first ladies pick up a copy of the book "first ladies influence and image" featuring profiles of the nation's first ladies with interviews of top historians, available in paperback, hard cover or as an ebook. >> tonight, on american history tv, beginning at 8:00 p.m. eastern, a look at the lives of nancy reagan and barbara bush, c-span in cooperation with the white house historical association, produced a series on the first ladies coming their private lives and the public roles they played. first ladies, influence and image features individual biographies of the women who served in the role of first lady in 44 administrations. watch american history tv tonight and over the weekend on c-span 3. next, in an interview with c-span former first lady rosalynn carter talked about the

lessons she learned as first lady as well as her time in the white house attending meetings, working on mental health issues, and working alongside her husband, former president jimmy carter. >> rosalynn carter, do you remember when you and president carter started having conversations about him running for president? >> what was that like? what was that conversation? >> it was very interesting. we had a friend that wrote and told jimmy that he thought he ought to run for president. well, we couldn't even say the word, that my husband is running for, well, i didn't tell anybody because we kept it very quiet. but then once he decided that he would do it, that was when i couldn't -- he could hardly say i'm going to be president. it was just something that was -- we never ever dreamed

would happen. i was excited about it. i had xacampaigned the whole la year before the governor's race for him and it was hard. amy was a baby. and i didn't like to leave her all the time. i enjoyed it. i learned so much about our state. we have 159 counties. i knew the capital of every county. issues, that's how i got involved in mental health issues, running the campaign for jimmy. our big mental health facility hospital, there had been a big expose and the mental health systems act had been passed, this was in '63, and this was 1966 when jimmy first ran for governor and got beat that time.

we got in late because our leading democratic candidate had a heart attack. they were moving people out of the hospital because there were like 12,000 people where they had room for 3,000. it was awful. it was happening all over the country. they were moving them out before they had any facilities for them and no services in the communities. everybody started talking to me about what will your husband do if he's elected governor of georgia. i just learned so much about what was going on. after we lost that election, i worked four years to learn a little bit about mental health and then the first month in office he appointed the governors commission to improve services for the mental and emotionally handicap. within he told me about that i thought this is giving me a chance to go across the whole country. it was so much fun to me. i loved to go into people's homes when we first started campaigning for president.

i went to iowa a lot, florida and iowa, in the beginning. those are two primaries. i had been working in the -- our farm supply business at home. when we got home from the navy, jimmy had me. i didn't work the first year. i started helping him. he only had seasonal labor. i started working for him and he said why don't you come and keep the office while i go out and visit the farmers. i would go into iowa to a tea. there might be six people in somebody's house. i knew the price of fertilizer and how much they could get for their corn. we had had a corn mill. i loved it. it was hard, but i was so excited. i had been able to learn all about georgia and i was able to learn about the country. i thought i knew he would be a good president. >> mrs. carter, when did you

know during that campaign that your husband would be elected president? >> i never doubted it. we never doubted it. i don't think anybody in our whole campaign thought we would lose. i mean, maybe you have to have that set of mind to win. we campaigned all the time just like we were going to win. >> what was the peanut brigade? >> the peanut brigade was a lot of our friends. it started out from georgia, but just being people from georgia, but it grew and grew and grew, who would campaign all over the country for us. they paid their own way. we had no money. everybody who worked in our campaign had to find a house to stay at, somebody that was a supporter that would have them -- let them spend the night with them. they had to pay for a hotel that

couldn't happen now. it was really close, not with money, not with the money that you have to have even to win the nomination. >> rosalynn carter, january 20th, 1977. what do you remember about that day? >> it was inauguration day. we walked down pennsylvania avenue in the cold, cold weather. it was exciting. >> whose idea was it to walk? >> it was jimmy's idea. he didn't tell me until the night before. >> why not? >> he didn't tell anybody else except the secret service agents. because we didn't -- well the secret service -- the first

thing i did was hire a housekeeper. then we taught the prisoners to cook and to serve and i developed a fairly competent staff. we had to hurry because the music club of atlanta had invited me to entertain van cliburn. on january 30th we actually moved in the governor's mansion on january 12th. jimmy had an aunt in this area.

