Transcripts For CSPAN3 History Bookshelf Randall Balmer Redeemer 20240713

Library and has gone through and found a very interesting documents that other people have not seen before and he has done that at other president ial libraries. Combined with that, he has also mined the resources of the archives on various evangelical organizations that have become involved in politics. And in addition to that, on top of his research skills, he is an excellent writer. Ive had the privilege of reading many of his books, including the one thats just come out. And i can tell you that as much as i followed the subjects and have done my own research there were many points i came across new information and said wow, that really explains whats going on. So if you want to understand the difference in the United States in the 1970s, and 1980s, and in case you have forgotten, there were significant differences. And you want to know about the sort of transition to the time when jimmy carter was president to the time when Ronald Reagan was president. If you want to understand the role of billy graham in american politics or the role of Jerry Falwell in american politics, this is the book for you. I highly recommend it and as i say i read it personally and found it very fascinating and i think all of you will, too. Before you rush out to the bot to buy the book, you have the privilege of hearing some comments by the author himself. I give you randy balmer. [applause] randy thank you for that kind introduction. Its wonderful to be back here. I did a lot of archival work at the Carter Center and the last time i was here the museum was being refurbished and i spent more than three hours this afternoon going through the exhibits. The guards had to chase me away. I was engrossed by it to them by it and it was quite a remarkable experience. I probably learned a few things that i didnt know before going through that museum. I want to talk about carter tonight, obviously. I want to tell you first of all my interest as indicated. I went to a Small College in northern illinois. Not weaken college. I was not good enough to get into that. Wheaton college. I was not good enough to get into that. I went to a small School Called Trinity College in deerfield, illinois in the 1970s. And it was during my time as an undergraduate at the jimmy carter burst out of the natural scene. I had grown up as an evangelical and was attending an evangelical college, and what was so remarkable to me is that he talked ontalked an unabashedly about being a bornagain christian, which is what we use to describe ourselves because we were always cowering when we did that, a bit ashamed of it, and jimmy carter wasnt. Jimmy carter came on the scene and said im a bornagain christian and this was for me and many other is a kind of wakeup call. Here was a man that was running for president and being taken seriously and who was able to talk about his faith in very unabashed and unapologetic terms. So i began taking notice of that. I followed his career rather closely over the years and resolved at some point i wanted to write a book about jimmy carter. I have to say ive been kind of brewing with this idea for probably at least two decades now. And over the last decade or so i have spent a good bit of time researching when my schedule permitted me to do that. Researching and finally got around to writing this book when my schedule permitted me to do that. The authors are always making claims for themselves which is not justified, but it is i think the first biography of jimmy carter to take his faith seriously as a way of understanding both himself, his conduct in president and beyond, as president and beyond, but also the very turbulent religious times in which he lived. Thats what i want to talk about a little today because i think that is the core of the book. I will do a few things in terms of background. Im sure many of you know the details already. Jimmy carter was born october 1, 1924, in georgia. He is the first president ever born in the hospital because his mother was a kind of itinerant nurse and he was able to be born in a hospital for the first time in American History. Jimmy carter went to Plains High School and went on to the u. S. Naval academy, which had been his dream ever since he was a boy. And then he was commissioned into the navy and accepted in the Nuclear Submarine program, and then in 1953, his father James Earl Carter senior succumbed to his two pack a day habit and jimmy carter was granted leave to go back to plains and attend his fathers bedside. That was for him a regulatory moment because he saw what his fathers life that meant to so many people, things he didnt know about his father. The time for example that he provided money to the family so they could buy new clothes to celebrate their daughters graduation from high school, something they couldnt have afforded to do other times. The times he carried peoples mortgages when they were too poor and too strapped to do so. The time that he had extended credit to various people in the family. And jimmy carter returned to his posting in schenectady, new york , wanting to have a life much more like his father to do the kind of good things that his father had done in the community. The one dissenter about the decision to leave the navy was Rosalynn Carter who was not amused by this development. Apparently, as nearly as i can tell, and there are people in the audience that can confirm or deny this, the car trip from schenectady new york to plains , georgia, was conducted in almost total silence between the two. Two very strongwilled people. And in this case, jimmy carter won that debate or that argument. But apparently the word divorce profit of at least once in the popped up at least once in the course of that transition. Carter of course takes over the business, not successful in the first year, less than 200 profit for the carter business interests, but then he quickly begins to build this into a growing concern. He also begins to look more broadly at service of the community, including on the Sumter County school board and then on his 38th birthday october 31, 1962, jimmy carter gets out of bed and puts on his sunday trousers rather than his work trousers and goes to america to fight over the Georgia State line without having consulted rosalynn before doing so. When i asked mr. Carter about this about a year ago in plains, georgia, he said, i cant believe i did that. Because he wouldnt dream of making such a decision like that today without consulting his wife. But times are very different in 1962 then they are now in the 21st century. The