The nation bade farewell to former President Jimmy Carter on Thursday with a majestic state funeral for a man who was anything but, remembering a peanut farmer from Georgia who rose to the heights of power and used it to fight for justice, eradicate disease and wage peace not war.
Five living presidents and a broad array of other leaders gathered at Washington National Cathedral to pay tribute to the 39th president, not only for his accomplishments during four years in the nation’s highest office but also his relentless humanitarian work around the world in the four decades after he left the White House.
“Throughout his life, he showed us what it means to be practitioner of good works, and a good and faithful servant of God and the people,” President Biden said in a eulogy, delivered just 11 days before he too leaves office as a one-term Democrat. “Today, many think he was from a bygone era. But in reality, he saw well into the future.”
The former president’s grandson Jason Carter, speaking for the family, described a humble man he called Pawpaw who kept his fishing trophies, hung used Ziploc bags to dry, greeted visitors wearing 1970s-style “short shorts” and Crocs and fumbled with a newly acquired cellphone. But he stressed the former president’s unending love of his fellow humans and determined efforts to change the world for the better during a life that spanned a century.
“Essentially, he eradicated a disease with love and respect,” said Jason Carter, who serves as the chairman of the Carter Center. “He waged peace with love and respect. He led this nation with love and respect. For me, this life was a love story from the moment that he woke up until he laid his head.”
The service in the cavernous cathedral on a bitterly cold Washington day represented the pinnacle of America’s honors to Mr. Carter. His coffin was then transported to Joint Base Andrews outside of Washington for the flight home to Georgia, where he will be buried later in the day outside the modest ranch house where he lived most of his life.
Mr. Carter, who died last week at age 100, lived longer than any president in history, long enough to see his legacy transformed from that of a failed president to one of faith, virtue and patriotism that recognized his accomplishments, not just his setbacks.
Mr. Carter was elected in 1976 on a promise to heal the nation after the traumas of the Watergate scandal and the Vietnam War only to find his own presidency fatally damaged by runaway inflation, oil shortages and a hostage crisis in Iran. While his administration is less remembered by today’s younger Americans, his personal integrity and devotion to causes greater than himself were held out as models for generations to come.
In addition to Mr. Biden and the first lady, Jill Biden, President-elect Donald J. Trump and his wife, Melania Trump, attended along with former Presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton. Laura Bush and Hillary Clinton attended as well, but Michelle Obama, who has expressed deep personal distaste for Mr. Trump, did not, attributing her absence to a scheduling conflict. Vice President Kamala Harris and several former vice presidents were on hand as well.
This was the first time the five surviving presidents have gathered in the same place since Mr. Trump defeated Ms. Harris in November to win a second term. None of the other presidents is fond of Mr. Trump, and much attention was paid to the body language and who shook his hand. Neither Mr. Biden nor Ms. Harris appeared to engage with him, but Mr. Obama, who was seated next to him, engaged in cordial chitchat before the service began.
It was also the first time in four years that Mr. Trump was in the same place as his estranged vice president, Mike Pence. The two shook hands briefly and politely but otherwise did not seem to say much to each other.
Mr. Pence challenged Mr. Trump for the Republican nomination last year and, after losing, refused to endorse his former running mate who, he said, sought to violate the Constitution by pressuring him to overturn the 2020 election that they lost to Mr. Biden and Ms. Harris.
Mr. Trump replaced Mr. Pence on the ticket with Senator JD Vance of Ohio, who sat during the service with the congressional delegation, as he is still a legislator until the Jan. 20 inauguration. Speaker Mike Johnson and Senator John Thune of South Dakota, the new Republican leader, both attended, but relatively few other Republican lawmakers did.
The tributes included eulogies from former President Gerald R. Ford and former Vice President Walter F. Mondale, written before their deaths and read by their sons, Steven Ford and Ted Mondale. Mr. Carter defeated Mr. Ford in the 1976 election but they later became friends, while Mr. Mondale was his close partner for four years in the White House.
“As for myself, Jimmy, I’m looking forward to our reunion,” Mr. Ford said in his eulogy. “We have much to catch up on.”
Still, for all the obvious contrasts with today’s politics, the speakers sought to avoid delving too deeply into commentary on the modern state of affairs. Mr. Mondale’s son altered the written text previously shared with The New York Times, dropping a reference to the nation “tragically dealing with the crisis of immigrants today.”
Stuart E. Eizenstat, a longtime friend of Mr. Carter who served as his White House domestic policy adviser, pushed back against the notion that Mr. Carter was a failed president but a successful former president. He listed a raft of policy successes on the environment, civil rights, international relations and other issues.
“The test of American presidents is not the years they served but the duration of their accomplishments,” he said.
But it was Mr. Carter’s personal story that evoked so much power. The Rev. Andrew Young, a civil-rights leader who served as his ambassador to the United Nations, expressed astonishment even now at how the former president rose from the dirt of Georgia to the White House.
“It was something of a miracle, and I don’t mean this with any disrespect, but it’s still hard for me to understand how you could get to be president from Plains, Ga.,” Mr. Young, 92, sitting in a chair, said during the homily.
After being flown to Georgia, Mr. Carter’s coffin will be brought for a final private service to Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains, where he taught Sunday school deep into his ’90s. A motorcade with the coffin will make a last journey through Plains to the Carter home. Navy jets will conduct a flyover in missing-man formation and then Mr. Carter will be interred in a family plot next to Rosalynn Carter, his wife of 77 years, who died in late 2023.
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