He was a good guy

 Mark Seliger/August

Carter was a good guy. Caring, loyal and a true humanitarian, his take on the world, with emphasis on truly understanding the Palestinian equation, was nuanced and intelligent to a fault. He got hosed for inflation, something presidents have little real control over and got rightfully roasted over Eagle Claw, the ill planned and failed rescue mission of the hostages in Iran. but ... in retrospect, he did more in trying to establish peace in the Middle East than any other president.

To whit

There’s no predicting history’s verdict. Up to now, Jimmy Carter, who died on Sunday at age 100 in Plains, Ga., has been judged to be a middle-of-the-pack president, his one term in office remembered for circumstances and events that simply overwhelmed him: the seizure in Iran of 52 American hostages, the bungled attempt to rescue them, the gasoline lines, inflation, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Yet he is also considered one of America’s greatest ex-presidents, for using the residual star power of his office to help his successors and his country as a peacemaker, backstage diplomat, human rights champion, monitor of free elections and advocate for the homeless while finding time to write poetry and, by his own example, providing the best possible case for traditional religious values.

In 2002, having been nominated many times for the Nobel Peace Prize, Mr. Carter finally won it for his “vital contribution” to the Camp David agreement, which set the stage for peace between Israel and Egypt, as well as for his commitment to human rights, his work fighting tropical diseases and for furthering democracy everywhere.

Not perfect by any means but ...

As this board observed in 1994, compared with Mr. Carter, most former presidents struggled to use their stature for the common weal. Most wrote memoirs. Some disappeared into private life; some set up foundations; some went around collecting large sums for speaking. Mr. Carter took risks and played crucial roles as an honest broker in nuclear talks with North Korea and in civil conflicts on the continent of Africa and in the Middle East.

He described his second career as “waging peace.” That work remains far from finished, and it remains for those who admired Mr. Carter to continue.

Lastly, his stance on cilvil rights is the right one without question.

Mr. Carter was the first U.S. president to publicly denounce apartheid in South Africa and the first to make a state visit to sub-Saharan Africa. His sustained personal engagement and diplomacy were later deemed among the most critical outside influences in Zimbabwe’s peaceful transition to majority rule in 1980. And he was the first president to assert clear American support for a “Palestinian homeland.”

Mr. Carter rocking Madison Square Garden in 1976.Credit...Elliott Erwitt/Magnum Photos