election of course is contested because of the widespread corruption in the county. I forget the numbers but they are in the museum. There were Something Like 420 ballots that were cast in the county, and only 300 some registered voters and for some reason in fact the voters managed to vote in alphabetical order down to the second and third letters in their last names. It was quite a remarkable day for georgia politics. Carter of course finds out about this and he is morally outraged. If you read turning point, which i have to say that is my Favorite Book of his. It bristled with moral outrage and righteous indignation and he had been robbed of his election and the campaign in january of 1963. Carter then runs for governor in 1966. He runs what would qualify at the time as a racial moderate, and he beaten by all people, lester maddox. Lester maddox, of course known for his segregationist ways the day after Lyndon Johnson got the Civil Rights Act of 1964 leicester agreed in the restaurant with the ax handle threatening to drive them away or driving them away from eating in his restaurant because he did not want a desegregated restaurant. Of course he uses this to catapult himself to the governorship. He lost 22 pounds in that campaign because of his vigorous campaigning. He lost a lot of money, the family put a lot of money into that campaign and he returns to plains not really sure what hes going to do. There are family accounts that have him Walking Around the fields and just not knowing how to proceed, and very often with tears in his eyes. And then of course the following year he has a famous encounter with his sister, and he has a recommitment of his life to jesus, which seems to be very transformative. He speaks of that experience not as a bornagain experience that occurred back in 1935 at the Baptist Church, but a renewal and rejuvenation of his faith. On the heels of that, jimmy carter goes on the two mission trips, one to pennsylvania with other baptist laymen going around knocking on doors to tell people about jesus, and again in springfield, massachusetts in massachusetts, in november of that year with a cubanamerican pastor from brookland. I believe it is brookland. From brooklyn. I believe it is brooklyn. This was again a very informative moment for jimmy carter. At the end of the week together, carter asks the reverend you know, how why it is he is such a strong christian, strong believer, and how he is so effective dealing with other people. And he tells carter that the secret to a life of faith or being a good christian is two things. To love god and to love the person in front of you at any given time. And he repeats this many times over the course of his life as being a formative moment. He never loses sight of the Georgia State house. And in 1970, he launches yet another campaign, this time successful, for governor of georgia. Jimmy carter does court the segregationist vote in this campaign. And the final days of the campaign he endorses lester maddox, who was running for because theovernor, governors of georgia could not succeed themselves. Carter endorsed him and seeks and wins some of the segregationist endorsements here in georgia. He is uneasy about that and there is good evidence for that. He tells the head of the united niekro college fund, you wont like my campaign, but you will like my administration. There is some evidence i think that it is uncompetitive but i think that there is some evidence after that campaign carter apologizes to his primary opponent in that campaign, former governor carl sanders, for carters conduct during the campaign, but it was not exactly a sterling moment in the life of jimmy carter, and i think that he realizes that and regrets it. He takes the office as the governor of georgia in 1971 and famously says the people of georgia that the time for Racial Discrimination is over. This is in part what elevates him in terms of the national profile. The New York Times picked up on that and the following day in the front page there is an article about the inauguration governor, what he said to the people of georgia. And within several weeks or actually a couple of months Time Magazine puts him on the cover as an example of a new south governor that is a racial governor. Postracial governor. I have to mention that article, but carter is the one who is on the cover of Time Magazine. Carter almost immediately begins to think about running for president after being the governor of georgia, only who knows maybe a few days before he begins looking towards larger horizons. And in fact about the time within a day or two of George Mcgoverns cataclysmic loss to Richard Nixon in the president ial campaign of 1962. Carter sits down with other advisors and begins to plot out is rise to the presidency four years later. At the beginning of 1973, the beginning of 1974, the remarkable events took place two remarkable events took place within six months of each other. And here the narrative is going to urge a little bit more towards religion and faith. Over thanksgiving weekend in 1973 in chicago, illinois at the ymca at the southside of chicago, 55 evangelicals meet at the ymca and hammer out a document called the chicago declaration of evangelical social concern. This is a remarkable document in many ways, because the strain of evangelicalism that is offered in this document, and by the way, it is available on the web you can look at it for yourself, is part of what i call progressive evangelicalism that takes this mandate i believe from the new testament that talked about having peacemakers, when jesus talked about having peacemakers, to turn the other cheek, and so forth. But historically, the antecedent was evangelicals in the 19th century into the early 20th centuries who are very much concerned about those on the margins of society. In the antebellum period in particular coming out of an event that historians call the second great awakening around the turn of the 19th century, there was an evangelical reform impulse that really did shape American Society in profound ways over the course of the 19th century. One of the People Associated with this is probably the most important associated with this movement. This movement sought to Reform Society according to the norms. They were very much involved in abolitionism to try to eradicate slavery, but they were also involved in such issues as prison reform. The whole idea of a penitentiary came into vogue at the time. The idea of a place where a criminal could become penitent and then we hope constructively rejoin society in a much more salutary way. The issue of