Jimmy Carter Quotes

“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.”

“A person should have as our goal complete agape (self-sacrificial love). The most we can expect from a society is to institute simple justice.”

“Aggression unopposed becomes a contagious disease.”

“All my playmates on the farm were black, and later, when I started school in Plains, it was all white. But I was always eager to get back home to my friends in Archery.”

“America did not invent human rights. In a very real sense human rights invented America.”

“America does not at the moment have a functioning democracy.”

“Every act of energy conservation is more than just common sense: I tell you it is an act of patriotism.”

“Everyone has a right to peaceful coexistence, the basic personal freedoms, the alleviation of suffering, and the opportunity to lead a productive life.”

“Go out on a limb. That's where the fruit is.”

“God always answers prayers. Sometimes it's 'yes'. Sometimes the answer is 'no'. Sometimes it's 'you gotta be kidding'.”

“Human identity is no longer defined by what one does but rather by what one owns.”

“I have 22 grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and they keep me young.”

“I have often wanted to drown my troubles, but I can't get my wife to go swimming.”

“I let God be the judge and I believe that we worship a just and fair God who won't punish innocent people unnecessarily.”

“I personally have always been in favor of people who are gay being permitted to marry legally – and I still feel that way.”

“I say to you quite frankly that the time for racial discrimination is over.”

“I think a good husband has to depend on having a good wife.”

“I think I was identified as a failed president because I wasn't re-elected.”

“I think politicians really go with the tide.”

“I thought then, and I think now, that the invasion of Iraq was unnecessary and unjust. And I think the premises on which it was launched were false.”

“I wish I had known when I was in the White House what I know now about the Third World.”

“I'm a peanut farmer at heart, still grow peanuts on my farm in Georgia.”

“I've looked on many women with lust. I've committed adultery in my heart many times. God knows I will do this and forgives me.”

“If you don't want your tax dollars to help the poor, then stop saying that you want a country based on Christian values. Because you don't!”

“If you fear making anyone mad, then you ultimately probe for the lowest common denominator of human achievement.”

“If you're totally illiterate and living on one dollar a day, the benefits of globalization never come to you.”

“In every instance that I have known of with confrontation with the government and the press, the press was always right. So keep it up.”

“The best way to enhance freedom in other lands is to demonstrate here that our democratic system is worthy of emulation.”

“The test of a government is not how popular it is with the powerful and privileged few but how honestly and fairly it deals with the many who must depend on it.”

“There's no doubt that usually a president's public image is enhanced by going to war. That never did appeal to me.”