“We can choose to relieve suffering. We can choose to work together for peace. We can make these changes – and we must. No president has placed greater emphasis on equality, human rights, and the alleviation of human suffering than Jimmy Carter. He was the greatest social activist to ever serve as President of the United States. Say no to plagiarism. Get a custom essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get the original essayJames Earl Carter Jr, more commonly known as Jimmy, was born in Plains, Georgia on October 1, 1924. His parents, James Sr. and Bessie Lillian Gordy, were peanut farmers and devoted members of the Baptist Church. Jimmy began working on the family farm and store at the age of ten. In 1941, Jimmy graduated from high school, the first on his father's side of the family to do so. Carter's modest upbringing in Plains contributed to his rise to the presidency. After high school, Jimmy joined the Naval ROTC program to study engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. In 1943, Carter was accepted to the highly competitive Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, where he completed his studies. Jimmy was shorter than most of the men at the Academy, but he excelled in his studies. Shortly after Carter graduated in 1946, he married a girl he had known since childhood, Rosalynn Smith. The couple had four children, John William (Jack), James Earl III (Chip), Donnel Jeffrey (Jeff) and Amy Lynn. Jimmy served for seven years as a naval officer where he worked primarily on submarines. During those years, like most military families, the Carters moved frequently. In the summer of 1953, Jimmy's father died of pancreatic cancer. Jimmy moved his family to Plains, Georgia, to take over the family peanut farming business and care for his widowed mother. Once settled in Georgia, Jimmy entered state politics. Desegregation was just beginning to gain momentum in the American South in the 1950s. The anti-civil rights movement caused Carter's first liberal campaign for governor of Georgia to fail in 1966. Despite white backlash, Jimmy strongly opposed segregation. In 1970, Carter ran again for governor, this time focusing on white and rural voters who had rejected his liberal leanings the first time. Carter's second attempt was successful and he was elected governor of Georgia. As governor, Jimmy focused largely on equality, environmentalism, government efficiency, and breaking down racial barriers. Later, as President of the United States, Carter would apply these values ​​nationally. In December 1974, Jimmy Carter announced his candidacy for president and began a two-year campaign to represent the Democratic Party. Carter chose Senator Walter F. Mondale of Minnesota as his running mate. Jimmy saw Republican Richard Nixon's Watergate scandal as an ideal opportunity to restore the American people's faith in politics. Carter emphasized integrity. He said: “I will never lie.” Other Carter campaign slogans include "One leader, one change" and "I will never avoid a controversial issue." Slogans like these were well received by the American people, who had recently lost faith in government. Republican Gerald Ford, who became president after Nixon's impeachment, was Jimmy's opponent in the 1976 election. During hisDuring the 1976 presidential campaign, Jimmy Carter repeatedly invoked, before varied audiences, the theme of "competence and compassion." Carter entered the race with a double-digit lead over Ford. However, Carter made various mistakes that contributed to a much closer election than initially expected. The most significant of these errors occurred in an interview with Playboy; Carter admitted to committing adultery "in his heart" and made several other comments regarding sex and infidelity. Nonetheless, Carter won by 297 electoral votes to Ford's 241, making him the thirty-ninth President of the United States of America. When Jimmy took office, America was facing several national problems, including the persistent economic problems of inflation and unemployment. During his administration, Carter increased the workforce by nearly eight million jobs and reduced the budget deficit, measured as a percentage of gross national product. Unfortunately, inflation and interest rates were at record levels by the end of his administration, and efforts to minimize them created a brief recession. The top national priority during the Carter administration concerned energy policy and America's unhealthy dependence on foreign fuels. Carter solved the energy shortage by establishing a national energy policy, developing huge emergency oil reserves, and freeing control of domestic oil prices to boost production. Unfortunately, these triumphs were overshadowed when the 1979 Iranian Revolution once again drove up gasoline prices and led to long lines at gas stations. Carter made several achievements in domestic affairs that did not go unnoticed, such as his attempts to resolve economic and energy problems. had. Carter strongly pursued environmental conservation; He expanded the national park system, including expanding protection for 103 million acres of Alaska lands. Increasing human and social services was another of Carter's national goals. Jimmy created the Department of Education, strengthened the Social Security system, and appointed record numbers of women, blacks, and Hispanics to government positions. Carter sought government efficiency through civil service reform and through deregulation of the trucking and airline industries. Carter's attitude toward foreign affairs was unlike any before him. Carter's foreign policy focused on promising to make human rights a central concern in the United States' relations with other countries. This mentality led to a number of victories, including the establishment of full diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China, the ratification of the Panama Canal treaties, and the completion of negotiations of the SALT II nuclear limitation treaty with the Soviet Union. He also suspended economic and military aid to Chile, El Salvador and Nicaragua to protest their human rights abuses. Carter's most notable foreign policy achievements occurred in the Middle East during the Camp David Accords. In 1978, Carter mediated the historic peace treaty between Israel and Egypt. With this treaty, Israel withdrew from Sinai and both sides officially recognized their respective governments. The Iranian hostage crisis of November 1979 was detrimental to Carter's political career. Radical Iranian students seized the US embassy in Tehran, taking 66 Americans hostage..