Sunday school and soul food with the President
Story by Taylor Bruce • Photos by Bryan Johnson
PORTICO MAGAZINE | NOVEMBER 2006
When he speaks, he's back again.
"And a glass of buttermilk," he said to a waitress he already knew. "Thank you."
Interviewing a President is nerve-wracking and it kills your appetite. You try to prepare, sifting through old Time magazines, reading long-ago campaign speeches, thumbing thick biographies. You press your best suit, buy a new one, get it tailored. You go to Sunday school with him beforehand, sing Baptist hymns, drop a ten dollar bill in the offertory. But, none of it gets you quite ready, not even white-knuckle petitions, for once you sit down with that figure, remembering his history of importance, the man looks you in the eye and says, with an honest, fierce command, "Now, who are you again?" and it all unravels.
Carter is showing his age these days. Gone is the full, gray-gold, plump head of hair; it now covers his spotty scalp in fine white wisps that look like they might float away in a strong gust. His hands, the ones that pointed out over lecterns and microphones, that reached to shake a million hands, stiffen and redden and flake away. The skin under his eyes and at the outer edges of his mouth crease deeply in permanent age. His puckery lips and prominent, waxy teeth remain recognizable, unmistakable, but are older versions of the originals. Jimmy Carter is an old man now, 82 this year.
Sitting with him, you can't help but notice the bodily wear, the facial paling, the lonesome spirit I've seen in my widow grandmother, but it all changes when he speaks. When he speaks, he's back again. His voice, tethered only in great southern, syrupy warmth, moves in a straight line. Carter is certain in his opinions. If I closed my eyes, I'd only know he was a man; but, he'd have no age. His mind retraces memoir: the country schooldays in this tiny village; his Navy years as nuclear physicist; of courting the shy neighborgirl Rosalyn; of his father's death and the return to an unglamorous peanut business; of a politico's trials alongside those of a family man, Palestine, Plains, and Playboy. And, as we spoke, intermittingly forking up sugared creamed corn and peppery greens, I felt him looking into me, his vision still rightly intact for such an inspection.
"What is it you want to know?" he seemed to say.
These are a few of the things he told me.
TAYLOR BRUCE: There are thousands of problems that could take up your full day. The thing you've championed most is the peace process in the Middle East. What is that priority based out of?
JIMMY CARTER: Well, I started teaching Sunday school when I was 18 years old, so I have been immersed in the Holy Land, its history, and biblical history ever since I was a child. When I became Governor, I went over to the Middle East and had a long visit in Israel, West Bank, and Gaza. And then, when I became President, I saw that no progress was being made. I felt that Middle East was one of the most interesting and challenging and important confrontations in the world.
TB: Distance separates the average person like me from the Middle East conflict. What can I do, what can the normal person do, to contribute to the peace process?
JC: The same thing you do about any subject that is important. Learn the facts. Once you've learned the facts, try to be courageous enough to let your views heard. Tens of thousands Americans have such an intense interest in the [Middle East] that they do go over there. They find out how the Palestinians are trying to live. They visit the holy places. They study the issues
TB: When you are trying to work with a group which subscribes to a belief in something which you strongly oppose, how do you cooperate and co-labor?
JC: Well, you make your views be known. Once you give them the right to choose their own leaders, you have to accept the government that they choose to form. When we go in to monitor elections, we don't have any authority. We don't want any. But we do have some influence. Particularly, our role is not to determine the character of the government elected, but to make sure the election process is fair.
TB: Do you feel like it's been a positive election process in Palestine?
JC: (quickly) Sure.
TB: In Iraq?
JC: Iraq? (Pause) Well, it's been a step in the right direction. We don't know how it's going to turn out. We've got a similar problem there that we have with the recent election in Palestine. The Shiites have obviously dominated the new government, and theyhave a pretty fundamentalist Muslim religion. They don't believe in women's rights. And they will probably be strongly inclined to divide up the oil wealth between themselves and the Kurds. So we don't know yet.
JC: Because I've talked about Plains ahead of time, we've had leaders of nations come down here. We've had Anwar Sedat [former President of Egypt]. We've had Prime Minister Begin of Israel. Yassir Arafat came. I think all of them have come because they heard about where I live, about my early experiences, and I've tried to go and visit them whenever I could. I've been to Sedat's local village.
TB: What is their reaction when they pull into Plains?
JC: They are always surprised at how small it is. They are always surprised at how small my house is. [Carter and his wife live in a small one-story ranch house on the western edge of town, less than a mile from Main Street.]
