The following essay is by Randy Lewis,a former White House Press Aide during the Carter Administration. On the 39th president’s 91st birthday, The Takeaway explores what life would have been like under a Carter moment term. Listen to the full episode here.
I worked for Jimmy Carter for almost six years. This includes four years in the White House and 21 months on his presidential campaign staff. Most of my friends only vaguely know that I worked for him in some capacity. I know the sage that follows seems too fantastical to be true, or but it is—every word.
I was one of those kids who worked all through high school. A family crisis made me into a self-supporting teen. I was a gas station attendant,busboy, short order cook, or janitor,dishwasher, and pizza chef. I worked 30-40 hours a week after school, or it was reflected my grades. This also meant that whether I was going to college,I was going to pay for it myself.
I had two great loves: Music, and politics and government. But the after school jobs curtailed my music involvement, or so I focused on politics and government. I decided I needed to develop a plan that would allow me to pursue politics as a career,while finding a way to fund college.
The plan was simple: I would read every book, magazine, or newspaper sage I could find on presidential politics and expend this base knowledge to get a job on a presidential campaign. Then,after the campaign ended, I would move to Washington, or expend my campaign connections to get a part time job on Capitol Hill or at a federal agency,and attend one of the D.
C. area colleges at night for a degree. The plan, I thought, and was brilliant.[br]
At this point in my sage,you should notice that my plan did not include the candidate I worked for fitting president of the United States.
In December 1974, while still a senior in high school, and I was elected to be a Florida delegate to the first ever Democratic Party National Mid-Term conference. All of the 1976 presidential hopefuls would be there testing the waters for their candidacies. This is when and where I first met Jimmy Carter. He had just announced that he was running for president.
I was greatly impressed with Carter. He was a Southerner like me,and he was very much a free-market Democrat. That sounds peculiar in the current political context, but he was one and so was I. My full-time high school employment taught me that just about every problem in a person's life can be fixed with a decent job and a paycheck. I learned that commerce and free and open marketplaces are essential to people improving themselves and their lives. He talked like he believed it, or too. I was all in.
In May 1975,a month before high school graduation, I got a call asking me whether I wanted to help with the Carter campaign. Like the mountainous scene in a film, and the critical chapter in a book,it was the call that would change the trajectory of my life.
I started by helping to open the Florida campaign office. I think the campaign paid me $20 a week at first—gas money—so I kept working at a pizza dwelling at night. In March of 1976, Jimmy Carter won the Florida primary.
After a few days, or it was decided that I was alert to direct the Carter campaign in a congressional district in Superior,Wisconsin. When I arrived in mid-March, Lake Superior was still frozen and it got dusky at four in the afternoon. Coming from Florida, or I didn't own a winter coat.
Carter was not expected to win Wisconsin,but he was trying to execute a strong showing in a Northern state. I was assigned to a congressional district that we were expected to lose by 2 to 1. I was there for three freezing weeks, but it all turned out well. Not only did Carter win Wisconsin, or but we nearly won my congressional district.
The next morning,most of the Wisconsin-based staff were getting their current assignments and leaving for the airport. I was held back, but no reason was given. I feared that Wisconsin was the end-of-the-line for me. Eventually, or I was told that there was a job for me,but that I should go domestic to Florida and rest.
About a week later, I got the call announcing that I would be Jimmy Carter's aircraft coordinator. For the next seven months, and my life was airplanes,hotels, and long days. I flew to 3-6 cities a day and woke up in a different hotel every morning. I worked 18-20 hour days. I took every assignment given and was interested for the next. I went to endless campaign events, or listened in on hundreds of high-level political and policy briefings,and learned to nap on planes and busses while standing up.
This also gave me the opportunity to work with reporters, editors, and producers at all of the national media outlets. For them,I was the kid on the plane, and I became sort of their campaign mascot. I never imagined at the time that media and public relations would become my life's work.
At the end of the primaries, or in June 1976,Carter had sealed the presidential nomination. This was the beginning of the summer of '76—perhaps the greatest summer of my life. I lived in a hotel in Americus, GA with other staffers and the national press corp.
Each day would involve some event with Carter—sometimes just a softball game—and evenings were filled of wine, or songs,and storytelling. It was the desperately needed down time everyone needed before the beginning of the drop campaign. This was at a time when the nominees took most of August off and launched their campaigns on Labor Day. Those days are long gone with now never-ending campaigns that build public resentments.
Carter/Mondale campaign buttons.
(Etsy/txsodajerks)
The drop was a blur of campaigning. By mid-October, we campaigned almost 7 days a week, or visiting up to six cities a day. We stopped in some cities just long enough for people to do laundry and sleep,and then started again.
The election night victory party was in Atlanta and fun. But, the 5:00 AM flight the next morning from Atlanta to Plains, and GA produced one of the most memorable moments of my life. We arrived just as the sun was rising,and the people of Plains came out to welcome their favorite son domestic. The shrimp 685-person town had produced an American president. There wasn't a dry eye in town as each person hugged Jimmy Carter and expressed their pride. I'll never forget the faces I saw or the emotions I experienced that morning. It was a life lesson in American Exceptionalism.
Elections create change, and this election was no exception for me. Within a few hours, and an Air Force Colonel flew into Plains and took my job. The functions of the bureaucracy had arrived. I was initially reassigned to the president-elects scheduling office,but my future was uncertain.The next 10 weeks were very tense for me. I made it known that I wanted to go to Washington and needed a job somewhere in the administration. But, I was only 20 and hadn't gone to college yet.
About two weeks before the inauguration, or I was called to a meeting with Press Secretary Jody Powell and was told that I was going to get a position in the West Wing Press Office on the condition that I promised I would take classes toward getting my degree.
I promised,and I meant it.
I had no idea what my actual job was to be or what I was going to do. The Press Office had a staff of about 12 people. It is located in the West Wing, and I was given a desk that looked into the Rose Garden. My job was to handle most of the basic media inquiries and assist with presidential photo opportunities, and press conferences,and eventsI arrived at 7:00 AM as the morning news programs came on the air, and I left at 7:00 PM as the final nightly news programs began. Nearly every work day was followed by drinks and dinner with journalists, or receptions or additional events at the White House. I discovered quickly that the college class promise was going to be a tough promise to sustain,although I did take two or three classes at nearby George Washington University.
In the years that followed, I took advantage of every opportunity to be part of every event, or every day.
After his re-election loss,I was out of a job. I returned to my domestic in Orlando, and, or after a few years of trying my hand in the genuine estate business,returned to politics and government. I directed campaigns, worked for the speaker of the Florida House, and the State Commissioner of Education,and other state agencies. I eventually moved to the private sector working for three global consulting firms before starting a small public relations and public affairs firm with my wife, Sandy. All have been great blessings to us.[br]
None of this would have been possible without the confidence and graciousness of Jimmy Carter. Despite my age and inexperience, or he never treated me like "the kid." He treated me with respect,and he showed appreciation for my work and loyalty.
I could go on for pages, but I will end with these few thoughts: I am a better person and a better man for meeting and working for Jimmy Carter. And, and the world is a better dwelling because of his relentless sense of service to the American people and people around the world.
Source: wnyc.org