equal rights for women, including voting rights, which of course in the 19th century was a radical idea. Evangelicals were very much involved in the formation of the common schools, what we think about as Public Education today. As a way for those on the bottom rungs of society to aspire to a better life, to try to aspire to move into the middle class. Other campaigns associated in the movement would be the campaign which was inaugurated by the presbyterian minister in connecticut because they thought dueling was barbaric. There are peace crusades in the early part of the century and even a campaign of gun control. Imagine that in the early part of the 19th century. All of these were motivated and animated by evangelicals who were trying to make the world a better place. And what i find unites all of these reform impulses is that they were directed towards those on the margins of society. Those that jesus called the least of these. This is a tradition within the american evangelicalism that most people dont know about very much in the 19th century it was a robust tradition it really did serve to rehabilitate and reform in American Society in remarkable ways, particularly the antebellum period, but it moved over into the 20th century as well. People like William Jennings bryan, who was an evangelical and threetime failed democratic nominee for president , was very much conscious about womens rights and workers rights to organize and issues of this sort in the early part of the 20th century. So these people gathering in chicago in november of 1973 actually are trying to rehabilitate this tradition of the progressive evangelicalism which it kind of fallen away from various reasons which i would be happy to go into later, but i dont want to spend time dealing with that right now. And this document contains statements about militarism, about the yawning gap between rich and poor in American Society, the scandal that people went to bed hungry anywhere in the world, equal rights for women, which in the early 1970s was something of a radical idea at least among many religious folks. But also the lingering scourge of racism, and they sought to address these sorts of things. So that is one events that took place as i said in november of 1973. Less than six months later in athens, georgia, somewhere around here, there was an event at the university of georgia law School Called law day, and law day, as im sure you know is a tradition at the university of georgia law school. The law school invites dignitaries Like Supreme Court justices and attorneys general and the senators and various venerable people to address them. The keynote speaker for that address was the senator from massachusetts, edward kennedy, and the other speaker at that address was the governor of georgia, jimmy carter. In the morning, kennedy gives his keynote address which had to do with the impeachment proceedings unfolding at that time against Richard Nixon. Carter then addresses the luncheon gathering. Carter begins by saying that there were two very important formative influences on his life in terms of thinkers and theologians. One was a person who he quotes very often throughout his life, at least since his time as the governor of georgia. He said this had the sad duty of politics was to establish justice in his sinful world. And carters quoted that passage very often. He said the second formative influence on him was the great and wellknown theologian bob dylan, whose song in particular aint going to work on maggies farm no more was a important song about farmers. He goes on to talk about the fact that among the politicians and particularly lobbyists in washington, the deck was stacked against ordinary folks. These people, corporations in particular, had money to hire lobbyists who themselves were appointed to regulatory agencies regulating their own businesses and corporations, and how that was fundamentally unfair. He talked also about georgias prison population, which he had taken an interest in when he was governor of georgia and said that overwhelmingly the prison population in georgia consisted of those that were poor and couldnt afford adequate representation. In those who were more affluent were able to in effect buy their way out of the justice system. And he wound up his presentation by sending some of the populist themes that he was already beginning to rehearse for his potential president ial run in 1976. In the course of his remarks, he noticed a journalist in the audience looking up. He figured this journalist, hunter asked thompson from Rolling Stone magazine, was simply going going out of the parking lot to refresh whatever adult beverage he was consuming that day, but it turned out that Hunter Thompson was going to his car to retrieve his tape recorder because he wanted to record something extraordinary, a politician who dared to tell the truth. Thompson later described carters speech as a bastard of speech, and he said it was one of the most remarkable speeches, if not the most remarkable speeches, he had ever heard from a politician, who was willing to take on the powerful interests and to speak the truth. So, within a sixmonth period you have a remarkable juxtaposition of ideology between the social concern and a lot of the themes that carter sounded at his address in 1974. By the way, 40 years ago this month is when he gave that famous address. Carter then of course announces his candidacy for the presidency on december 12, 1974. The month before, the Gallup Organization had conducted a poll, interest and president ial candidates on the part of the American People, and among the 32 names they listed jimmy carters name was not among them. Thats how dark a horse he was when he announced the candidacy for president in 1974. Jimmy carter of course went on to iowa and small towns of New Hampshire and is able to make a name for himself, first in the caucuses at the end of january 1976, then in New Hampshire where he becomes a part of the national conversation. And i think that in many ways one of the signal achievements of the campaign for president in 1976 was the fact that march 9, 1976 he beat George Wallace in the florida primary, thereby effectively ending George Wallaces tenure at the presidency, thereby vanquishing the nations most notorious segregationist from political viability. And i dont think that jimmy carter gets the credit he deserves for having done that in 1976. He goes on to the Democratic National convention where he wins the nomination on the first ballot and then into the general election. He is flying high until he decided to give an interview