simple
justice.”
The
speech
was
probably
the most
important
of his
life,
including
those he
delivered
as
president.
It
brought
him
national
attention
and soon
landed
him on
the
cover of
Time
magazine.
Mr.
Carter
became a
leading
figure
in a
generation
of young
New
South
politicians
who were
seen as
determined
to move
their
region
beyond
the
rancorous
politics
of race.
As
governor,
Mr.
Carter
largely
lived up
to his
lofty
words.
He
appointed
more
women
and
minorities
to state
government
positions
than all
of his
predecessors
combined.
He also
continued
efforts,
begun in
the
state
Senate,
to
upgrade
Georgia’s
public
schools,
and he
overhauled
the
prison
system
and
judiciary.
Eye on
the
presidency
Mr.
Carter
was
constitutionally
limited
to one
term as
governor
(Georgia
governors
can now
serve
two
consecutive
terms),
but his
ambitions
were not
similarly
constrained.
He began
to think
of
running
for
president,
a goal
that
might
seem
wildly
out of
reach
even for
a bright
young
governor
with a
progressive
reputation.
As late
as
October
1975, a
public-opinion
poll on
possible
1976
Democratic
presidential
contenders
did not
include
his
name.
By the
1970
gubernatorial
campaign,
Mr.
Carter
had
acquired
the
services,
and the
fierce
loyalty,
of two
young
Georgians
who
would be
at his
side
through
his
presidency.
One was
Hamilton
Jordan,
a
political
science
student
who
volunteered
to work
for Mr.
Carter
in 1966
and
became
his
closest
political
strategist
and
White
House
chief of
staff.
The
other
was Jody
Powell,
who
began as
Mr.
Carter’s
driver
in the
1970
campaign
and went
on to be
his
chief
spokesman
and
White
House
press
secretary.
Jordan
died in
2008;
Powell
died in
2009.
While
still
governor
of
Georgia,
Mr.
Carter
quietly
pursued
the
presidency
with the
same
determination
that
marked
all of
his
endeavors.
He
managed
to get
appointed
to an
important
Democratic
National
Committee
campaign
post,
providing
a
vehicle
to meet
Democratic
politicians
and
activists
around
the
county.
Jordan,
his
executive
assistant,
left
Atlanta
for a
job with
the DNC
in
Washington,
where he
served
as the
unannounced
candidate’s
eyes and
ears at
national
party
headquarters.
Jordan
also
wrote a
long
memo
setting
out the
changing
contours
of the
nomination
process
and a
strategy
that
would
lead to
victory.
Mr.
Carter,
with
Powell
at his
side,
crisscrossed
the
country
tirelessly,
impressing
the
people
he met
and
gradually
building
a
foundation
of
support.
It all
came
together
on a
cold
January
night in
Iowa.
Mr.
Carter
did not
win the
Iowa
caucuses
in 1976
— the
most
votes
were
cast for
uncommitted
delegates
— but he
finished
first
among
those
who
competed.
That
gave him
a burst
of
publicity
and
momentum
that
carried
him to
victory
in the
New
Hampshire
primary
and
eventually
to the
nomination
as his
rivals
dropped
out of
the race
one by
one. It
was the
1976
Carter
campaign
that
firmly
established
Iowa as
the
starting
point of
the road
to the
White
House.
After
Watergate
and the
other
scandals
of the
Nixon
administration,
it was a
good
year to
be a
Democrat.
Mr.
Carter
chose
Sen.
Walter
F.
Mondale
of
Minnesota,
a
Northern
liberal
with
strong
ties to
organized
labor,
as his
running
mate,
and they
headed
into the
fall
campaign
with a
30-point
lead in
the
polls
over
their
Republican
opponents.
They
almost
lost.
Ford ran
a
disciplined
campaign
that
made
maximum
use of
his
status
as the
incumbent,
and Mr.
Carter’s
lead in
the
polls
steadily
dwindled.
Shortly
before
Election
Day,
Playboy
magazine
published
a long
interview
with the
Democratic
nominee.
As a
final
question,
Mr.
Carter
was
asked
whether
he
thought
that he
had
reassured
people
who were
uneasy
about
his
religious
beliefs
and
fearful
that he
would be
a rigid,
unbending
president.
In the
midst of
a long,
rambling
response,
Mr.
Carter
said:
“I’ve
looked
on a lot
of women
with
lust.
I've
committed
adultery
in my
heart
many
times.”
Public
doubts
about
the
born-again
peanut
farmer
and
one-term
governor
deepened.
Mr.
Carter
won the
election
by two
percentage
points.
His
steep
slide
during
the 1976
campaign
was an
early
warning
signal
of his
political
vulnerability.
Four
years
later,
Mr.
Carter
was the
incumbent,
but that
was
hardly
an
advantage.
