He took a unique route to redemption, building up the most exemplary post-presidency in American history.
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As Jimmy Carter turns 100 today, we’re reminded that he’s not only the oldest ex-president; he’s probably the most impressive and underappreciated in how he’s used his time after leaving the White House.
I remember, as a politically engaged teenager, watching Carter’s inauguration on TV. I don’t recall any details about his speech after the swearing-in, but I do remember seeing him forgo the presidential limousine and walk back to the White House.
This may strike us as a bit of political theater, now that symbols are often manufactured by consultants and poll-tested for their viability. But in 1977 it appeared meaningful and heartfelt, another sign that Jimmy (not “James”) Carter was a regular guy — not a limo guy, not a golden escalator guy, but one of us.
Peanut Farmer, Nuclear Technician, Deacon, Governor
As governor of Georgia (he hailed from the aptly named Plains), he started a trend of using “outsider” status as a stepping stone to the presidency, paving the way for Govs. Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush to make the same journey.
Touting his governing experience made sense, but he also offered an impressive (and unpadded) pre-political resume, having worked as a nuclear technician in the US Navy, run a peanut farm, and acted as deacon in his Southern Baptist church.
Two years after the national rupture of Watergate, leading to the resignation of Richard Nixon — who, just two years before that, had won reelection with the biggest landslide in modern history — Carter brought the promise of restoring honesty and integrity to the government.
Despite some impressive achievements, including an Israel-Egypt peace treaty and a general amnesty for Vietnam draft evaders (finally bringing that ignoble chapter to a close), he lost reelection to the movie sheen of Reagan in 1980.
From a historical perspective, this made him look like an inconsequential four-year Democratic island in an ocean of Republicanism (eight years of Richard Nixon/Gerald Ford on one side, 12 years of Reagan/George H.W. Bush on the other).
Avatar of the Modern Presidency
But there were many firsts in Carter’s story, and in a lot of ways he defined the modern presidency. He was the first to win as an “outside the beltway” politician, where previous candidates had flaunted their insider knowledge and Washington bona fides; the first to publish a campaign book (Why Not the Best?); the first to bring in a state team to run the White House (unfortunately sometimes to his detriment).
It may have been Ford who briefly appeared on Saturday Night Live — introducing his press secretary, Ron Nessen, as that week’s host — but it was Carter who was interviewed by Playboy and Rolling Stone, who knew the Allman Brothers (Georgia natives) and quoted Bob Dylan.
In these particulars he presaged the rise of Clinton 12 years later, another southern Democratic governor who shortened his first name, appeared on MTV, played saxophone on The Arsenio Hall Show, and defeated an establishment incumbent Republican president.
While Carter protested the segregationist policy of his church (though he didn’t leave it), in 1980 Reagan actively sought racist voters, notoriously campaigning for “states rights” at the Neshoba County Fair in Philadelphia, MS, near where three civil rights advocates had been murdered by the Ku Klux Klan in 1964.
Carter was reminiscent of Harry Truman in his humble origins and outsider status, though Truman was delivered into the White House as FDR’s vice president. Carter achieved national prominence on his own, channeling a folksy demeanor that became part of his brand and was later successfully adopted by Clinton.
Not since the Kennedys had a presidential family proved so intriguing and entertaining. Consistent with some other White House occupants, he had an embarrassing brother in Billy — echoing JFK’s brother Teddy and presaging Roger Clinton Jr., Malik Obama, and Neil Bush (though George W. Bush was himself another troublesome brother).
Gary Trudeau’s political comic strip Doonesbury had a field day with the Carter clan, and I remember one panel where a reporter shows up in Plains to interview the then-candidate, encountering his feisty mother, known as Miss Lillian. Asked where her son was, she answers, “He’s out back catching frogs.”
This was funny because it was all too credible, and it turned out — after the exhausting trauma of Nixon’s scandals and Ford’s apparently hapless governing — that a frog-catcher was just the kind of president voters were looking for.
This was the beginning of the intersection of politics and popular culture, a trend that arguably eventually led to the catastrophic rise of Donald Trump. But in 1976 it was new, exciting, and innocent. There may have been only an 11-year age gap between Nixon and Carter, but Jimmy Carter seemed to be from a younger generation.
A Humble, Wondrous Third Act
Carter’s single term had the misfortune to coincide with high inflation, an oil crisis, and the Iranian hostage crisis, all things understandably — though, in the last case, deviously — exploited by Reagan in 1980. The backlash to the Watergate scandal turned out to be surprisingly short-lived (current Democrats take note).
What is extraordinary is that the Jimmy Carter story didn’t end with this defeat.
There are different ways to orchestrate an ex-presidency. You can try to overcome an administration of scandal and ignominy by fading away (Lyndon Johnson, George W. Bush) or fading away followed by writing books and taking on the mantle of elder statesman (Nixon). You can cash in your high-approval chips for a huge payday on the lecture and book circuit (Clinton and Barack Obama) or you can deny you ever lost, try to get in on the cryptomarket, and launch an incendiary reelection bid (You Know Who).
Jimmy Carter took a unique route to redemption, building up the most exemplary post-presidency in American history. “Building” is the operative word because, with Habitat for Humanity, he literally helped construct houses for low-income families around the world. It’s difficult to imagine Reagan, G. W. Bush, or even Obama helping construct houses in Vietnam, but Carter and his late wife Roslyn did so as recently as 2009 (they were then in their 80s), building 32 homes in Dong Xa village in the northern Hải Dương province.
Carter’s adeptness as a carpenter was noted by fans, who sometimes compared him to a character of biblical fame who shared his woodworking skills as well as his initials, “J.C.”
Carter’s astonishing longevity is one key to his post-Washington success, in effect outliving the perceived failure of his short presidency. At the age of 100 he’s lived through seven other presidencies and has finally been embraced by a Democratic Party that had ignobly shunned him for many years.
He continued tirelessly in the four decades following his presidency, teaching at Emory University in Atlanta as well as Sunday School in his native Plains, and conducting diplomatic missions at the behest of subsequent Democratic administrations — efforts that contributed to his being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002. Through his Carter Center, he achieved quieter successes such as wiping out 99.9 percent of Guinea worm in Africa and helping to stabilize democracies abroad by monitoring the conduct of elections.
Carter’s astonishing longevity is one key to his post-Washington success, in effect outliving the perceived failure of his short presidency. At the age of 100 he’s lived through seven other presidencies and has finally been embraced by a Democratic Party that had ignobly shunned him for many years.
Even in his dotage, Carter has continued to exert a positive influence on our culture, boldly announcing his entrance into hospice care last year and so helping to destigmatize end-of-life arrangements. I for one was fooled into thinking he had mere weeks to live but, as always, he outwitted us.
Happy birthday, world humanitarian, man of Plains — oh, and ex-president. Nice resume.
J.B. Miller is an American writer living in England, and is the author of the forthcoming novel Duch (Lori Perkins Books).