to playboy magazine, that appears just a few weeks before the election, and this is the famous interview where he said that he acknowledged he had lusted after women that were not his own wife. A statement for evangelicals that is utterly unremarkable but the press picked up on this and made a huge spectacle of it and carter began to sink in the polls. He lost 15 Percentage Points in favorability rating after the playboy interview. He does squeak through the election over gerald ford and begins his presidency. Im happy to talk about the presidency itself. Im conscious of time here and im not going to talk so much about his specific endeavors or compulsions as president , but i want to focus again on the religious situation that i think is really quite remarkable and is the paradox behind the life of jimmy carter. That is, why is it that evangelical supporters in the great numbers of 1976 turn so dramatically against him four years later in 1980 . I think it is a fascinating story and that is one of the stories i try to tell in the book because it is a story that is often misunderstood and frankly just wrong. The standard narrative is that by the late 1970s, evangelicals were exercised over the roe v. Wade ruling of 1973 that legalized abortion. Jerry falwell and others have stoped this story. Very often they refer to themselves as the new abolitionists trying to draw a parallel between the opposition to abortion and the opposition of antebellum evangelicals to the scourge of slavery covered, so it makes a great story. But there is actually a bit of fiction, quite a bit of fiction in fact. Abortion for evangelicals simply wasnt an issue. They were considered a catholic issue for most of the 1970s. Let me provide a bit of evidence. I wont be able to get all of it, but just to give you a sense of it. In 1969, christianity today magazine which was kind of the flagship magazine of evangelicalism convened a conference together with the Christian Medical Society to talk about abortion as a moral issue. After the conference was over, they issued a statement saying we cant agree that abortion is a moral issue, but we are inclined to allow abortion under certain circumstances. 1971, the Southern Baptist convention, which im sure many of you know is what we doubt of liberalism, passed a resolution meeting in st. Louis, missouri calling for the legalization of abortion, a resolution they reaffirm in 1974 a year after the ruling and again in 1976. When roe v. Wade was handed down, several prominent evangelical leaders including the former president of the Southern Baptist convention, pastor of the First Baptist church in dallas texas and expressed his satisfaction with the roe v. Wade ruling as marking an appropriate distinction between personal morality and public policy. My point in amassing this evidence is to say that abortion was not the issue that organized evangelical preachers and others into the religious right. Well, what was it . A quick story, and im going to be brief about this, although i would be happy to go into more details later. The quick story is that evangelical preachers in particular organized not to oppose abortion, but to defend racial segregation. The issue was of course the deep issue with the brown v. Board of education ruling in 1954, but the foreground issue was the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which in title six forbade the racial segregation or the discrimination. By 1970, the Internal Revenue service was trying to enforce the provisions of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and issued a ruling, an opinion that said any organization that engages in racial segregation or Racial Discrimination is not by definition a charitable organization. Therefore, it has no claims on the taxexempt status. I would be happy to go into details of the case that came out of mississippi but the issue was socalled segregation academies that grew up, especially the south, after the brown v. Board of education ruling of 1954. As the Internal Revenue service was trying to enforce this ratified by the District Of Columbia on june 30, 1971 in a case called greene v connelly, in the course of , thecing that provision irs targeted a fundamentalist school in Greenville South Carolina called Bob Jones University which into 1971 did not admit africanamericans to the student body. Until 1975 at of fears of racial mixing did not admit unmarried africanamericans, still keeping retaining their racial policies. Jerry falwell said its easier to open a massage parlor then his then a Christian School. He had his own Christian School netsuite gets him in these other preachers motivated. The architect of the religious right has corroborated this and ive had personal conversations with him and hes utterly emphatic about this. Getas trying to evangelicals involved in politics since the Goldwater Campaign of 1964 and i couldnt get them interested. I tried everything i could. Attentiont their until the school issue surfaced and thats what finally galvanized them into a political movement. There is a second part of the story for the rise of the lib religious right. The bob jones case and similar cases is what got the attention of evangelical leaders like but he was others also savvy enough to realize that he needed a different issue in order to get grassroots evangelicals behind this movement, which we know of as the religious right. And what happens is that in 1978 in the elections, there is, the answer finally comes to him. In the elections of 1978, particularly in minnesota and iowa, something remarkable happens. There are three statewide seats up for office in the senate and one of them is for the term of Hubert Humphrey into the governorship, all that for grabs in 1978. In iowa, dick clark was the incumbent democratic senator and down in iowa going into the election, no poll showed clark behind im sorry, no poll showed clark ahead by fewer than ten Percentage Points going into the final days of that senate election. What happens in both iowa and minnesota is that prolifers, roman catholics, leafleted Church Parking lots on the sunday before the election and in iowa, and dick clark loses the election to roger jepson and in minnesota, prolife republicans capture all three of those elections. The governorship and both senate seats, all of them on a prolife campaign. When i was doing research at the university of wyoming in laramie, which for some reason is where the correspondence crackle with excitement when the results of the 1978 election come in, because he realizes hes got his issue that is going to galvanize this new movement