With his passing on December 29th at the age of 100, his funeral on January 9th, and his body being in the DC U.S. Capitol this week for people to pay their final respects, President Jimmy Carter and his legacy have been very much in the news. Rightfully so.
At the time of his presidency from 1977-1981, he was faced with a lot of challenges with the economy, oil embargo, and the Iran Hostage situation. Ronald Reagan did a major sweep of the 1980 election due largely in part to those two pieces. Yet Carter's legacy lived on for 44 years past his presidency. He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 for "his decades of untiring efforts to find peaceful solutions to international conflicts, to advance democracy and human rights, and to promote economic and social development.” He was dedicated to Habitat for Humanity and in 2017 he used 10 acres of his land to supply solar panels which provide electricity for about half of Plains, Georgia.
Growing up on a family farm in rural Georgia, Carter had ties to both his community and the land. He was a charter member of the Georgia Conservancy in 1967.
Some of President Carter's achievements while he was in the White House include:
- Creating the Chattahoochee River National Recreation Area in Atlanta in 1978.
- Installing solar panels on the White House in 1979 (which were later removed by President Reagan).
- Predicting the perils of use of fossil fuels and setting a goal of obtaining 20% of our energy from renewable resources by 2000. (Sadly, this did not come to pass.)
- Establishing The Alaska National Lands Conservation Act of 1980 federally expanded 157 million acres of protected lands which doubled the size of the National Park System. This stands as the largest act of expansion of its kind in history.
- Signing "15 major pieces of environmental legislation, including the first toxic waste cleanup and the first fuel-economy standards. His two major legislative accomplishments, the National Energy Act of 1978 and the Energy Security Act of 1980, transformed the energy landscape of America."
- Directing the National Academy of Sciences to analyze the greenhouse effects, becoming the first leader worldwide to view climate change seriously.
These are all the making of a great human being who has accomplished incredible things in his life time.
We thank you President Carter for your service.
To read more, check out these articles, where I researched this post:
- NPR: Jimmy Carter's Environmental Legacy Set the Foundation for Today's Climate Action by Jeff Brady (12/29/24)
- Rolling Stone: Jimmy Carter: America's Greatest Environmental President by Jeff Goodell (12/29/24)
- CBS: POLITICS For Jimmy Carter, protecting environment was an "exhilarating" challenge by Cara Korte (12/29/24)
- Yale Environment 360: Unheralded Environmentalist: Jimmy Carter’s Green Legacy by Kai Bird (3/29/23)
- Georgia Conservancy : Celebrating the Environmental Legacy of President Jimmy Carter
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