i called her, she was a wonderful person, and she came and helped me and we did a beautiful dinner. we put tuxedos on the prisoners, which was new and different for them. anyway, we had a wonderful meeting. and then i got her to organize those who could take people through the governor's mansion because when i went the first time the state patrolmen were in the hallway guiding the tours and i thought that didn't seem very homey so i got the aunt with a list of people that came and helped, came every day. the mansion was open. anyway, i had to learn everything. i had to developed a staff. we learned by trial and error. i had my sister that helped me and we, for instance, when we

entertained we -- one of the first entertainers we had was a man who had -- we read his biography and his talent and what he did and it sounded perfect. we had a lot of race car drivers. atlanta has a speedway and they were coming to eat dinner with us. we got him. he stood up, when he stood up to sing, he sang opera. if you can believe. after that we learned we had to audition everybody. when i got to the white house, everything was already done. had a social secretary. i didn't have to worry about, you know, about what we were going to serve or any of those things. she would make our plans for me and bring them to me and i would decide what i wanted to do. it was quite wonderful. and amy was 3 years old when we moved to the governor's mansion. she had never known anything else. you couldn't -- the governor's mansion the only thing i would change is that you couldn't get

from our upstairs where we lived to the kitchen without going through the tourists. amy learned at 3 years of able -- age to walk through the tourists like this. there's the baby. she got where she would walk right straight through without seeing them. i remember when we got to the white house and she went to school the first day, here was amy going in like this, which she had been doing all her life, going through. everybody felt so sorry for her. but that was just part of her life. actually, after that happened on the first day, the press got together and decided not to bother amy anymore. and that was really wonderful too in the white house. we didn't have to worry about that very much. >> where did you first meet jimmy carter? >> well, plains georgia has a population of 634.

i think i knew everybody in town. there were no girls my age in town. and, of course, i knew who he was. can i drink some water? i knew him, but he was three years older than i am. but his little sister who was three years younger than i am, would stay in town for -- if we had a basketball game or some event at the school, she would stay with her grandmother who lived in town. we became really close friends. she was my best friend growing up. >> this is ruth? >> thises is ruth. and he graduated high school at 16. we only went 11 grades back then. i was 13. there was no way i ever thought i would go with jimmy carter. i didn't go with him until he

came home the last -- before he was a first classman he came home from the naval academy and i went out with him the night before he was going to leave. ruth and i plotted to get me out there with him because i wanted to -- i had fallen in love with his photograph on the wall in her room at home. she would call me and say he's here and he had a month's leave and i would go out there and he would be gone. one day we had a house, fairly close to the house, and everybody in town used it for events, church events and school events and things like that, and called and said that somebody had used the pond house the night before and they were going out there and cleaning up. she and jimmy. and wanted me to come spend the day with them. that night i was at the church meeting standing at the door, it

was a youth meeting one night during the week, and ruth was with her boyfriend and jimmy drove up and he got out of the car and asked me to go to the movie with him. i went to the movie with him and then went to the station to see him off the next night and then we started writing letters to each other and at christmastime he asked me to marry him and i turned him down. i was young. i had my promised my father on his death bed that i would go to college. i had not finished college. well, i went to annapolis the weekend of the ring dance. i don't remember what they call that weekend. he asked again and i accepted. i was still young. >> it was july 7th, 1946? >> that's right. >> you said your father died

when you were quite young? >> 13. i was the oldest of four children. had two brothers and then my little sister who was 4 years old. my father developed leukemia. i didn't know he was sick. i had been wanting to go to a church camp in the summer and they told me we didn't have enough money for it. and then one day i came home and -- from school and my dad asked me if i would like -- still like to go to the camp. i said great. i didn't know he was going to the hospital to see what was wrong. he died just maybe -- that was in maybe may and he died in november. >> how did that affect your role as the oldest child? >> well, everything changed for us. i was the oldest one. my mother had never written a