of the religious right. And, in fact, he uses that to full advantage in the 1980 election, which of course goes against jimmy carter, and evangelical, who is running for the reelection against Ronald Reagan, whose credentials are lets say more tenuous than jimmy carters were. Ronald reagan for whatever his qualities was episodic churchgoer, who by the way as the governor of california in 1967 had signed into law the most liberal bill in the country, but by 1980 he had come around to the prolife position, and that was good enough for paul and falwell and other leaders of the religious right. Carters face politically is also compromised by billy graham. I tread carefully here because a lot of people as do i have a great deal of respect for billy graham, but billy graham repeatedly throughout the 1980 president ial Campaign Gives assurance to carter himself or to carters aids of his support, and then days later or earlier, he is making phone calls to people, like reagans campaign chair, offering to do whatever he could to elect Ronald Reagan rather than jimmy carter in 1980. All of this is in the book. Im just giving you a summary of this. Carter of course is defeated and then he goes back to plains where he begins to construct his postpresidency. Im going to try to wrap this up quickly so i can take some questions. We are standing here in one glorious manifestation of his postpresident ial years. I think the most distinct comment about jimmy carter, particularly in his postpresidency, came from the former president of Emory University said about jimmy carter the only person in history for whom the presidency was a steppingstone. And i think it really does capture what jimmy carter has done. Apparently jimmy carter isnt fond of that quotation, but i think it does capture what he has been able to do. I called the book redeemer for a number of reasons. I think in many ways he redeemed the nation after the sins of watergate. I tried to impress this on students and they do not quite grasp i think how low we were as a nation in the 1970s in terms of our confidence in ourselves, but also our confidence particularly in institutions and the presidency. Lyndon johnson had lied to us about vietnam. Richard nixon had lied to us about pretty much everything. Im exaggerating a little, of course, but jimmy carter comes along and says the same, i will never knowingly lie to the American People again. I try tried to impress on students what a radical idea that was in the 1970s with a president who wouldnt lie to us. We were not used to that sort of thing and the fact that he was a Southern Baptist teacher i think also burnished his credentials and his probity. Jimmy carter has many faults. The book doesnt gloss over those. I think. I try to treat them fairly and evenhandedly, but no one i think has seriously questioned his integrity and his moral core, and that is one of the great things about jimmy carter. Im going to close by reading a couple of short passages from the epilogue, which was my visit to plains, georgia a year ago, june 2 actually. I wanted to go down to hear mr. Carter do his sunday school lessons, and i also had an interview with him. So i will read a few passages from the epilogue, called sunday morning in plains, georgia. Southwestern georgia is the baptist country. The back roads heading south of columbus are bracketed by red soil and a scruffy pines and the buildings sporting names like shiloh marion Baptist Church and greater good Baptist Church. Love jesus no matter what, one of the signs read, and another only jesus saves. Outside of princeton, georgia preston, georgia still another sign and horrors, take jesus for your savior. And Baptist Church has posted the each of the commandments on the chainlink fence for the edification of the travelers passing through town. Just before crossing from webster into Sumter County, georgia, the signs on the georgia highway 27 points towards the archery at home of jimmy carter, and then the road eases into the plains where it becomes church street. The Business District not much more than a block long, near the railroad tracks. The street from the Seaboard Coast Line Railroad depot that served as the Campaign Headquarters for carters improbable run for the presidency of 1976 and now has a museum commemorating that campaign. Plains, georgia is no longer the habit of excitement that it was in the summer of 1976, when legions of journalists and thousands of tourists descended to learn more of the democratic nominee for president. Then, Lillian Carter at the train station and billy carter threw back a few beers and entertained visitors with quips like, i have a mother who joined the peace corps and went to india when she was 68. I have a sister that races motorcycles and another that is a holy roller preacher. I have a brother that says he wants to be president of the United States. Then pausing for a dramatic effect, im the only sane one in the family. [laughter] i talk about going to church which mccarter, the sunday jimmy carter the sunday , school class at his church, then meeting with him after church. He takes me to his house because he wants to give me a book that he took from his wifes nightstand because he couldnt find a copy of the book. He gave it to me kind of looking at her to see what her reaction would be rather apologetically. Then he goes on to another event. As the caravan headed out of town on highway 61 also known as old plain highway by the way of archery, which parallels the Seaboard Coast Line Railroad tracks that young jimmy carter walked as a boy in order to sell boiled peanuts in town for pocket money. All of carters life has been characterized by a striving and this insatiable ambition to rise above his circumstances as a country boy, as a navy midshipman, as a politician, as president , and beyond as respected world leader and humanitarian. In the course of the sunday school lesson, carter had referred to the notion of the priesthood of believers, that each of us is responsible directly to god and that the priestly caste or irrigation of the Ministerial Authority the effect of that relationship to impeded that relationship. But carter failed to note the other central criticism of the medieval catholicism works righteousness, the popular understanding that individuals could earn salvation by good works. Protestants are equally susceptible, seeking to prove by their good works that they are among the elect. As i passed the hardscrabble farm and it was difficult to give the impression that carter was still driven and almost obsessed by a kind of works righteousness. Carter always believed