I thought a lot about our Nation and what I should do as President. And Sunday night before last, I made a speech about two problems of our country —… - Jimmy Carter

I believe that anyone can be successful in life, regardless of natural talent or the environment within which we live. This is not based on measuring success by human competitiveness for wealth, possessions, influence, and fame, but adhering to God's standards of truth, justice, humility, service, compassion, forgiveness, and love.

Mrs. Annie Duitscher from Baltimore came by. In 1882, when she was eleven years old, she saw President [William] McKinley going up the street and moved forward to shake hands him. Her father said 'We're just common folks. You can't shake hands with the president.' And now she's 106 years old and came by to shake hands with me. She's very lively and witty, and I enjoyed meeting with her.

In closing, I want to ask you to do one more thing, and that is that since you've bound yourselves together in a common purpose, understanding one another and overcoming the differences that exist among you, that now you try to understand the special needs of the nonhandicapped, to understand the needs of other handicapped people. It's not a time for hatred or lashing out or recrimination or condemnation of the nonhandicapped for the long delays in meeting your needs, because many people who are not handicapped can't understand those special needs. So, it's a time of education both ways, and for a realization that only when we work together--the handicapped who are leaders, the handicapped who will always be dependent, the potentially handicapped child who wants to have that prevented and the nonhandicapped adult leader--when we work together, we can continue to make even greater progress.