By Terence Smith
Ours is an unembarrassed, unequivocal Carter Household tonight as the testimonials pour in for James Earl Carter, the 39th President of the United States, dead at the extraordinary age of 100.
My wife, Susy, was on his staff as part of the Congressional Liaison group known as the Budget Task Force. She worked in a high-ceilinged, huge office in the Old Executive Office Building across the alley from the White House. She has plenty of Carter and Carter Administration stories to tell. The two of us actually met in the Carter White House 40-odd years ago.
I covered the 39th President as Chief White House Correspondent for The New York Times, interviewing Carter in the Oval Office, writing about his struggles with Congress and the economy (remember the gas lines, the soaring inflation?) traveling with him aboard Air Force One all over the world.
So many memories come back tonight. Particularly poignant is the recollection of his last 72 hours in office, as Carter worked tirelessly, with just snatches of sleep, to complete the deal that would bring home the 52 American hostages that had been held in Teheran for 444 long days and, arguably, had cost him a second term as President.
On the morning of January 20, 1981, with the negotiation essentially complete but the hostages still being held in Teheran, Carter went up to the west front of the U.S. Capitol to stand at attention as Ronald Reagan was sworn in in his place. Then, in the motorcade that followed to Andrews Air Force Base, word finally came that the hostages had boarded a plane and cleared Iranian air space. The hostage crisis was over, all 52 hostages were being brought home alive and private citizen Carter returned to his home in Plains, Georgia.
Instead of resting, Carter and a few aides and reporters, including me, were back in the air early the next morning, flying to Wiesbaden, Germany, to greet the hostages as they were being examined in a U.S. military hospital. Arriving after dark, Carter and a couple of aides held an emotional meeting at the hospital trying to explain to angry, frustrated hostages all that had been done, fruitlessly, to win their release. They were far from satisfied, but they were all alive, and free.
Carter’s face was drawn and white as he returned to the aircraft where the rest of us were waiting. When I asked him what the meeting had been like, he had a pained expression on his face. “Cathartic,” he said, “cathartic.”
The huge plane with “United States of America” emblazoned on its side refueled and took off, flying through the night back to Washington and Plains. The Presidency of James Earl Carter — Jimmy Carter —was over.