TB: I would think it might put them at ease a little bit.
JC: Well it does. In fact, when Arafat came- he was in a Saudi Arabian plane- they knew they were coming to visit a former President of the United States, so they landed in one of the big suburbs of Atlanta, even though we had given them instruction on landing down here. But, they refused to. They couldn't accept the fact that I lived in a pretty much rural area. Plains puts people at ease. Of course, it's got a bustling feel on Sunday when I teach.
TB: So, this year will be sixty years on the dot for you and Rosalyn? Something rare, huh?
JC: Well, we haven't made it yet.
Carter said several things in bone-dry humor to jab at his wife Rosalyn. She'd not bat an eye his way, but you knew that she picked up on the sarcasm. I was actually surprised at this nature of their relationship, or my witness to it, a relationship of vigor and joviality. I imagine Jimmy jokingly playful, full of under-the-breathe gibes and quips, on the couple's earliest dates, back somewhere near the end of World War II. I got the sense that they, simply put, liked one another.
TB: I reread your Nobel lecture last night. Several things stuck out. One particularly. It was the sentence, "God gives us the capacity for choice."
(Carter interjects. He tells me to eat up. I lie and tell him I'd a big breakfast at the B&B. We are silent for several seconds. I take a bite from my plate, and he speaks up.)
JC: The Nobel lecture said a lot of things that needed to be said.
TB: Do you sleep better in Plains? (This question came from the blue, immediately following his response to the Nobel Peace Prize speech. He responded quickly.)
JC: I sleep good anywhere. 
JIMMY CARTER: Well, I started teaching Sunday school when I was 18 years old, so I have been immersed in the Holy Land, its history, and biblical history ever since I was a child. When I became Governor, I went over to the Middle East and had a long visit in Israel, West Bank, and Gaza. And then, when I became President, I saw that no progress was being made. I felt that Middle East was one of the most interesting and challenging and important confrontations in the world.
TB: Distance separates the average person like me from the Middle East conflict. What can I do, what can the normal person do, to contribute to the peace process?
JC: The same thing you do about any subject that is important. Learn the facts. Once you've learned the facts, try to be courageous enough to let your views heard. Tens of thousands Americans have such an intense interest in the [Middle East] that they do go over there. They find out how the Palestinians are trying to live. They visit the holy places. They study the issues
TB: When you are trying to work with a group which subscribes to a belief in something which you strongly oppose, how do you cooperate and co-labor?
JC: Well, you make your views be known. Once you give them the right to choose their own leaders, you have to accept the government that they choose to form. When we go in to monitor elections, we don't have any authority. We don't want any. But we do have some influence. Particularly, our role is not to determine the character of the government elected, but to make sure the election process is fair.
TB: Do you feel like it's been a positive election process in Palestine?
JC: (quickly) Sure.
TB: In Iraq?
JC: Iraq? (Pause) Well, it's been a step in the right direction. We don't know how it's going to turn out. We've got a similar problem there that we have with the recent election in Palestine. The Shiites have obviously dominated the new government, and theyhave a pretty fundamentalist Muslim religion. They don't believe in women's rights. And they will probably be strongly inclined to divide up the oil wealth between themselves and the Kurds. So we don't know yet.
JC: Because I've talked about Plains ahead of time, we've had leaders of nations come down here. We've had Anwar Sedat [former President of Egypt]. We've had Prime Minister Begin of Israel. Yassir Arafat came. I think all of them have come because they heard about where I live, about my early experiences, and I've tried to go and visit them whenever I could. I've been to Sedat's local village.
TB: What is their reaction when they pull into Plains?
JC: They are always surprised at how small it is. They are always surprised at how small my house is. [Carter and his wife live in a small one-story ranch house on the western edge of town, less than a mile from Main Street.]
TB: I would think it might put them at ease a little bit.
JC: Well it does. In fact, when Arafat came- he was in a Saudi Arabian plane- they knew they were coming to visit a former President of the United States, so they landed in one of the big suburbs of Atlanta, even though we had given them instruction on landing down here. But, they refused to. They couldn't accept the fact that I lived in a pretty much rural area. Plains puts people at ease. Of course, it's got a bustling feel on Sunday when I teach.
TB: So, this year will be sixty years on the dot for you and Rosalyn? Something rare, huh?
JC: Well, we haven't made it yet.
TB: Do you sleep better in Plains? (This question came from the blue, immediately following his response to the Nobel Peace Prize speech. He responded quickly.)
JC: I sleep good anywhere.