Grudging respect. . .

Let me begin by saying that I was never a fan of Jimmy Carter.  Though it is perhaps unkind to say in the wake of his recent death, his presidency was mediocre at best and perhaps worst.  It is not because he was not smart or because he had no values but because he did not understand the environment of Washington nor did he seem to learn.  As everyone has said, he was certainly a better ex-president than he was one who governed.  In fact, it is hard to remember his failings as president because his successes as former president shone so brightly.  He did not pack up his hat for the speakers podium and the fat checks that accompany the circuit (though nearly every other candidate or former president has done a remarkably good job of cashing in on their fame).  Maybe he was naive about peace when he established the Carter Center and maybe he was optimistic when he took up a hammer for the cause of houses for Habitat for Humanity but I much prefer his version of retirement to others (Democrat or Republican, it does not matter all that much).   Sure, there were times I wish he had kept quiet and other times I wish he had spoken out but all in all he earned some grudging respect from me.

The core and center of that respect was the enigma of Carter -- a pro-life Democrat.  You see how time has moved by the fact that no one could ever use those two terms together anymore about anyone.  There was a time when abortion and the sacred character of life was not a partisan issue but a moral one and it found support in both parties.  Now we have entered an era in which it is impossible to be a Democrat and be pro-life and the Republicans have jettisoned their party position in order to win elections.  Yes, I know, there are more pro-life people among the Republicans than anywhere else in partisan American politics but the reality is that it is an issue which has faded from importance.  To be against abortion is now a radical position -- as radical as it was to be for it in 1973.

As others have noted, Carter appointed a pro-life Roman Catholic to run Health, Education, and Welfare.  He continued to lament the babies lost to abortion his whole life (at least as far as I can see) and did not abandon his belief even when it was no longer politically tenable in the Democrat Party.  Perhaps people tolerated his heresy here because he was old and his retirement made it hard for them to take a higher road than he had taken.  He was the first President to live under the Hyde Amendment (Biden long ago caved in his longstanding support for its federal money ban for abortion).  Though he did not take the bully pulpit to promote the overturn of Roe or march against abortion clinics, he was a steady and stalwart voice for the sacredness of life and he did so with some measure of dignity that his critics had to respect even though they did not agree.

Though not a religious witness, I must give Carter the nod for several profound acts deregulating airline travel, the trucking industry, and the trains.  He does get kudos for having eliminated a federal agency or two when his successors have expanded the bureaucracy.  Of course, none of these helped to endear him to the liberal and progressive wing of his party and yet showed a time when a Democrat could be something other than a lefty.  To be sure, leftward was his drift in later years but mostly his problem there was in siding with the wrong side in his pursuit of his peace agenda. 

Though I take issue with him as theologian, I respect the fact that he continued to go to church and teach Bible class.  There are always plenty of excuses for former presidents to use as to why they do not attend, his practice here was exemplary.  Perhaps it was his faith or it could have been helped by his small town upbringing but Carter seemed to presume that church and life were joined at the hip.  I will give him that.  He was not one of those whose words about his faith would have to be taken at face value because his piety did not give much evidence.

So even though I did not vote for him nor did I find much in his presidency to admire, the man won my grudging respect.  Sadly, I fear that we have seen the last of his kind of Democrat and that Republicans may not be far behind the modern day Democrats in looking at abortion solely as a political issue and no longer a moral or theological one.