The casket of former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, draped in an American flag, is at the Carter Center in Atlanta, where it will remain for public viewing until Tuesday in preparation for a state funeral later in the week. Carter, who passed away on December 29 at the age of 100, will be honored with a public farewell that traces his remarkable life journey from humble beginnings in the Depression-era South to his rise to the highest office in the land and his later decades dedicated to global humanitarian work.
The farewell began yesterday, with the procession following Carter’s journey from the Georgia Capitol, where he served as both a state senator and a progressive governor, to the Carter Presidential Center in Atlanta. His children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren accompanied him, beginning in Plains, his tiny hometown of just 700 people, where Carter was born on October 1, 1924. Along the way, the hearse made a stop at the farm where Carter worked alongside Black sharecroppers under his father’s employ before continuing toward Atlanta.
Jason Carter, the former president’s grandson and current chair of the Carter Center’s governing board, reflected on his grandfather’s life, noting, “It’s amazing what you can cram into a hundred years.”
The pallbearers included Secret Service agents who had protected the Carter family for nearly 50 years, as well as a military honor guard with Navy personnel, honoring Carter as the only U.S. Naval Academy graduate to ever serve in the Oval Office. The ceremony featured the playing of “Hail to the Chief” and “Be Thou My Vision,” a hymn close to the heart of the devout Baptist president.
Carter’s body will lie in repose at the Carter Presidential Center until 6 a.m. on Tuesday, allowing the public to pay their respects around the clock. Afterward, his casket will be transferred to the Capitol for a period of repose before the state funeral on Thursday at the Washington National Cathedral. Following the ceremony, Carter will be returned to Plains, where he will be buried next to his wife, Rosalynn, in the town where they built their home prior to Carter’s first political campaign in 1962.
{Matzav.com}