in the value of work. On the farm hard work would sustain the family and bring profitability. At school, diligent study would lead to better opportunities. In the navy, hard work might win praise or a promotion. On the campaign trail, working harder than your opponent an hour earlier every morning or shaking more hands would lead to victory. Once in office, long hours, the resolve to read every piece of legislation and attention to the minutia of negotiations would ensure success and re election. Carters term in the white house disrupted that calculus. He faced intractable odds as president , the nations chronic energy dependence, soaring interest rates, and Islamic Revolution in iran. Political opposition from within his own party that simply wouldnt yield to the hard work or longer hours. Carters shattering electoral loss in 1980 represented not only the end of his political career, but also the repudiation of the notion that if he just worked harder and longer his efforts would be reworded. Rewarded. How could the electorate not realize he was doing everything humanly possible, working as hard as he could come to solve these problems . After absorbing the defeat and returning to georgia, carter reaffirmed his commitment to the works righteousness as a way to redeem his loss. The Carter Center would be an activist institution, not merely a celebratory one. Habitat for humanity was nothing if not an activist organization. This former president wouldnt retire quietly into private life. There was work to be done. Eradicate indices, monitoring eradicating disease monitoring elections, building , houses, reprimanding dictators and obdurate politicians, teaching sunday school, heading off military confrontations, ending hunger, making peace. If carter could work hard enough, in religious terms, he could accumulate enough merit and might be able to tilt the balance of history in his favor. To a remarkable degree jimmy carters commitment to the works righteousness met with success. Although partisans continue to criticize and ridicule his presidency regard it more come historians now favorably, albeit with something less than unvarnished approbation. Carters activities after leaving office earned him praise and even admiration. The awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 provided perhaps the ultimate validation of carters works righteousness. At what point does carter reprieve from his moral exertions . When can he relax and settle into retirement . Certainly not on a sunday. Even after teaching sunday school, attending church, posing with tourists, fielding questions from a biographer, and massaging habitat for humanity donors, as i was going down highway 61 towards the archery, carter was speeding off to the next event on a crowded schedule. The president pushing 90yearsold was still a restless man consumed by a kind of frenetic benevolence. As Martin Luther recognizes centuries earlier commit those who subscribe to the ethic that works righteousness coniferous certain they have accumulated enough merit. Jimmy carter doesnt lack so much for passion as he does for respite. The man man whose improbable election of 1976 redeemed the nation from the sins of watergate has finally earned his own redemption. Jimmy carter himself, however, may be the last to know. Thank you. [applause] we will take a few minutes of questions. If you have a question, wait for the microphone to come. You dont grab the microphone. Lets take 10 minutes or so of questions. Questions . I wonder if you could talk about the current use of evangelical. In the 1960s, it seems like it was to differentiate between the fundamentalist and the cultural differences and now its all in the newspapers that dont know anything about religion. It seems to be, that they go back for the evangelical. That is a great question about fundamentalists and evangelicalism. Jerry falwell himself said at one point that if if fundamentalist is someone who is mad about something. And its not a Bad Commission and its not a bad definition frankly because it suggests the , difference not so much in theology but temperament. Jerry falwell always wanted to identify himself as a fundamentalist rather than evangelical because he thought evangelicals were prone to compromise. There are eerie reverberations of the tea party stuff that you hear these days and that sort of rhetoric. He thought evangelicals were too willing to compromise anyone to maintain a kind of hard edge. So youre right. The terms are somewhat interchangeable. It is more a matter of disposition and militancy on the part of fundamentalists rather than evangelicals. But you are right, a lot of people do conflate the two, in part because there isnt a great deal of theological distinction between the two. I was wondering if you could tell us your opinion on the kind of juxtaposition of antiabortion, expansion of alcohol and guns in georgia this past legislative session. Im sure there are People Better qualified to comment on that then ive. What are you suggesting . There is some sort of linking . If it seems like over here is doing antiabortion, and then alcohol and guns are on this side, so it seems like it is the opposite type thing. Oh, i see in terms of libertarian sentiments . It is fascinating to me. I dont want to be partisan here or tendentious, but it does strike me on the face of it as curious that the people who talk about Less Government and less interference in private lives are willing to work for laws that would be say more intrusive. It is a great paradox that nobody has explained to me exactly how that works. But arguably theres the paradox on the others of the spectrum as well, that is people who are more in favor of regulation on the issue of abortion and dont want any regulation whatsoever and have a prochoice position, so there is a great deal of contradiction there. But i think it underscores that for evangelicals frankly and i think the 1970s prove this, it is not necessarily a logical issue for him. They had to be alerted to it. And there are other things that happened in the late 1970s that account for that. A film series that featured a man by the name of Francis Schaeffer and everett koop who of course becomes Ronald Reagans surgeon Surgeon General that really does kind of educated evangelicals about the abortion issue and how this was part of a pattern of moral decay matter more and society, but as i said, throughout the 1970s its not an evangelical issue. President carters openness, being very comfortable another southern president , bill clinton spoke about his faith very freely uncomfortable. Dad very