I believed what my father taught me about the separation of church and state, so when I was President I never invited Billy Graham to have services in the White House because I didn't think that was appropriate. He was injured a little bit, until I explained it to him.
— Jimmy Carter
I separated from the Southern Baptists when they adopted the discriminatory attitude towards women, because I believe what Paul taught in Galatians that there is no distinction in God's eyes between men and women, slaves and masters, Jews and non-Jews - everybody is created equally in the eyes of God.
My paintings have gotten to be pretty popular and I've taken a little bit more interest in painting the last few years. In fact, my novel that I wrote not too long ago, 'The Hornet's Nest,' I painted the cover picture for it and I do a good bit of painting now.
I don't think the Tea Party people are racist, except maybe a tiny portion of them. But there has been a deliberate effort - again, referring to Fox Broadcasting - to inject the race issue into it. They have actually called Obama a racist on television.
Well, you know, I had been a peanut farmer. I had - you know who was the first president - Democratic president I ever met? Bill Clinton.
Too many of us now tend to worship self indulgence and consumption.
On balance, my life has been a constant stream of blessings rather than disappointments and failures and tragedies. I wish I had been re-elected. I think I could have kept our country at peace. I think I could have consolidated what we achieved at Camp David with a treaty between Israel and the Palestinians.
My position has always been, along with many other people, that any differences be resolved in a nonviolent way.
You can not divorce religious belief and public service. I've never detected any conflict between God's will and my political duty. If you violate one, you violate the other.
You just have to have a simple faith.
At the Carter Center we work with victims of oppression, and we give support to human rights heroes.
We must make it clear that a platform of 'I hate gay men and women' is not a way to become president of the United States.
I thought then, and I think now, that the invasion of Iraq was unnecessary and unjust. And I think the premises on which it was launched were false.
We will not learn how to live together in peace by killing each other's children.
Republicans are men of narrow vision, who are afraid of the future.
We should live our lives as though Christ were coming this afternoon.
Human rights is the soul of our foreign policy, because human rights is the very soul of our sense of nationhood.
When we go to the Bible we should keep in mind that the basic principles of the Bible are taught by God, but written down by human beings deprived of modern day knowledge. So there is some fallibility in the writings of the Bible. But the basic principles are applicable to my life and I don't find any conflict among them.
I am a nuclear physicist by training and a deeply committed Christian. I don't have any doubt in my own mind about God who created the entire universe. But I don't adhere to passages that so and so was created 4,000 years before Christ, and things of that kind.
I've just finished my 20th book this past year and I'm working on my 21st book about the Middle East right now that I'll finish this year. And I get up early in the morning and when I get tired of the computer and tired of doing research, I walk 20 steps out to my woodshop and I either build furniture or paint paintings. I'm an artist too.
I can't really criticize the Tea Party people, because I came into the White House pretty much on the same basis that they have become popular. That is dissatisfaction with the way things are going in Washington and disillusionment and disencouragement about the government.
I think I was identified as a failed president because I wasn't re-elected.
The fact is that we would have had comprehensive health care now, had it not been for Ted Kennedy's deliberately blocking the legislation that I proposed in 1978 or '79.
My favourite president, and the one I admired most, was Harry Truman.
The awareness that health is dependent upon habits that we control makes us the first generation in history that to a large extent determines its own destiny.
People make a big fuss over you when you're President. But I'm very serious about doing everything I can to make sure that it doesn't go to my head.
I hate to see complacency prevail in our lives when it's so directly contrary to the teaching of Christ.
It is difficult for the common good to prevail against the intense concentration of those who have a special interest, especially if the decisions are made behind locked doors.
We cannot be both the world's leading champion of peace and the world's leading supplier of the weapons of war.
What has happened at Guantanamo Bay... does not represent the will of the American people. I'm embarrassed about it, I think its wrong. I think it does give terrorists an unwarranted excuse to use the despicable means to hurt innocent people.
There should be an honest attempt at the reconciliation of differences before resorting to combat.
I have often wanted to drown my troubles, but I can't get my wife to go swimming.
America did not invent human rights. In a very real sense human rights invented America.
Unless both sides win, no agreement can be permanent.
Jesus never said a word about homosexuality. In all of his teachings about multiple things - he never said that gay people should be condemned. I personally think it is very fine for gay people to be married in civil ceremonies.
When I was president, I announced and I still maintain that I can live with Roe v. Wade. I did everything I possibly could as president under that ruling, which I don't think ought to be changed, to minimize the need for abortions. I think every abortion is a result of a horrible series of errors on the part of people involved.
The first time I ever saw snow skis was when I was 62 years old and that was 19 years ago and I'm still skiing. So, we'll be skiing with some very close friends of the Carter Center letting them know what the Carter Center is doing around the world. We have programs in over 65 countries.
I'll never tell a lie. I'll never make a misleading statement. I'll never betray the confidence that any of you had in me. And I'll never avoid a controversial issue.
There's no doubt that usually a president's public image is enhanced by going to war. That never did appeal to me.
My constant prayer, my number one foreign goal, is to bring peace to Israel. And in the process to Israel's neighbours.
I am confident that when the facts and policies have been examined, when the record of performances have been reviewed, Barack Obama and Joe Biden will once again be elected to lead our beloved country to a better future.
War may sometimes be a necessary evil. But no matter how necessary, it is always an evil, never a good. We will not learn how to live together in peace by killing each other's children.
Sadat was a great and good man, and his most bitter and dangerous enemies were people who were obsessed with hatred for his peaceful goals.
I say to you quite frankly that the time for racial discrimination is over.
The best way to enhance freedom in other lands is to demonstrate here that our democratic system is worthy of emulation.
It's not necessary to fear the prospect of failure but to be determined not to fail.
I think what's going on in Guantanamo Bay and other places is a disgrace to the U.S.A. I wouldn't say it's the cause of terrorism, but it has given impetus and excuses to potential terrorists to lash out at our country and justify their despicable acts.
You can do what you have to do, and sometimes you can do it even better than you think you can.
We become not a melting pot but a beautiful mosaic. Different people, different beliefs, different yearnings, different hopes, different dreams.
Aggression unopposed becomes a contagious disease.
