Jimmy Carter Research Paper

Jimmy Carter was a famous southern American politician and author. He was born October 1, 1924 in Plains, Georgia. Carter grew up with both of his parents back in Archery, Georgia which was only two miles away from his hometown. His father was a hard working farmer who had his own farm on their home land. His mother was a registered nurse in the 1920s. Carter was a very well educated young male who loved attending school and was always so eager to learn new things. He always avoided trouble when he was in school or at home. When Jimmy was ten, he then began to work with his father on their farm. Both of Carters parents were very religious, which means the family always attended church and Sunday school. Jimmy Carter attended the all-white Plains

High School while majority of the black population gained their education at home or at church due to the racial activity going on at the time in the early twenties. He was the first on his father’s side to graduate high school. Carter then studied engineering at Georgia Southwestern Junior College before he then joined the ROTC program where he then completed his studies at the Georgia Institute of Technology.
Carter grew up around the time when the great depression began, his family managed to prosper and find ways to support each other through these long hard years. By the late 1930s his father had over 200 workers employed on his farm. Carter was never really the type to fit in well with others so he just continued to be great in his academics. In the year of 1946 he graduated in the top ten of his class. When jimmy joined the Navy to work on submarines he then met Rosalynn. He married Rosalynn Carter in 1946. With jimmy being in the navy like most military families they tend relocate state to state often due to a new position or job opportunity. Rosalynn later gave birth to four children, three boys, John William, James Earl Carter III and Donnel Jeffery. She gave birth to one girl Amy Carter.
In 1953 Jimmy’s father passed away from pancreatic cancer. Once he died the farm and family business fell apart. Carter’s mother requested for him to move back to Georgia so he could help take care of his mother and take over the family farming legacy his father left. Carter resigned back to Georgia while taking care of the family farm business. Whenever he was not busy taking care of the family business and trying to support his family in his spare time he became very active and interested in politics. Jimmy was always great when it came to achieving anything, he won a seat on the Sumter County Board of Education in 1955 and later on he became its chairman.
After taking over Carters interest in politics in 1962 He ran for the Georgia State Senate against a local business man Homer Moore. Once the polls were finally closed and all the voted had been accounted for. Moore ended up winning the election. Due to the widespread fraud, Carter appealed to a local court about the number of votes. The judge discarded the fraud votes and then declared Carter to be the winner as a two termed senator of Georgia. He then became a member of the Georgia senate from the 14th district. In 1966 Carter considered running for the United States House of Representatives but instead he decided to run for governor of Georgia. In the midst of a white backlash to the civil rights movement, his liberal campaign failed to gain many democratic votes, so he finished the election in third place. The winner of this race was Lester Maddox. As hard working and dedicated carter was into becoming governor, he took matters into his own hands and began to use certain strategies to win the next election. Nevertheless his strategy worked and in 1970 Carter defeated Carl Sanders to becoming governor of Georgia. He became the 76th Governor of Georgia.
In 1976 Carter decided that the Democrats needed a new strong, motivated leader in the White House, so of course nothing ever stopped Jimmy from running for an election, he then ran to become the next president.

Carter was one of the ten candidates for the democratic presidential nomination in 1976. He campaigned on certain themes for example reducing government waste, balancing the budget and increasing help to the less fortunate. All of carter’s strategies were more focused on the people and the economic issues around the United States at the time. He always tried to find ways to help everyone in America. He focused on changing things and trying to make the United States a better country. He was elected president in 1976 defeating President Gerald Ford in a very close election. He served as the 39th president of the United States. During his term as president of the United States, Carter created two new cabinet-level departments, the department of energy and the department of education. He also started a national energy policy that included things like price control and new technology. With the economic issues being one of Carters main focuses he confronted high inflation, high unemployment and slow growth. Due to the Soviet move he ended détente and escalated the Cold War. At the time president Carter many different issues to deal with as president. From 1979 to 1981 Carter faced the Iran hostage crisis, the 1779 energy crisis and the soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The Iran hostage crisis happened on November 4th 1979, a group of Iranian students who attended a Muslim school in Iran were instructed to strongly support the Iranian Revolution and to take over the United States Embassy in Tehran. Fifty-two American citizens were held hostage for the next 444 days until January 20th 1981. During this terrifying crisis President Carter stayed in the white house for more than 100 days until he left to participate in the lighting of the National Menorah. On April

24th 1980 he ordered operation eagle claw to try to free the hostages but the mission ended up failing leaving eight American servicemen dead and the destruction of two air crafts. The U.S. energy crisis occurred on April 18th 1977, he delivered a televised speech about the crisis. He encouraged energy conservation by all United Stated citizens and installed solar water heating panels on the white house. Carter also wore sweaters to prevent turning down the heat in the white house. He attempted to calm various conflicts around the world, but mainly in the Middle East.
In 1980 many citizens saw how hard Carter worked as president and many people loved the new changes and the many ideas he had in mind during his presidency. He then ran for re-election that same year. He ran against Ted Kennedy in the Democratic Party’s primaries for presidential nomination. Jimmy Carter won the 1980 primary with a percentage of 51.13% of the votes but lost the general election to Republican candidate Ronald Reagan, who won forty-four out of fifty states.
He is currently ninety years old. Today in the year of 2015 he is the second oldest of America’s four living former presidents. He is a supporter of our current president Barrack Obama but has been critical of aspects of his foreign policy, particularly the use of drones and Obama’s decision not to close Guantanamo Bay detention camp. In August 2015 Jimmy Carter was diagnosed with melanoma which quickly moved to his liver and brain. He has received and started treatment to help get rid of the melanoma including surgery, immunotherapy and radiation therapy.