comfortably. Our current president , and there was an article in the New York Times about a month ago that he has kind of showcased he feels uncomfortable speaking about faith and the conversation of faith in america he doesnt go to service. He doesnt reference the literature or bible versus comfortably. Do you think that is a legacy carter was able to open and sustained or that door has kind of closed . That is a great question. I addressed this issue and im not necessarily trying to push raqqa got the book that i addressed this in the book called god in the white house. What i argue there is John Kennedys address to the Houston Ministerial Association on september 12, 1960 at the rice hotel really did establish this idea in american politics, president ial politics, that faith is separate. That is what he did in that speech is told the voters when effectively to bracket his faith, catholicism, wind they went to the polls. They argue what i call the kennedy paradigm really did persist in politics up until 1976. Jimmy carter will test you on carter this. How many people here could tell me what Lyndon Johnsons religious affiliation was . Rare its disciples of christ. Most people say bad just. Most people dont know that butost people say baptist most people dont know that because it wasnt part of the conversation. In a backhanded way i think that we americans want to have nixon reintroduces it, because when 1976 Campaign Rolls around, we americans want to have some sort of a sense of a candidates moral compass because we lived through the debacle of the nixon presidency, and that question has persisted. Its dying away now. I think the farther we get from nixon, the less salient that particular question is in president ial politics, but one that the problems of that question is that we dont know how to ask the question. We want to know are the candidates we vote for for president are they morally reliable, that is due they have a moral compass . We dont know how to ask the question. The only way we know how to ask is to say, are you religious . The flawed assumption behind that question is someone that someone who is religious couldnt be a moral person. If it is simply false and we know that its false that is a bad question and i think that we wait are getting away from nixon. Carters campaign represented i i think a reversal. Im of the voter indifference to a candidates faith and the fact that he spoke about it so openly and freely was certainly a big part of his appeal. Certainly please. I loved your closing sentence. I totally loved it. Now maybe he will be the last one to know. Im sure you gave him a copy of this book. What did he think . What is his feedback . I have to as steve. I just sent it to him last week. The book is out less than a week, so i just sent it to him. So hes not the last one to know. I want to be clear in saying that, carter is kind of animated by or obsessed by righteousness. I dont think that is a bad thing. He has done some wonderful things and the world is a better place because of his activism. I dont quite i dont question that for a moment. But he does seem to be driven, steve is nodding, even approaching 90 years old. He seems to have no indication of letting up. What do you make of president carters continuing divide from his nomination. From his former denomination. I think of his most recent book as perhaps one example, but hes not been the advocate for choice, whatever his thoughts may be. That isnt something that we know him for. The relationship in the Southern Baptist convention is to say i described in the book as a dysfunctional marriage with the frequent separation and the reconciliation is just not good. Where it begin to go south, so to speak, was in 1979 when you had the conservative takeover of the Southern Baptist convention down in new orleans. I have asked carter about this. He saw this real wakeup call that he was in trouble with evangelicals. One of the Southern Baptist leaders comes to visit him in the white house, and at the end of their conversation, his conversation with the president , he said im paraphrasing president carter, a lot of us are praying that you will abandon your religion of secular humanism. Carter records in his diary, he goes back to his living quarters in the white house and asks his wife what is secular humanism. [laughter] it is a fraught relationship, and i dont think they will ever reconcile. He said this many times, the central issue for him is the role of women. Im sure a lot of people in this room know, one of the first things they did in 1979 was to into the ordination of women. Was seen to end the ordination of women and mr. Carter doesnt go along with that. And i applaud him for that. Can you explain the feelings he had at the time . His own church split over integration. Can help me with the year. That was long before he went on to the national scene, but there was a boat during the Civil Rights Era at a time when civil doing activist were church visitations where civil rights parishioners would show up in white churches and if they were turned away that was an embarrassment. The Church Deacons decided at the plains Baptist Church to bar africanamericans from the door. It was only the Carter Family and one of person in the and one other person in the congregation who voted to integrate plains Baptist Church. Carter kept his peace about that until returning to plains, georgia following the white house. One other person in the congregation who voted effectively to integrate planes Baptist Church. Carter kind of kept his piece about that until after leaving the white house. He cast his lot in part because of their racial inclusiveness. As an episcopal priest who is also in academia right now, who spent the last several years researching jimmy carter, you are in a unique position to talk intelligently about the state of religion in america, and where its going. I did not want to let you get out of here before you did that. [laughter] to help you out a little bit, it question. Most recently, the example of one example of religion in public life is the supreme courts recent ruling. A town in greece, new york can now start their Public Meetings with prayers. One of the legal rationales was, they basically said it was not unconstitutional because these prayers are so ceremonial that that they basically dont mean anything anymore. People who are not raised in religious households, or dont have religious backgrounds, that is what they know from watching the news, prayer is meaningless. Where is religion in this country going . [laughter] [applause] i am not going to do the larger