Both in in his presidency and in life, Jimmy Carter, was a model of true public service.
“President Carter was a man of character, courage, and compassion, whose lifetime of service defined him as one of the most influential statesmen in our history,” Biden said in a White House statement. “He embodied the very best of America: A humble servant of God and the people. A heroic champion of global peace and human rights, and an honorable leader whose moral clarity and hopeful vision lifted our Nation and changed our world.”
The son of a farmer and a nurse, Carter served in the Navy Reserves during the Second World War, returning home to manage his family’s peanut farm in Georgia following his father’s death. A humanitarian, man of faith, public servant, and lifelong Democrat, he served as a Georgia state senator, the state’s 76th governor, and ultimately president of the United States from 1977 to 1981.
In 2002, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his work to find peaceful solutions to international conflicts, to advance democracy and human rights, and to promote economic and social development. Continue here....
-- Jennifer Mattson
Setting partisanship aside as he could, Jimmy Carter served people and their interests above his own. Though not perfect (but, by many estimations, better than most), he strove to better his fellow-man by famously committing to never lying to the American people and living his life as one of them (a real contrast, it seems to me, to many so-called public servants):
Former President Jimmy Carter lies in state at U.S. Capitol
How former President Jimmy Carter's hometown of Plains shaped his life
This may say it best: