His stand on human rights is looked to as an example today.
In spite of all the controversy, Carter maintained a surprisingly successful foreign policy for someone who had so little experience. He had made a campaign pledge to make human rights a high priority, even though he found it difficult to put into practice. He accelerated the process of ending white colonial rule in Africa. He actually improved relations with Latin America by ending the treaty with Panama and handing over control of the Panama Canal. But his crowning achievement was at Camp David, September 1978, when he personally brought together the leaders of Israel and Egypt and signed a peace treaty between them, attempting to bring stability to the Middle East. He followed up by normalizing relations with China and signing the SALT II arms control treaty with the Soviet Union.
The United States will never be safe if the basic tenets of the U.S. Constitution and the country's founders' insights are endangered, the rights that are depended upon daily, and are admired and spread by example throughout the world through our foreign policies. If other nations see our stance in the world as non-advocating of human rights, when we support right-wing dictators and violate human rights in military prisons and mistreat those in the services, we will not...
Other nations will come to fear and despise us. Also, within the U.S., pursuit of an agenda that fights for a goal at all costs, including in that cost the lives of innocent civilians and their rights as humans, will polarize and divide citizens. There will be those who will see the departure from the ideals in seeking the goal as immoral and unconstitutional and this will create disrespect for the government among the people. Leaders must be chosen carefully, for if they do not uphold the high morals and ideals that the United States was founded on in every way, the country will be led astray.
Works Cited
Carter, Jimmy. Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Jimmy Carter, vol.1. 1977. http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/facts/democrac/55.htm
Mickey Z. "Nobel Carter?" The Legacy of Jimmy Carter. 11 Oct 2002. http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=2463.
Nobel Lecture by Jimmy Carter, Ozlo, December 10, 2002.Stockholm, Sweden: Pressens. 2002. http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/2002/carter-lecture.html
The Presidency. "Grolier's Encyclopedia. New York: Scholastic. 2000.
Wills, Garry. Reagan's America. New York: Penguin Books. 1987
