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The state funeral for James Earl “Jimmy” Carter, Jr., the 39th President of the United States, was as well attended by dignitaries as one might expect — or hope.
Among the hundreds in attendance at the Washington National Cathedral were Presidents Biden, Obama, Bush, and Clinton; Vice Presidents Harris, Pence, Gore, and Quayle; Secretaries of State Clinton and Kerry; first and second spouses; Chief Justice Roberts and Associate Justices Sotomayor, Kagan, Kavanaugh, Barrett, and Jackson; current and former heads of government from Canada, Colombia, Japan, Portugal, and the United Kingdom; Prince Edward, Duke of Edinburgh; Antonio Guterres, Secretary General of the United Nations; and scores of senators and members of Congress and ambassadors and other luminaries.
I may be missing a notable name or two. Perhaps at least two. That is possible.
Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood sang “Imagine" — one of the late president’s favorite songs.
Steve Ford, the son of President Gerald Ford, whom Pres. Carter defeated in the 1976 election, delivered a beautiful eulogy in which he said to the Carter family: “God did a good thing when he made your dad.”
President Biden, in what is likely the final major public speech of his tenure, summed up President Carter in three words: “Character, character, character.”
It all felt right and good. It felt fitting. It felt rare and maybe fleeting. It felt like we may not see this kind of easy agreement across the political spectrum for a long time.
But with all due respect, it didn’t come close to matching the quiet and hardy adoration that could be observed in the previous 36 hours on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol and surrounding streets.
It is cold in D.C. this week, enough during the day to aggressively bundle up and enough at night to find any excuse to be indoors and immediately reject that one friend’s insane invite to go out for a drink, much less an evening stroll.
It is, for most of us, bitterly cold.
It is so cold—at least to this Texas gal—that nothing less than the threat to life and limb to a loved one would be enough to convince me to venture into the elements. It is so cold that “outside” is wholly inadequate and only the word “elements” carries a sufficiently adequate connotation.
Last night, at 9pm, the temperature was easily below 20 degrees with the wind chill. I understand some of you up north consider this balmy. You must understand that most of us think you’re crazy.
So, it was painfully cold and uninviting, and yet, even late into the night, there were thousands and thousands of people across all walks of life waiting in line outside for several hours just to enter the Capitol Rotunda for a few moments and walk around the flag-draped casket of one Jimmy Carter and pay their respects to a model human being.
There were those who were off for the federal holiday and those who came after a long day of work—suits and dresses and military uniforms—young and old, Democrats and Republicans and independents, the working class and the wealthy, entire families, all of them standing outside in the freezing cold for several hours.
That’s not an exaggeration. The wait was several hours. At best, one could reasonably hope to get through the line and the quick orbit within the Rotunda in just over three hours. Some folks waited longer, some as many as five hours depending on when they got in line.
When was the last time you waited five hours in line for anything? When was the last time you waited three hours in line? When was the last time you did this in the bone chilling cold? When was the last time you did this without any expectation of a tangible reward?
They all knew there was no material incentive to be had here. It wasn’t like everyone who made the journey got a cookie or gold star after leaving the Rotunda. There were no certificates of appreciation conferred upon completion. No dinner coupons. No drink tickets. No free t-shirts.
Need to use the restroom? Walk a few blocks to a nearby restaurant or bar and hope someone is kind enough to hold your spot in line.
It was so cold that even the usually familiar sight of phones capturing every angle of any given political event for social media was scarce. Gotta keep those hands warm.
People heard the updates. It’s gonna be three hours. Maybe four. Maybe five.
They stayed in line.
It wasn’t as though Pres. Carter could do anything for these thousands upon thousands of people who came to say goodbye beyond what he did for them in life, deeds already completed and offered without any assumption of reciprocity.
This man who hadn’t been president in more than four decades, who had a 31 percent approval rating the month he lost reelection, who was unfairly maligned for many years over his job performance, who was unjustly a punchline to much of the country afterward for so long after leaving office — it was this man they came to honor.
They stayed in line, freezing, probably hungry, probably needing to use the restroom at some point, many of them probably wishing they were at home with a hot beverage and blanket in hand.
They stayed in line.
This one-term president, who went back to his peanut farm after leaving office, who was detested by the bulk of D.C. political circles, who didn’t cash out and join a bevy of corporate boards, who didn’t feel it necessary to say what was popular or easy, who navigated his life thereafter as a private citizen with such grace and integrity that even his most ardent detractors had to tip their hats and acknowledge his decency.
I realize there are so many reasons to feel pessimistic about the future of our country at the moment, but if such decency is so honored as we’ve seen by everyday Americans on the ground in our Nation’s Capitol over these past few days, tell me that isn’t cause for hope.
Tell me that isn’t a glimmer of what we could still be.
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