In 1976 the Democratic Party chose Jimmy Carter as its nominee for president, and the American people elected him to that office over the incumbent president, Gerald Ford, bringing to a climax the most meteoric rise in modern U. S. politics. In choosing Jimmy Carter, the voters gained a president about whom they knew little and one who prided himself on being relatively unknown outside his home state of Georgia. He had never been a national candidate and had no significant experience on the national scene or any close ties to Washington. Jimmy Carter decided to run for president after his second term as governor of Georgia. (Goldfield, 2007, p.869) He sensed that the mood of the country was anti-Washington and that people were interested in a candidate who had not been associated with the Watergate scandal or with the Vietnam War. His campaign was built on moderate positions on most major issues, and he set a moral tone for the election by promising never to lie to the American people and to institute a government that was decent, compassionate, and responsible. In foreign affairs, Carter wanted to establish human rights as a tenet of American policy. (Jimmy Carter, n.d., ¶5) His frequent criticism of nations that violated basic human rights and his pleas in behalf of Soviet dissidents angered the Soviet government, which viewed the statements as intervention in its internal affairs. Despite these differences, Carter and Soviet President Leonid Brezhnev signed the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT II) setting limits on the numbers of Soviet and U. S. nuclear-weapons systems. In spite of his vigorous campaign, however, the treaty was not ratified by the Senate and eventually was placed in limbo by the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. (Goldfield, 2007, p.872) Carter brought to fruition the long negotiations over the Panama Canal treaties by persuading the Senate to ratify them. (Goldfield, 2007, p.871) Conservative forces severely criticized the treaties as a sellout of vital American interests, and the issue had a significant impact in some areas of the South and West in the 1980 congressional and presidential campaigns. Much the same reaction greeted Carter's decision to inaugurate full diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China in 1979, thus cutting formal U. S. ties with the Nationalist Chinese government on Taiwan. Probably the most perplexing problem facing President Carter was the seizure of American diplomats and embassy employees in Teheran in November 1979, by radical Iranian students. More than a year of inconclusive negotiations with the Iranian government, plus an unsuccessful airborne attempt to rescue the hostages, proved to be difficult political and policy problems. Although many people were dissatisfied with Carter's handling of the hostage seizure and many blamed his administration for not having protected embassy personnel in the first place, the delicate problem was muted somewhat as an issue owing to the paucity of reasonable alternative plans, the erratic nature of a succession of Iranian governments, and fears generated by Iranian threats to punish or kill the hostages. (Goldfield, 2007, p.872) On assuming office in 1977, President Carter inherited an economy that was slowly emerging from a recession. He had severely criticized former President Ford for his failures to control inflation and relieve unemployment, but after four years of the Carter presidency, both inflation and unemployment were considerably worse than at the time of his inauguration. Carter also faced a drastic erosion of the value of the U.S. dollar in the international money markets, and many analysts blamed the decline on a large and persistent trade deficit, much of it a result of U.S. dependence on foreign oil. (Goldfield, 2007, p.870) The president warned that Americans were wasting too much energy and that domestic supplies of oil and natural gas were running out. He also warned that foreign supplies of petroleum were subject to embargoes by the producing nations. In mid-1979, in the wake of widespread shortages of gasoline, Carter advanced a long-term program designed to solve the energy problem. He proposed a limit on imported oil, gradual price decontrol on domestically produced oil, a stringent program of conservation, and development of alternative sources of energy such as solar, nuclear, and geothermal power, oil and gas from shale and coal, and synthetic fuels. In what was probably his most noted domestic legislative accomplishment, he pushed a significant portion of his energy program through Congress. (Goldfield, 2007, p.870) Other domestic accomplishments included approval of the Carter plan to overhaul the civil-service system, making it easier to fire incompetents; creation of new departments of education and energy; deregulation of the airlines to stimulate competition and lower fares; and environmental efforts that included passage of a law preserving vast wilderness areas of Alaska. (Jimmy Carter, n.d., ¶5) Carter was not successful in gaining support for his national health-insurance bill or his proposals for welfare reform and controls on hospital costs. He was unsuccessful also in gaining congressional approval to consolidate natural-resource agencies within the Department of the Interior and expanded economic development units in the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Also, his tax-reform proposals were not favorably received by Congress. Jimmy Carter was widely perceived by the public to be ineffectual in the office. He had not been able to get much of his legislative program through Congress. His relationships with the Democratic leadership of the House and Senate were cool and distant. His White House staff was composed of old Georgia friends, few of whom appeared knowledgeable about Washington politics. (Goldfield, 2007, p.870) He was criticized for allowing the U.S. embassy personnel in Iran to be taken hostage and for not having found a way to secure their release. His initiatives in the Mideast peace process appeared to have foundered. The economy was in disarray with double-digit inflation and high unemployment prevalent at the same time. The country had suffered long lines at the gas pumps, as well as fuel-oil shortages and high prices. I think that some of the issues facing Carter were of his creation but not all. He inherited a weak economy and the distrust of the American people in government.
Resources:
Goldfield, David. (2007). The American Journey. Pearson Prentice Hall: Upper Saddle River, NJ
Jimmy Carter. (n.d.) Retrieved from Nobel Prize.org database on December 22, 2008. Website: nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/2002/carter-bio/html