check. she went -- she had a -- she went to college for two years and had a teacher certificate but she had never taught. back then in plains, you ordered your groceries at the mercantile company and ordered your clothes and they would send the groceries to the house. my daddy paid for it all. when he was on his death bed he called us all in and told my mother that she wanted him to sell the farm if she had to because he wanted us to all go to school. i think we -- i don't know. i'm sure sold the farm but the next year her mother died. she was an only child. and mama died not even -- we had no idea she was sick and my grandfather lived on a farm outside of town. went out to milk the cows and when he came back in she was

leaning over tying her shoe, dead in the chair. someone called my mother 11 months after my daddy died. we had been depending on them so much. they said your mother died this morning. i mean, i can't imagine anybody doing that to her. i was getting ready to go to school and i heard her screaming in the hall where the telephone was. it was tough. her mother worked in the grocery store and then she worked in thele school lunch room and then when i was still in high school she got a job in the post office and worked there the rest until she had to retire. she had to retire at age 70. it was the law. and i was campaigning, this is 1975, christmas, because her birthday is christmas eve and on her birthday she had to retire. so i was campaigning. i went campaigning after christmas. i came back home. my brother called me as soon as

i got home and said go to see mother she called all week long. i went to see her i said mother, she had to get up and work every morning at 7:00 and then she had to come back late in the afternoon, but my grandfather came to live with us when my grandmother died. my mother had flexible hours because the postmaster didn't want to get up early and didn't want to stay late. anyway, i said, mother, don't you enjoy just being able to sleep in? she said it's not that. it's just that nobody thinks i can do good work anymore. that made an impression on me. then when jimmy was president, i did work with the teaching and i became interested working with mental illness too because there were no doctors to care for people with mental illness and no geriatric doctors. we passed an age discrimination

law and with people in the federal government could work as long as they wanted to and people outside could work until they were 75. i worked a lot on it. >> rosalynn carter, you have always been a political partner to your husband. is that a fair statement? >> i've been a partner. i would call it a partner. he was in the navy for seven years, after we got married we had three boys and the first three years after the first year i had one baby, and he was gone for two years, he was on a battleship. back then you had to serve two years before you could go to the air force submarine. he was gone from monday to thursday every week and duty one night i had to take care of everything. then when he got home and i began working in the farm supply business, i knew more in books very soon than he did and i think that's when we really developed a good partnership i could say.

don't buy corn anymore. we had been losing money on it. it developed into a wonderful partnership. so when he was -- when -- i didn't campaign when he ran for the senate. i kept the business while he campaigned. but then when he -- i campaigned when he ran for governor, was the first time i had campaigned. but then when he got in the governor's race, i learned all the issues and campaigned and enjoyed it and did the same thing when he was running for president. i think it was the first time -- i know lady bird had come through plains on a train, but i think that it was the first time people -- that women had campaigned. i know -- i got in the car with a friend when jimmy started to run for president and we just -- i wanted to know if i could campaign in other states like i

did in georgia. i went to florida. we went to florida and stayed 10 or 12 days. we would stop along the way in the towns and pass out brochures and look up the radio stations. we started working, we

>> how did you develop the issues you wanted to talk about or became an expert in? >> well, i worked in mental health. and a lot of that came from

seeing what happened to my mother because that was in the campaign. but also in traveling in campaigns they took me where there were a lot of democrats. and so i went to a lot of nursing homes and facilities for older people and saw great needs in that area, so that influenced my work. i worked on immunization, but he was governor at the same time jimmy was.

