James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr. (born October 1, 1924) is an American politician who served as the 39th President of the United States (1977–1981) and was awarded the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize, the only U.S. President to have received the Prize after leaving office. Before he became President, Carter, a Democrat, served as a U.S. Naval officer, was a peanut farmer, served two terms as a Georgia State Senator and one as Governor of Georgia (1971–1975).[2]
During Carter's term as President, he created two new cabinet-level departments: the Department of Energy and the Department of Education. He established a national energy policy that included conservation, price control, and new technology. In foreign affairs, Carter pursued the Camp David Accords, the Panama Canal Treaties, the second round of Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT II), and returned the Panama Canal Zone to Panama. He took office during a period of international stagnation and inflation, which persisted throughout his term. The end of his presidential tenure was marked by the 1979–1981 Iran hostage crisis, the 1979 energy crisis, the Three Mile Island nuclear accident, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the United States boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow (the only U.S. boycott in Olympic history), and the eruption of Mount St. Helens in Washington state.
By 1980, Carter's popularity had eroded. He survived a primary challenge against Ted Kennedy for the Democratic Party nomination in the 1980 election, but lost the election to Ronald Reagan, the Republican candidate. On January 20, 1981, minutes after Carter's term in office ended, the 52 U.S. captives held at the U.S. embassy in Iran were released, ending the 444-day Iran hostage crisis.[3]
Carter and his wife Rosalynn founded the Carter Center in 1982,[4] a nongovernmental, not-for-profit organization that works to advance human rights. He has traveled extensively to conduct peace negotiations, observe elections, and advance disease prevention and eradication in developing nations. Carter is a key figure in the Habitat for Humanity project,[5] and also remains particularly vocal on the Israeli–Palestinian conflict.
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[show]Early life
James Earl Carter, Jr., was born at the Wise Sanitarium[6] on October 1, 1924, in the tiny southwest Georgia city of Plains, near Americus. The first president born in a hospital,[7] he is the eldest of four children of James Earl Carter and Bessie Lillian Gordy. Carter's father was a prominent business owner in the community, and his mother was a registered nurse.
Carter has Scots-Irish and English ancestry. One of his paternal ancestors arrived in the American Colonies in 1635.[8][9] His family has lived in the state of Georgia for several generations. Ancestors of Carter fought in the American Revolution, and he is a member of the Sons of the American Revolution.[10] Carter's great-grandfather, Private L.B. Walker Carter (1832–1874), served in the Confederate States Army during the American Civil War.[11]
Education
Carter was a gifted student from an early age who always had a fondness for reading. By the time he attended Plains High School, he was also a star in basketball. While he was in high school, he was in the Future Farmers of America (later the National FFA Organization), serving as the Plains FFA Chapter Secretary.[12]
After high school, Carter enrolled at Georgia Southwestern College, in Americus. Later, he applied to the United States Naval Academy and, after taking additional mathematics courses atGeorgia Tech, he was admitted in 1943. Carter graduated 59th out of 820 midshipmen at the Naval Academy with a Bachelor of Science degree with an unspecified major, as was the custom at the academy at that time.[13] After serving in both the Atlantic and Pacific U.S. Submarine Fleets, Jimmy Carter attended graduate school, majoring in reactor technology and nuclear physics.[14][15]
Carter served on surface ships and on diesel-electric submarines in the Atlantic and Pacific fleets. As a junior officer, he completed qualification for command of a diesel-electric submarine. He applied for the US Navy's fledgling nuclear submarine program run by then Captain Hyman G. Rickover. Rickover's demands on his men and machines were legendary, and Carter later said that, next to his parents, Rickover had the greatest influence on him. Carter has said that he loved the Navy, and had planned to make it his career. His ultimate goal was to become Chief of Naval Operations. Carter felt the best route for promotion was with submarine duty since he felt that nuclear power would be increasingly used in submarines. Carter was based inSchenectady, New York, and worked on developing training materials for the nuclear propulsion system for the prototype of a new submarine.[16]
On December 12, 1952, an accident with the experimental NRX reactor at Atomic Energy of Canada's Chalk River Laboratories caused a partial meltdown. The resulting explosion caused millions of liters of radioactive water to flood the reactor building's basement, and the reactor's core was no longer usable.[17] Carter was ordered to Chalk River, joining other American and Canadian service personnel. He was the officer in charge of the U.S. team assisting in the shutdown of the Chalk River Nuclear Reactor.[18]
Once they arrived, Carter's team used a model of the reactor to practice the steps necessary to disassemble the reactor and seal it off. During execution of the disassembly, each team member, including Carter, donned protective gear, was lowered individually into the reactor, where he could stay for only a few seconds at a time to minimize exposure to radiation. They had to use hand tools to loosen bolts, remove nuts, and take the other steps necessary to complete the disassembly process.
