Jimmy Carter: State funeral and day of mourning to be held for former US president | BBC News

tributes are being paid from around the world to the former US president and Nobel Peace Prize winner Jimmy Carter who's died at the age of 100 he was the peanut farmer who became the most powerful man in the world serving one term as president from 1977 to 1981 he's the longest lived American leader well let's speak now to Ambassador Stuart eisenstat who was President Carter's chief White House domestic affairs adviser during the whole of his time in the Oval Office Ambassador thank you very much for joining us on BBC News um amazing to have someone

with your knowledge of the president with us and uh what was he like during that time of course it was post Richard Nixon and all of that entailed what that had done to the American psyche and and the belief in democracy well this is more than a 50-year relationship I was his policy director when he ran for governor when he ran for president and then as Chief domestic advisor in the White House from 19 77 to 81 and he was first of all on a personal level a renaissance man he was a patriot he was

in the US Navy as a submarine officer he was a poet he was a preacher he was an author of 32 books he was an engineer he was a great wood cutter he was a flower fisherman so on a personal level he had an astonishing Ray of interests uh he was a tremendously disciplined worker he came in early and left late uh he always insisted on having more information he wanted the appendices to some of our memos he would send our memos back with circles around mispellings or split infinitives or grammatical mistakes because he expected

exactitude and yet on a personal level again uh he allowed all of his senior staff and their families knowing we worked 24/7 and didn't see our families as much as we could to come to Camp David the presidential Retreat on weekends and I still remember him asking my young teenage son if he would jog with him he would invite our family over to have uh movies and popcorn with he and rosalin that Personal Touch was was always there along with being a very demanding Taskmaster he was I'm sorry go ahead I was wondering what did

he make of that moniker the peanut farmer um I I've always been curious about that well he was perfectly pleased with it because he was a peanut farmer that was one of his appeals in the primary he was a man who worked the Earth who worked the soil uh you know he didn't work in a in a expensive office uh and indeed I think the most uh difficult conversation that he and Rosen a marriage of 77 years had was when he was a officer in the Navy a submarine officer and his father was dying in

planes and he decided he had to go back to save the business and Rosalyn desperately didn't want to go back to Plains and for the whole trip back from Hawaii she didn't talk to him but she became a great partner in the business and a great political partner and again one of the most distinguished first ladies only the second one next to an Roosevelt to testify in Congress on her own legisl mental health legislation and had the first that had her own office and her own staff in the East wing of the white house now

so he was he was a he was a feminist too um one of my earlier guests said that that was very much the case she thought um his International achievements uh overshadowed domestic achievements in fact many uh critics of his presidency say that his domestic policy agenda didn't live up to what it should have been do you think that criticism is fair absolutely wrong we got almost 70% of our major legislation passed one of the highest levels of any president our energy three bill or three energy bills created the foundation for the energy security we

have today deregulating oil and gas starting the whole renewable solar process all the ethics legislation we have today came from him he created the Department of Education and increased funding for Education he was a great environmental president double the size of our national parks with the Alaska lands build and something was truly transformative is he deregulated all forms of transportation and Telecommunications trucks Airlines bringing air travel to the middle class railroads uh he created the the whole era of cable because of his telecommunications deregulation and here is a southerner from the deep segregated South who

was a great civil rights advocate he appointed more black Americans Hispanic Americans and women and women to Federal judgeships and to senior positions in administration that all 38 Presidents put together so he had a very good domestic record his International Record was also outstanding which we can discuss in a second Ambassador unfortunately we are out of time but we really appreciate your time uh and your Rec elections of that period with President Carter Ambassador Stuart eisenstat thank you very much and around the world and across the UK this is BBC News