Raised on a peanut farm in the predominately African American town of Archery, Ga., Carter made friends with many Black children in the countryside near Plains, despite his attending racially segregated schools and his father being a devout segregationist. His mother was a nurse, and although we don’t know much about her views on race, scholars infer that her views must have been more moderate given that she provided free health care to many poor Blacks who lived nearby. Jimmy Carter wrote and spoke at length about his time working on the family farm alongside Black farmhands and sharecroppers.
No doubt the circumstances of where he was raised, who his friends were growing up and the emergence of the modern civil rights movement contributed to his relatively progressive views about race that were to follow him into public office. He entered the Georgia Senate in 1963 relatively enlightened for the times: As a state senator he called for statewide school consolidation and reorganization, a move that would have certainly threatened the segregated traditions of public education at the time.
Carter lost his first bid for the governorship, coming in third in the 1966 Democratic primary in an election that resulted in the governorship of segregationist Lester Maddox. Carter won the office in 1970 after unfortunately moderating some of his relatively progressive views on race. But moderation is not abandonment. In his inaugural address as the 76th governor of Georgia, Carter declared that “the time for racial discrimination is over.”
As much of a teachable moment as that was for me, President Carter’s appointment in 1977 of Andrew Young as our first Black ambassador to the United Nations was a watershed moment for the country. Although Young’s career as ambassador was cut short, due primarily to an unauthorized meeting with the Palestine Liberation Organization, he went on to become mayor of Atlanta in 1982.
Carter also appointed the former leader of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, John Lewis, to become the associate director of the federal agency responsible for running the VISTA program, the Retired Senior Volunteer Program and other social service initiatives. Lewis held that job for two and a half years before resigning in 1980 to run for the Atlanta City Council. Serving one and a half terms on the council, Lewis stepped down in 1986 and ran successfully for Young’s former 5th Congressional District seat.
President Carter’s appointments of civil rights leaders to high administrative positions was important, but his appointment of Black and female judges was even more significant. Carter appointed more women (40) and people of color (57) to the federal judiciary than had been appointed by all past presidents combined. He transformed the judiciary without having the opportunity to make one U.S. Supreme Court nomination.
I had the privilege of being in Carter’s presence on several occasions after he left the presidency. I sometimes ran into him at various activities at Atlanta’s Paideia School, where his daughter Amy’s children attended, my children attended and my wife taught for over 30 years. Whenever I ran into him at school activities such as grandparents’ luncheons, he was always humble, kind and accessible — very much like he appeared as president. He was there as a doting granddad, not as the greatest ex-president.
In a more official status, I spent time with him at the Carter Center in 1992 when I represented Atlanta Mayor Maynard Jackson at a global development forum. This event was chaired by Carter and U.N. Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali. Its objectives were to find “practical ways to improve development cooperation on an international scale.”
I found it interesting that Carter wanted local governments to be involved in this forum about global economic development. Equally important to me personally was the fact that the mayor, when he couldn’t attend himself, sent me, a city council member, instead of a ranking member of his administration. The mayor allowed me to share the spotlight by taking on a high-profile opportunity on behalf of the city, one that created trust and brought us closer together as a government.
Jimmy Carter’s life holds many lessons for today’s local and state officials: Where it seems that we are going backwards in terms of race relations, it soothes the soul to know that Carter, though never perfect, early on in his personal and political lives confronted the racial prejudice that was so much a part of the society he grew up in. It makes one wonder why some state legislators and governors, as well as politicians on a national level, can’t do the same today.
Carter’s life also demonstrated the redemptive power of civility and kindness. In this world of partisan politics, where meanness has been normalized, the life of Jimmy Carter shows us that racial harmony and human kindness are two unfulfilled quests still worth pursuing.
Governing’s opinion columns reflect the views of their authors and not necessarily those of Governing’s editors or management.
