2016 Global Humanitarian Summit Dedicated to President Jimmy Carter

We are excited and proud to dedicate the 2016 Global Humanitarian Summit to President Jimmy Carter.

President Carter is a great inspiration to so many and one of the world’s greatest humanitarians and peacemakers. We honor him for his wonderful giving spirit, which exemplifies the spirit and mission of the Global Humanitarian Summit.

James Earl (Jimmy) Carter Jr. (born October 1, 1924)

Carter, the 39th President of the United States (1977-1981), was awarded the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize for his work with the Carter Center.

Carter, a Democrat raised in rural Georgia, was a peanut farmer who served two terms as a Georgia State Senator (1963-1967) and one as the Governor of Georgia (1971-1975). He was elected President in 1976, defeating incumbent President Gerald Ford in a close election (the Electoral College margin of 57 votes was the closest since 1916 and no election featuring an incumbent since 1976 has had a closer popular vote). As of 2015, he is the second oldest (after George H. W. Bush) of America’s four living former presidents.

On his second day in office, Carter pardoned all evaders of the Vietnam War drafts. During his term as President, he created two new cabinet-level departments, the Department of Energy and the Department of Education. He established a national energy policy that included conservation, price control, and new technology. In foreign affairs, Carter pursued the Camp David Accords, the Panama Canal Treaties, the second round of Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT II), and the return of the Panama Canal Zone to Panama. On the economic front, he confronted persistent “stagflation,” a combination of high inflation, high unemployment, and slow growth. The end of his presidential tenure was marked by the 1979–1981 Iran hostage crisis, the 1979 energy crisis, the Three Mile Island nuclear accident, and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. In response to the Soviet move, he ended détente, escalated the Cold War, and led the international boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow.

In 1980, he ran against Ted Kennedy in the Democratic Party’s primaries for the presidential nomination, winning the 1980 primary, but lost the general election in an electoral landslide to Republican candidate Ronald Reagan, who won 44 of 50 states.

He founded the Carter Center in 1982 as his base for advancing human rights. He has also traveled extensively to conduct peace negotiations, observe elections, and advance disease prevention and eradication in developing nations. He is also a key figure in the Habitat for Humanity project.

In August 2015, at age 90, Carter was diagnosed with melanoma which had metastasized to his liver and brain, and he began treatment which included surgery, immunotherapy, and radiation therapy.