Former US President Jimmy Carter was honored Thursday with a funeral at the Washington National Cathedral, before being buried in his home state of Georgia.
The funeral ceremony in Washington was attended by President Joe Biden, President-elect Donald Trump, as well as former presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush and Barack Obama. President Biden delivered the keynote address in his honor.
"Jimmy Carter's friendship and his life taught me that the strength of character is more important than the title and the power we have: It is the strength that everyone should be treated with dignity, respect, and that everyone deserves equal opportunities. We have an obligation not to allow space for hate and to not accept the greatest sin, the abuse of power," President Biden said in his speech.
Former President Carter's body was flown to the Cathedral from the Capitol, where the American public paid their last respects to him since Tuesday.
The audience and speakers at the ceremony highlighted the achievements and humanity of the 100-year-old former president, who died last month.
"He built houses for people in need," said Joshua Carter, one of his nephews, who recalled how Mr. Carter regularly taught day school in his native Plains, Georgia, after he left the White House. .
"He eliminated diseases in forgotten places. He made peace everywhere in the world, wherever he saw a chance. He loved people," Joshua said.
Jason Carter, another grandson of the former president, eulogized his grandfather and his wife Rosalynn, who died in 2023.
"They were people from small towns who never forgot who they were and where they were from, no matter what they accomplished in their lives," said Jason, who heads the Carter Center, a global humanitarian operation founded by the former president after he left the task.
The ceremony offered an unusual glimpse of unity for the nation in an era of division and polarization. Former President Barack Obama and President-elect Donald Trump, political rivals who have traded controversies with each other for years, sat next to each other Thursday and chatted for several minutes, even laughing.
As President-elect Trump took his seat before the service began, he shook hands with Mike Pence in a rare interaction with his former vice president.
The former president's flag-draped casket arrived in the Capitol lobby on Tuesday, ahead of Thursday's state funeral.
In that grand space — where only about 50 Americans have been given this special honor since 1852 — Senate Majority Leader Jon Thune, at a service late Tuesday, described former President Carter as: “A Navy veteran , peanut farmer, governor of Georgia. And the president of the United States. Church school teacher. Nobel Prize Winner. Advocate for peace and human rights. And above all, a loyal servant of his creator and his fellow citizens."
And Vice President Harris — who the day before, in this very building, certified the incoming president's victory — extolled former President Carter's policies.
"He was the first president of the United States to have a comprehensive energy policy, including providing some of the first federal support for clean energy," she said Tuesday. "He also passed over twelve major pieces of environmental protection legislation. And more than doubled the size of America's national parks."
Mr. Carter, who served as the 39th president, died on December 29 at the age of 100 at his home in Georgia. Since then, his last journey took his coffin through the narrow streets of his humble hometown, the town of Plains; through the boulevards of Atlanta, the state capital, and through the skies in snowy Washington, D.C., for his state funeral./Voice of America (A2 Televizion)
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