During and after his presidency, Carter indicated that his experience at Chalk River shaped his views on nuclear power and nuclear weapons, including his decision not to pursue completion of the neutron bomb.[19]
Upon the death of his father James Earl Carter, Sr., in July 1953, Carter was urgently needed to run the family business. Resigning his commission, he was discharged from the Navy on October 9, 1953. In a critical biography, author Steven Hayward stated that Carter could have had a distinguished naval career, with eventual promotion to admiral a possibility.[20]
Farming
Though Carter's father, Earl, died a relatively wealthy man, between his forgiveness of debts and the division of his wealth among heirs, his son Jimmy Carter inherited comparatively little. For a year, due to a limited real estate market, the Carters lived in public housing; Carter is the only U.S. president to have lived in housing subsidized for the poor.[21]
Knowledgeable in scientific and technological subjects, Carter took over the family peanut farm. Carter took to the county library to read up on agriculture while Rosalynn learned accounting to manage the business' financials.[21] Though they barely broke even the first year, Carter managed to expand in Plains. His farming business was successful. By his 1970 gubernatorial campaign, he was considered a wealthy peanut farmer.[22]
Early political career
Georgia State Senate
Jimmy Carter started his political career by serving on various local boards, governing such entities as the schools, hospitals, and libraries, among others. In the 1960s, he was elected to two terms in the Georgia Senate from the fourteenth district of Georgia.
His 1961 election to the state Senate, which followed the end of Georgia's County Unit System (per the Supreme Court case of Gray v. Sanders), was chronicled in his book Turning Point: A Candidate, a State, and a Nation Come of Age. The initial results showed Carter losing, but this was the result of fraudulent voting. Joe Hurst, the sheriff of Quitman County, was involved in system abuses, including votes recorded from deceased persons and tallies filled with people who supposedly voted in alphabetical order. Carter challenged the results; when fraud was confirmed, he won the election. Carter was reelected in 1964 to serve a second two-year term.
For a time in the State Senate, he chaired its Education Committee.[23]
In 1966, Carter declined running for reelection as a state senator to pursue a gubernatorial run. His first cousin, Hugh Carter, was elected as a Democrat and took over his seat in the Senate.
Campaigns for governor
Main article: Georgia gubernatorial election, 1966
In 1966, Carter considered running for the United States House of Representatives. His Republican opponent, Howard Callaway, dropped out and decided to run for Governor of Georgia. Carter did not want to see a Republican governor of his state, and joined the race. He lost the Democratic primary, but drew enough votes as a third-place candidate to force the favorite, liberal former governor Ellis Arnall, into a runoff election. A chain of events resulted in the nomination of Lester Maddox, a segregationist Democrat. Maddox was elected as governor of Georgia by the Georgia General Assembly, although he finished a close second in a three-way general election race with Callaway and Arnall, who ran as a write-in candidate. During the primary, Carter ran as a moderate alternative to both the liberal Arnall and conservative Maddox.[23] Although Carter lost, his strong third-place finish was viewed as a success for the little-known state senator.[23]
Main article: Georgia gubernatorial election, 1970
Carter returned to his agriculture business and, during the next four years, carefully planned his next campaign for Governor in 1970. He made more than 1,800 speeches throughout the state.[citation needed]
During his 1970 campaign, Carter ran a vicious Wallacite primary campaign against the more liberal former governor, Carl Sanders. While some would label his Democratic primary campaign as populist in the Democratic tradition (he labeled his opponent "Cufflinks Carl"), Carter's campaign was much worse and was aimed at inciting racial animosity among Whites towards Sanders.
