Former President Jimmy Carter has died at the age of 100.

Carter served one term in the White House from 1977 to 1981.

It was a troubled time when the nation faced high inflation and energy shortages.

And Carter struggled over his four years to portray himself as an effective leader,

but perhaps his greatest contributions came after he left office. In fact, Jimmy Carter has been

praised as the nation's greatest former president. I'm Rachel Martin, and you're listening to a special edition of Up First.

Today, we're remembering the life of former President Jimmy Carter.

And here to talk through Carter's legacy is NPR senior political correspondent Don Gagne.

Hey, Don.

Hi there.

So let's begin our conversation way back in

1976. These were the last few months of the presidential campaign season. America was celebrating,

right? It was the bicentennial, although the country was still reeling from the Vietnam War.

You had these countervailing things, right?

All the positive nature of the bicentennial, but the Vietnam War had just wound down literally

in the previous year. On top of all of that, the country was in the midst of an energy crisis.

There was lots of cynicism among the

American people. To take you back to those days, President Gerald Ford was an incumbent

running for a full term in office. Recall that he'd inherited the presidency two years earlier

in 1974 when a disgraced Richard Nixon resigned from office

as the Watergate scandal just closed in around him. Right. And then amid all of that,

there's this Southerner running on the Democratic ticket, which in it of itself was a big deal.

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