Was the thirty-ninth president of the United States between the period from 1977 to 1981, representing the Democratic Party and after winning the elections to Gerald ford who aspired to re-election.
He was born in a small farming town called Plains, in the state of Georgia, near Americus, on October 1, 1924. Son of a prosperous agricultural businessman James Earl Carter, a cotton and peanut grower, being a typical landowner in the southern United States and Bessie Lillian Gordy, a registered nurse who instilled in him a taste for reading, was baptized with the same name as his father, James, Earl Carter Jr., as befitted the oldest of the couple’s four children.
During the Great Depression The family went to live on a smaller farm that they owned but where they had neither water nor electricity, despite their economic possibilities and during this period they had permanent contact with their African-American neighbors who were their father’s workers, an interaction that could only be take place inside the farm since at the time the strictest racial segregation reigned and even his best friend was of color, ADDavis.
Their paternal ancestors who came from the south of England had come to America in 1635 when the territory was still what was called American Colonies and since their arrival they have lived in the state of Georgia.
He studied at the Plains High School where he was a diligent student and very fond of reading; In 1941 he wanted to enter the United States Naval Academy, which at that time could only be accessed with the support of a congressman or senator, which was only possible until the summer of 1942.
Meanwhile he had enrolled in the Georgia Southwestern College University in the city of Americus and in the Georgia Institute of Technology where he wanted to improve his knowledge in science. Already in 1943 he managed to enter the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, where he obtained the rank of lieutenant in 1946, ranking 59th among the 820 students in his class, additionally achieving a degree in science. Some time later he pursued studies of nuclear physics and reactor technology at the Union College, even when he did not finish his studies.
Marry Rosalynn smith, who was one of her sister’s best friends.
He appeared at the Submarine School in 1948 where he was assigned to the Pacific and would surely have continued his career in the Navy, had it not been for the premature death of his father, which led him to give up this career and dedicate himself to the family business of peanuts, in his native Plains.
He was Governor of the State of Georgia from 1971 to 1975 and a Senator in the Georgia General Assembly from 1962 to 1966.
When he launched himself into the campaign for the presidency, with his iconoclastic style, without a solid backing from his party, Carter called for unclear moral values, but maintained a strong criticism of the Washington bureaucracy, promising honesty, austerity and sincerity, directing his campaign to those who felt fed up with traditional politicians and even when at the beginning of the campaign he faced Ford who was seeking his re-election, no one conceded him the victory, he surpassed Ford with 50.1% of the vote.
His style of government so particular that it broke the norms of the traditional, sought to establish a competent and compassionate government, which was made difficult by the economic crisis arising from the increase in energy prices and a stagnation of the economy without, on the contrary, , inflation stopped. However, and against all the forecasts of traditional politicians, at the end of his term Carter had managed to make a significant decrease in unemployment, also controlling the public deficit. He opened the departments of education and energy and transformed the entire social security scheme.
In the international field he played a role in Camp David Accords, the treaty of Panama, by which he returned the canal to Panama and in the second round of the Salt Accords. Everyone recognized his permanent concern for the defense of human rights.
In the last year of his mandate he had to face the seizure of the US embassy in Iran and the holding of hostages by Iranian students and the failure of the rescue, which was coupled with a very serious fuel shortage in his country and the start of the War in Afghanistan.
He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 for his constant effort in the search for peaceful and conciliatory solutions in international conflicts, through the promotion of democracy and the defense of human rights.