The historian E. Stanley Godbold wrote,
Carter himself was not a segregationist in 1970. But he did say things that the segregationists wanted to hear. He was opposed to busing. He was in favor of private schools. He said that he would invite segregationist governor George Wallace to come to Georgia to give a speech.[this quote needs a citation]
Carter's campaign aides handed out a photograph of his opponent Sanders celebrating with black basketball players.[24][25] Following his close victory over Sanders in the primary, Carter was elected governor over the Republican Hal Suit.
Still, Carter was never a segregationist, and refused to join the White Citizens' Council. This caused a boycott of his peanut warehouse. His family was one of two among their congregation to vote to admit blacks to the Plains Baptist Church.[26] (Note: Most blacks had quickly left the Southern Baptist Convention after the Civil War, setting up independent black Baptist congregations and, quickly, state and national associations. Others joined the African Methodist Episcopal Church or the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, independent black denominations founded in the early 19th century by free blacks in the North.)
After his election, Carter changed his tune dramatically, saying,
I've traveled the state more than any other person in history and I say to you quite frankly that the time for racial discrimination is over. Never again should a black child be deprived of an equal right to health care, education, or the other privileges of society.[27]
Leroy Johnson, a Georgia State Senator, reflected:
We were extremely pleased. Many of the white segregationists were displeased. And I'm convinced that those people that supported him, would not have supported him if they had thought that he would have made that statement.[28]
Governor of Georgia
Carter was sworn in as the 76th Governor of Georgia on January 12, 1971, and held this post for one term, until January 14, 1975. At the time, governors of Georgia were not allowed to succeed themselves. His predecessor as governor,Lester Maddox, became the Lieutenant Governor. Carter and Maddox found little common ground during their four years of service, often publicly feuding with each other.[29][30] In Georgia, the Governor and Lieutenant Governor were not elected as a team.
Civil rights politics
Carter declared in his inaugural speech that the time of racial segregation was over, and that racial discrimination had no place in the future of the state; he was the first statewide officeholder in the Deep South to say this in public.[31]Carter appointed many African Americans to statewide boards and offices. He was often called one of the "New Southern Governors" – much more moderate than their predecessors, and supportive of racial desegregation and expanding African-Americans' rights.[citation needed]
State government reforms
Carter improved government efficiency by merging about 300 state agencies into 30 agencies. One of his aides recalled that Governor Carter "was right there with us, working just as hard, digging just as deep into every little problem. It was his program and he worked on it as hard as anybody, and the final product was distinctly his."
He also pushed reforms through the legislature, to provide equal state aid to schools in the wealthy and poor areas of Georgia, set up community centers for mentally handicapped children, and increase educational programs for convicts. Carter took pride in his program for the appointment of judges and state government officials. Under this program, all such appointments were based on merit, rather than political influence.[32][33]
Death penalty and crime
After the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Georgia's death penalty law in 1972 as unconstitutional, Carter quickly proposed state legislation to replace the death penalty with life in prison without parole (an option that previously did not exist).[34] When the Georgia legislature passed a new death penalty statute, Carter, despite expressing reservations about its constitutionality,[35] signed the new legislation on March 28, 1973.[36] It authorized the death penalty for murder, rape and other offenses, and implemented trial procedures to conform to constitutional requirements.
In 1976, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Georgia's new death penalty for murder. In the case of Coker v. Georgia, the Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty was unconstitutional as applied to rape.
Many people in the United States were outraged when Lieutenant William Calley was convicted in a military trial and sentenced to life for his role in the My Lai Massacre in South Vietnam. Carter instituted "American Fighting Man's Day" and asked Georgians to drive for a week with their lights on in support of Calley.[37] Indiana's governor asked for all state flags to be flown at half-staff for Calley, and Utah's and Mississippi's governors also disagreed with the verdict.[37]
United States Senate appointment
Richard Russell, Jr., then President pro tempore of the United States Senate, died in office on January 21, 1971. Only nine days into his governorship, on February 1 Carter appointed David H. Gambrell, state Democratic Party chair, to fill the unexpired Russell term in the Senate.[38] Gambrell was defeated in the next Democratic primary by the more conservative Sam Nunn.
