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Fulbright Association
1100 G Street, N.W.
Suite 525
Washington, D.C. 20005
Phone: (202) 347-5543
Fax: (202) 347-6540 |
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Biography of Jimmy Carter |
| Born on October 1, 1924, in the small farming town of Plains, Ga., former
President Jimmy Carter grew up in nearby Archery. Father James Earl Carter,
Sr., was a farmer and businessman, mother Lillian Gordy, a registered nurse.
President Carter attended Plains public schools, Georgia Southwestern College,
and the Georgia Institute of Technology. He received a Bachelor of Science
degree from the United States Naval Academy in 1946 and later did graduate work
in nuclear physics at Union College. During his naval career, he served with
both the Atlantic and Pacific fleets and became lieutenant (senior grade),
working under Admiral Hyman Rickover to develop the nuclear submarine program.
He married Rosalynn Smith on July 7, 1946. When his father died in 1953, he
resigned his commission and returned with Rosalynn to Plains. President Carter
worked his own farm and continued his father's small business, selling
fertilizer and farm supplies. Carter's Warehouse grew into a profitable,
general purpose seed and farm supply operation. Soon after his return to
Plains, President Carter became involved in the affairs of the community. He
chaired the county school board and served as the first president of the Georgia
Planning Association. |
| In 1962, President Carter was elected to the Georgia Senate. He lost his first
gubernatorial campaign in 1966, but ran again in the next election and won,
becoming Georgia's 76th governor on January 12, 1971. While in office, his
fellow governors selected him to serve as chairman of key regional boards,
including the Southern Regional Education Board and the Appalachian Regional
Commission. In 1973, he chaired the Democratic National Committee campaign for
the 1974 congressional elections.On December 12, 1974, he announced his
candidacy for president of the United States. He won his party's nomination on
the first ballot at the 1976 Democratic National Convention and was elected
president on November 2, 1976. |
| President Carter championed human rights throughout the world. Particularly
noteworthy among the foreign policy accomplishments of the Carter administration
were the Panama Canal treaties, the Camp David Accords, the treaty of peace
between Egypt and Israel, the SALT II treaty with the Soviet Union, and the
establishment of U.S. diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China.
In domestic affairs, the Carter administration launched a comprehensive energy
program carried out by a new Department of Energy and oversaw deregulation in
the energy, transportation, communications, and finance industries. His
administration also created the Department of Education and developed major
environmental protection legislation, including the Alaska Lands Act.
President Carter's autobiography, Why Not the Best?, was published in 1975. He
has written seven other books: Keeping Faith: Memoirs of a President (1982);
Negotiation: The Alternative to Hostility (1984); The Blood of Abraham (1985);
Everything to Gain: Making the Most of the Rest of Your Life, with Rosalynn
Carter (1987); An Outdoor Journal (1988); Turning Point: A Candidate, A State,
and A Nation Come of Age (1992); and Talking Peace: A Vision for the Next
Generation (1993). |
| As university distinguished professor at Emory University in Atlanta, President
Carter founded The Carter Center in 1982 in cooperation with the university.
The Carter Center brings people and resources together to promote peace and
human rights, to resolve conflict, to foster democracy and development, and to
fight hunger and disease throughout the world. |
| The Carter Center has helped monitor elections in nearly a dozen countries. Its
work has contributed to an increase in worldwide child immunization rates from
20 to 80 percent. The center has lead the fight to eradicate Guinea worm
disease in the developing world by the end of 1995. It has also assisted
African farmers to more than triple grain production.
The Carter-Menil Human Rights Foundation awards a prize for outstanding
contributions to the advancement of human rights. In 1991, President Carter
launched The Atlanta Project, a community-wide effort to attack the social
problems associated with poverty. |
| President Carter has also served on the board of directors of Habitat for
Humanity. He and Mrs. Carter volunteer one week each year to help build homes
for poor people in the United States and abroad. President Carter teaches
Sunday school and is a deacon in the Maranatha Baptist Church of Plains. |
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