“To young people, to anyone seeking meaning and purpose: study the power of Jimmy’s example,” Biden said in his eulogy.
The two-and-a-half-hour funeral capped a nearly week-long series of tributes that began in Plains, where Carter was born in 1924, lived most of his life and died last month at the age of 100.
The formalities began last Saturday when a motorcade accompanying Carter traveled from his childhood home and family farm before moving to the Carter Presidential Center, where it remained idle until Tuesday morning.
The late president’s remains were then brought to Washington, D.C., where he lay in state at the U.S. Capitol, and where long lines of mourners waited hours in frigid conditions this week to file past his flag-draped casket in the Rotunda. Capitol. .
Among them was military veteran Dianne Meyers, who traveled from Minnesota to pay her respects.
Charging
“He was my commander-in-chief when I served in Germany for three years, between 1976 and 1979,” he told this newspaper.
“We were many times on the brink of war with Russia. He didn’t blink an eye and managed to keep us at peace. “I wanted to come and thank you for keeping me safe.”
At 9am on Thursday (Friday AEDT), Carter’s coffin was carried from the roundabout to the sound of a 21-gun salute and made its way through snow-filled streets where spectators stood on the pavements, applauding and waved the American flag while he approved.
But perhaps the most notable sight was inside the cathedral, where the nation’s five living presidents put aside their political grievances (to some extent) as they bid farewell to Carter.
President-elect Donald Trump (right) shakes hands with former Vice President Mike Pence.Credit: AP
Trump, accompanied by his wife Melania, was the first to take his seat. After sharing an icy handshake with his former Vice President Mike Pence (the pair had a falling out over the 2021 Capitol attack when Trump supporters threatened to hang Pence for not blocking Biden’s election victory), the president-elect passed several minutes chatting and laughing with Obama, the man at the center of Trump’s racist conspiracy.
Shortly after, Republican George W. Bush and his wife Laura entered, followed by Vice President Kamala Harris and her husband Doug Emhoff. The four did not recognize the Trumps before the ceremony, but they did after the service was over.
Eulogies written by former President Gerald Ford and former Vice President Walter Mondale before their deaths were read by their sons, Steven Ford and Ted Mondale.
Carter’s grandson Jason also paid a private tribute to the man he called “Paw Paw,” describing his grandfather as a “regular guy” whose life was “a love story, from the moment he woke up until he “He laid his head down.”
Guests of honor: (front row) President Joe Biden, First Lady Jill Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff; (behind them) former President Invoice Clinton and former First Lady Hillary Clinton, former President George W. Bush, former First Lady Laura Bush, former President Barack Obama and President-elect Donald Trump. Credit: AP
Ultimately, Carter’s casket was carried out of the cathedral to return to Plains, where the former president will be buried with his greatest love: Rosalyn Carter, his childhood sweetheart and wife of 77 years, who died in late 2023.
“I miss him, but I take comfort in knowing that he and his beloved Rosalyn are reunited again,” Biden said. “God bless you, Jimmy Carter.”
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