Other activities
During the 1972 Democratic National Convention, Carter endorsed the candidacy of Senator Henry M. Jackson of Washington.[39]
In 1973, as governor, Carter filed a report on a 1969 UFO sighting with the International UFO Bureau in Oklahoma City.[40][41][42] In 2007, Carter said that he did not remember why he filed the report, and that he likely did it at the request of one of his children. He also said he does not believe it was an alien spacecraft, but likely a military experiment being conducted from a nearby military base.[43]
In 1974, Carter appeared as the first guest on an episode of the game show What's My Line, signing in as "X", to hide his occupation. After his job was identified on question seven of ten by Gene Shalit, he talked about having brought movie production to the state of Georgia, citing Deliverance, and the then-unreleased The Longest Yard.
In 1974, Carter was chairman of the Democratic National Committee's congressional, as well as gubernatorial, campaigns.
1976 presidential campaign
Main article: United States presidential election, 1976
When Carter entered the Democratic Party presidential primaries in 1976, he was considered to have little chance against nationally better-known politicians. His name recognitionwas two percent. When he told his family of the decision to run for president, his mother asked, "President of what?"[citation needed] As the Watergate scandal of President Nixon was still fresh in the voters' minds, Carter's position as an outsider, distant from Washington, D.C., became an asset. He promoted government reorganization. Carter publishedWhy Not the Best? in June 1976 to help introduce himself to the American public.[44]
Carter became the front-runner early on by winning the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary. He used a two-prong strategy: In the South, which most had tacitly conceded to Alabama's George Wallace, Carter ran as a moderate favorite son. When Wallace proved to be a spent force, Carter swept the region. In the North, Carter appealed largely to conservative Christian and rural voters; he had little chance of winning a majority in most states. He won several Northern states by building the largest single bloc. Carter's strategy involved reaching a region before another candidate could extend influence there. He had traveled over 50,000 miles, visited 37 states, and delivered over 200 speeches before any other candidates announced that they were in the race.[45] Initially dismissed as a regional candidate, Carter proved to be the only Democrat with a truly national strategy, and he clinched the nomination.
The national news media discovered and promoted Carter, as Lawrence Shoup noted in his 1980 book The Carter Presidency and Beyond:
What Carter had that his opponents did not was the acceptance and support of elite sectors of the mass communications media. It was their favorable coverage of Carter and his campaign that gave him an edge, propelling him rocket-like to the top of the opinion polls. This helped Carter win key primary election victories, enabling him to rise from an obscure public figure to President-elect in the short space of 9 months.
Carter was interviewed by Robert Scheer of Playboy for the November 1976 issue, which hit the newsstands a couple of weeks before the election. While discussing his religion's view of pride, Carter said: "I've looked on a lot of women with lust. I've committed adultery in my heart many times."[46] He is the only American president to have been interviewed by Playboy.
As late as January 26, 1976, Carter was the first choice of only four percent of Democratic voters, according to a Gallup poll. Yet "by mid-March 1976 Carter was not only far ahead of the active contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination, he also led President Ford by a few percentage points", according to Shoup.[47]
He chose Senator Walter F. Mondale as his running mate. He attacked Washington in his speeches, and offered a religious salve for the nation's wounds.[48]
Carter began the race with a sizable lead over Ford, who narrowed the gap during the campaign, but lost to Carter in a narrow defeat on November 2, 1976. Carter won the popular vote by 50.1 percent to 48.0 percent for Ford, and received 297 electoral votes to Ford's 240. Carter became the first contender from the Deep South to be elected President since the 1848 election. Carter carried fewer states than Ford—23 states to the defeated Ford's 27—yet Carter won with the largest percentage of the popular vote (50.1 percent) of any non-incumbent since Dwight Eisenhower.
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