One July
1980
poll put
his
approval
rating
at 21
percent,
one of
the
lowest
ever
recorded
for a
president.
Mr.
Carter
was the
first
president
to
openly
embrace
rock-and-roll
music,
and he
credits
the
Allman
Brothers
and
other
musicians
with
helping
him win
election
in 1976.
“I was
practically
a
nonentity,
but
everyone
knew the
Allman
Brothers,”
Mr.
Carter
said in
a 2020
documentary,
“Jimmy
Carter:
Rock-and-roll
President.”
“When
they
endorsed
me, all
the
young
people
said,
‘Well,
if the
Allman
Brothers
like
him, we
can vote
for
him.’”
Mr.
Carter
was
challenged
for his
party’s
nomination
by Sen.
Edward
M.
Kennedy
of
Massachusetts,
a hero
to
Democratic
liberals
who had
come to
detest
Mr.
Carter
for what
they
considered
his
conservative
policies.
The
Kennedy
campaign
badly
damaged
Mr.
Carter’s
reelection
chances,
but it
also
exposed
weaknesses
in
Kennedy’s
presidential
aspirations.
Mr.
Carter
won the
nomination,
and the
youngest
of the
Kennedy
brothers
never
again
sought
the
presidency.
In the
fall,
Mr.
Carter
faced
Reagan,
the hero
of a
rising
conservative
movement.
As he
had in
the 1970
campaign
for
governor
of
Georgia,
Mr.
Carter
played
to win.
He
mounted
a
negative
assault
that
depicted
Reagan
as a
right-wing
ideologue
who was
too
dangerous
to
entrust
with the
nation’s
future.
In the
only
nationally
televised
debate
of the
fall
campaign,
Reagan
disarmed
that
portrayal.
“There
you go
again,”
he said
in his
avuncular,
optimistic
style,
responding
to Mr.
Carter’s
accusations.
Reagan
won by
almost
10
percentage
points,
sweeping
44 of
the 50
states.
For
years,
people
in Mr.
Carter’s
orbit
believed
that
Reagan
supporters
had been
in
contact
with
Iranian
officials
and
urged
them to
delay
the
release
of the
U.S.
hostages
in
Tehran
until
after
the 1980
election.
The
purpose,
allegedly,
was to
make
sure
that Mr.
Carter
didn’t
pull off
an
“October
surprise”
that
could
swing
the
election
in his
favor.
Investigations
by the
U.S.
House
and
Senate
concluded
that
there
was no
credible
evidence
of any
such
plot.
In March
2023,
while
Mr.
Carter
was in
hospice
care,
the New
York
Times
reported
allegations
made by
Ben
Barnes,
a
longtime
politician
and
operative
from
Texas,
that
supported
those
suspicions.
Barnes
said
that he
had
accompanied
his
mentor,
former
Texas
governor
and
former
U.S.
treasury
secretary
John B.
Connally
Jr., to
several
Middle
East
countries
in the
summer
of 1980
and that
Connally
urged
leaders
there to
pass a
message
to
Iranian
officials
that
they
should
wait
until
Reagan
was
president
to
release
the
hostages.
Connally
and most
other
key
players
had
died,
and
Barnes’s
allegations
could
not be
independently
confirmed.
But the
Times
story
felt
like a
vindication
to Mr.
Carter’s
allies.
Gerald
Rafshoon,
Mr.
Carter’s
White
House
communications
director,
told the
Times
that the
allegations
were
“pretty
damn
outrageous.”
After
the
Times
story
was
published,
grandson
Jason
Carter
told The
Post
that he
believed
that Mr.
Carter
remained
alert
enough
to know
about
the
article
and that
the
family
was
gratified
by what
it added
to the
historical
record,
but “my
grandfather
had
moved
on.”
Jason
Carter
said he
never
once —
despite
all that
had been
written
about
dirty
politics
played
at the
expense
of the
hostages
and Mr.
Carter —
heard
his
grandfather
talk
about
it. “I
think
that
tells
you a
lot,”
Jason
Carter
said.
“He
believed
there
were
other
things
more
important
than
politics.”
In his
first
act as a
former
president,
performed
at the
request
of the
new
president,
Mr.
Carter
flew to
a U.S.
air base
in
Germany
to greet
the
American
hostages
who were
returning
from
Iran. He
was 56
and
could
not know
how much
time he
had left
or how
he would
use it.
But in a
farewell
address
a week
earlier,
Mr.
Carter
suggested
that
although
he had
lost an
election,
he was
not
finished
with
what he
saw as
his
life’s
work.
“In a
few
days,”
he said,
“I will
lay down
my
official
responsibilities
in this
office
to take
up once
more the
only
title in
our
democracy
superior
to that
of
president,
the
title of
‘citizen.’”
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