question. I would be happy to do it, but it would take another lecture. At least a semester of lectures. They issue the issue of prayer, you cannot be more right about that. What i say about separation of church and state, first of all, its a baptist issue. There are two fundamental characteristics of baptist. Other one is adult baptism, the other is liberty of conscience and the separation of church and state. It goes back to Roger Williams. It is a very perceptive question. What people missed about this is, Roger Williams talked about separating the garden of the guard church from the wilderness of the world by means of a wall of separation. Jefferson picks it up in 1802, but it comes from Roger Williams. Lets deconstruct that statement for a moment. The puritans, of which Roger Williams was one, were not members of the sierra club. Right . So, when they talked about wilderness, wilderness was a place of desolation. This was a place of danger. This is where evil lurked. When Roger Williams talks about project ring protecting the garden of the church, what he is saying, in effect, is, lets protect the integrity of the faith by not confusing it with politics or state. That is the genius of Roger Williams formulation, in my judgment. Let me give you an example of how this plays out. Nextdoor in alabama, judge roy moore, the monument with the 10 commandments, i was called as one of the witnesses in that case. I was one of the few baptists around, even though im not a baptist, because Roger Williams was absolutely right. When you do that sort of thing, you fetishize the faith, you trivialize the faith. When the judge ruled his name i have forgotten at the moment i will get it later. That it was unconstitutional because it violated the establishment clause of the first amendment. The workers were preparing to remove the monument. One of the protesters screamed, get your hand off my god. Unless i miss my guess, one of those commandments a something about a graven image. That was precisely Roger Williams point. When you do that sort of thing, when you have a prayer that is meaningless, you trivialize the faith. That is the real danger. Most people talk about, i am not worried that the constitutional system will start crumbling because the city council in idaho or upstate new york opens with a prayer. I worry about the integrity of the faith. That is what i think Roger Williams was talking about. That is the danger in the decision, like the greece decision that just came down. Great question. Anymore questions . If not [applause] this has been a fascinating look at jimmy carter. You will want to get a copy of redeemer. He will be signing copies in the lobby. Lets thank him one more time. [applause] and if you will join us in the lobby. Thank you all very much. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2018] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] tonight, on American History tv on cspan3, the 1999 interview with the late senator robert heard prior to the trial of president clinton. We have a great body of evidence before us. Much of which is sworn testimony already it has been crossexamined but it would be possible, in my own mind, for us to conduct a trial without having witnesses called. P. M. Eastern 9 00 on American History tv on cspan3. This weekend on the presidency, university of Central Arkansas historian looks back at conservative criticism of president Ronald Reagans Foreign Policy toward the soviet union during the 1980s. Heres a preview. Conservatives are also hearing this and they are scared that this might be the case that reagan might give away sdi that he might bargain away the Strategic Defense Initiative in exchange for nuclear reduction. Theervatives are writing administration and publishing opeds and criticizing the administration and reagan actually has to have the grassroots leaders to the white house. The major conservatives in the house and senate and he stands up in front of the group and he gives this eloquent speech about how mikell gorbachev is a new type of leader and they can trust him, hes mr. Conservative. And there is silence. Hes not used to that. Not from the people who are supposed to be his most ardent supporters. When he leaves the room, there is a disconnect between conservative activists and president reagan himself. That he willem not bargain awaysdi at reykjavik. When he shows up to reykjavik and he and gorbachev, it goes swimmingly well. Meet backs we can here in 10 years and we will destroy the last Nuclear Weapon together. It will be wonderful because Nuclear Weapons will be gone. Thats how optimistic reagan is that they will do Something Big and a pretty much outlined a deal that would have been a major reduction or complete reduction in intermediate weapons. Group goesup in each its separate ways for a moment to regroup before they come back to the table to make a deal and when they come back to the table, for which ive says i have one condition. Sdi must be limited to the laboratory for 10 years. If you will agree, mr. President , we can sign this agreement today and announce it to the press. Reagan is furious. He is absently furious. He feels betrayed. Were not supposed to be any conditions. Reagan puts on his iconic white coat and he leaves. He walks out and conservatives hail reagan for this. They loved him for saying no and sticking up for the conservative vision. The reality i think is that most people in the pentagon were told president reagan and secretary was probably more than 10 years away anyway. Convinced that walking away from the deal at reykjavik really had any significant value. It did for reagan. He promised conservatives he would not sell them out and he didnt. Learn more about conservative criticism of president Ronald Reagans Foreign Policy to the soviet union sunday at 8 00 p. M. And midnight eastern on the presidency perko this is American History tv. American history tv products are now available at the new cspan online store. Go to cspan store. Org to see whats new for American History tv and check out all of the cspan products. Next, from the National World war i museum and memorial annual symposium, historian and author Tammy Proctor gives an illustrated talk titled the myth of isolation, american enter bashan in postwar europe, 19 191924. Back here to the National World war i museum and , theial at our symposium 1919 piece . We are pleased you are here and please welcome our next speaker, dr. Tammy proctor at the Utah State University where she teaches modern european and world history. A native of kansas city, missouri, she holds degrees in journalismnd