Jimmy Carter Quotes

When I reflect upon my blessings during my very nice lifetime, I am inspired to make sure that I spend the balance of the days of my existence in a productive way.

As a Christian, a trained engineer and scientist, and a professor at Emory University, I am embarrassed by Superintendent Kathy Cox's attempt to censor and distort the education of Georgia's students.... There is no need to teach that stars can fall out of the sky and land on a flat Earth in order to defend our religious faith.

I am not here as a public official, but as a citizen of a troubled world who finds hope in a growing consensus that the generally accepted goals of society are peace, freedom, human rights, environmental quality, the alleviation of suffering, and the rule of law.

I enjoyed being President.

God wisely designed the human body so that we can neither pat our own backs nor kick ourselves too easily.

We will not learn how to live together in peace by killing each other's children.

I believed what my father taught me about the separation of church and state, so when I was President I never invited Billy Graham to have services in the White House because I didn't think that was appropriate. He was injured a little bit, until I explained it to him.

Within the stable economy it's necessary to eliminate all forms of sexual discrimination, and to provide women for the first time in our history with economic opportunities equal to those of men.

At the beginning of this year also, I called upon the North Korean side to open dialog between the responsible authorities of the South and the North at any place, at any time, and at any level, in order to prevent a recurrence of war and to cooperate to speed up the peaceful unification of our fatherland. However, no sincere response has yet been made by North Korea.

There should be an honest attempt at the reconciliation of differences before resorting to combat.

When combined, the small individual contributors of caring, friendship, forgiveness, and love, each of us different from our next-door neighbors, can form a phalanx, an army, with great capability.

We are grossly wasting our energy resources and other precious raw materials as though their supply were infinite. We must even face the prospect of changing our basic ways of living. This change will either be made on our own initiative in a planned and rational way, or forced on us with chaos and suffering by the inexorable laws of nature.

The Southern Baptist Convention, as you know, decided in the year 2000 that women should not be permitted to be pastors or deacons or chaplains in the military service. Some Southern Baptist seminaries don't even permit women to teach male students. I don't agree with that. But they can go in and quote a few passages of Paul that women should be restricted in their services.

For this generation, ours, life is nuclear survival, liberty is human rights, the pursuit of happiness is a planet whose resources are devoted to the physical and spiritual nourishment of its inhabitants.

When I ran, I didn't have any money. Now, it requires raising hundreds of millions of dollars just to get the nomination, and I don't care to be involved in that process.

Failure is a reality; we all fail at times, and it's painful when we do. But it's better to fail while striving for something wonderful, challenging, adventurous, and uncertain than to say, " I don't want to try because I may not succeed completely.

Penalties against possession of a drug should not be more damaging to an individual than the use of the drug itself; and where they are, they should be changed. Nowhere is this more clear than in the laws against possession of marijuana in private for personal use... Therefore, I support legislation amending Federal law to eliminate all Federal criminal penalties for the possession of up to one ounce [28g] of marijuana.

The measure of a society is found in how they treat their weakest and most helpless citizens. As Americans, we are blessed with circumstances that protect our human rights and our religious freedom, but for many people around the world, deprivation and persecution have become a way of life.

I remember the last three days that I was president, I never went to bed at all. I never went to bed until we had negotiated the final release of the hostages.

In general the 53 countries on the continent of Africa have made great progress towards freedom and democracy, and in terms of electing good, sound administrations.

Trust is very much a part of our democracy.

A fundamentalist can't bring himself or herself to negotiate with people who disagree with them because the negotiating process itself is an indication of implied equality.

As President, I was able to save with the stroke of the pen a hundred million acres of wilderness area in Alaska. This is the kind of thing that is is gratifying to a President, but to be on a solitary stream with good friends, with a fly rod in your hand, and to have a successfull or even an unsuccessful day-they're all successful-is an even greater delight.

[on the Republican party] A party with a narrow vision, a party that is afraid of the future.

You just have to have a simple faith.

A lot of the things that we passed in the energy policy were embedded in law, and they resulted in tremendous reductions in waste of energy in all kinds of things.

Many of the most highly publicized events of my presidency are not nearly as memorable or significant in my life as fishing with my daddy.

We consider these settlements to be contrary to the Geneva Convention, that occupied territory should not be changed by establishment of permanent settlements by the occupying power.

I enjoy walking by myself on the same paths where, as a little boy, I delighted in following my father around.

I'm much more introspective than I was, say, thirty years ago.

On the basis of both values and interests, the natural relationship between Islam and the United States is one of friendship.

It is generally not known in the world that, in the years preceding 1916, there was a concerted effort made to eliminate all the Armenian people, probably one of the greatest tragedies that ever befell any group. And there weren't any Nuremberg trials.

I believe in the separation of church and state. The government has the right to say what happens in a civil case, like in a court house. And religious people have a right to say what happens in a church congregation. They are two completely separate things.

I believe in the separation of church and state and would not use my authority to violate this principle in any way.

When I was in the White House, I was confronted with the challenge of the Cold War. Both the Soviet Union and I had 30,000 nuclear weapons that could destroy the entire earth and I had to maintain the peace.

I believe those passages in the New Testament, not by Jesus, but by Paul, that say women should not adorn themselves, they should always wear hats or color their hair in church - things like that - I think they are signs of the times and should not apply to modern-day life.

Our American values are not luxuries but necessities, not the salt in our bread, but the bread itself. Our common vision of a free and just society is our greatest source of cohesion at home and strength abroad, greater than the bounty of our material blessings.

Penalties against possession of a drug should not be more damaging to an individual than the use of the drug itself

It's a terrible and tragic and counterproductive policy to avoid communicating with people who disagree with us.

I can get up at 8am and be rested... or I can get up at 5am and be President.

I'm not a mediator or a negotiator. I don't want to be one.

There's always an element of self delusion among people who believe they ought to be President. There's an underestimation of your opponent and an overestimation of your own abilities. This is compatible with being rich and powerful, the idea that we were blessed by God because we deserve to be blessed.

I believe men and women are the same and that women should be given an equal chance to serve God with men.

I have a great deal of confidence in myself and in my faith.

My position has always been, along with many other people, that any differences be resolved in a nonviolent way.

I can't really criticize the Tea Party people, because I came into the White House pretty much on the same basis that they have become popular. That is dissatisfaction with the way things are going in Washington and disillusionment and disencouragement about the government.

Always I'm working on some of book. That's the way I make a living.

Some major churches overemphasize the importance of preaching as a means to increase membership and fail to reach out with compassion to their neighbors in need.