i was ready to work on immunization. immunization was required by school age in 15 states. there was a bit of argument about whether 15 or 17, and the first year we got it in all 50 states. that was exciting. and we had this big meeting in washington to celebrate had people from all over the country. the next day there was not one word in the paper about it. i was so upset. i got upset because they covered

my mental health work the first few meetings i had and then they never showed up anymore, and one of the things i wanted to do was bring attention to the issue and how terrible it was and the few services. but just getting it out in the public, that's what i did in georgia. but they just didn't come. one day i was walking in the white house and met this woman who was one of the press people. and i said no one ever covers my meetings. she said ms. porter mental health is just not a sexy issue, and that i didn't like. but we toured the country,

developed legislation and passed the mental health systems act of 1980. it passed through congress one month before. i have a great mental health program here. and one of the people who worked with me in the white house and he did a comparison of what we did in 1980. it just passed 30 and it was announced here, the final

regulations. but i'm so thrilled now. >> and you and betty ford worked on this. >> that's right. after we left the white house betty and i would go to washington. she would get the republicans and i would get democrats, and we made some progress. >> your husbands were known as becoming best friends or very good friends. did you and betty ford have the same relationship. >> yes, we developed a really good relationship. that's when jimmy and gerald ford began -- and i started

working with betty and we developed a really wonderful relationship. >> mrs. carter, there are several first ladies still living. is there a sorority of first ladies in a sense? >> well, i had a good relationship with betty ford and with lady bird as long as she was alive but that's about it. there's never been a real -- we see each other at events and at library dedications but there's never been that closeness that i had with betty ford and lady bird. >> when you were first lady you had a weekly luncheon with your

husband and would attend cabinet meetings. what was the purpose of that? >> well, i had a luncheon with jimmy. there were always things i wanted to ask him and some was about the family and finances and things going on back home. but we also talked about issues. i would say it was more family and personal things going on, but it gave us time to do that. jimmy stayed at the oval office a good bit in the daytime. didn't go back much at tile. but in august he started calling me about 4:30 in the afternoon. my office was in the east wing.

but he started calling me and said let's go jog or do something. and also i wanted to be home when amy got home from school. but we would jog and exercise, swim and sit on the truman balcony and talk about what he had done during the day and what i had done during the day. and we just had a good relationship. but what i learned in the white house was that there is no way to know what happened because of the press. i mean, you can't learn from newspapers. we didn't have computers. there were big mainframes in the white house but no one ever used them. this was a long time ago.

and he said every day he stepped off the elevator why did you -- i was touring the country, having press conferences and i needed to know. in february one year after he stepped off the elevator he said why don't you come to cabinet meetings and then you'll know why we do things. what a lot of people don't know is -- he was in veterans affairs and i sat by him next to the door and i went every time i could that the cabinet met because i thought it was necessary for me to go what was going on and the decisions made and so forth so that i could explain to people in the country as i toured around.

>> did you receive criticism for attending those meetings and for being the president's emissary? >> i don't think i ever received criticisms from the west wing. they knew how close we were and how interested i was. but there was all kinds of criticism. that's the hardest because you know everybody that criticizes you. when i got to the white house i knew it was coming. i didn't like it, but you have accept that. i think you almost have to in public life. you have to know that what your

husband does is what he thinks is the best possible thing for our country. heset me down one day. he said if you don't think i'm doing the best job i can do then worry about it. and then you have to accept that, but also my feeling was if they reported things in a way we didn't like it's because they didn't know it. they were ignorant about what was going on, and most of the time that's true. if they have good reason and they know why you're doing it and so forth. and with today's television there's no way not to know what's happening because they talk about it. we had people who really knew what was in the law which was so good for us.

we found out the day before he was going to announce the final regulations, had been talking to her about it. she's a good friend. this is 33 years after. it was exciting. it was emotional. >> was it possible to have a private life in the white house, and did the white house feel like home?

>> it felt like home to us immediately because all our boys had been campaigning and we were together. i had two of my sons and amy there. and we had meals together. we had to make a rule if you were not going to be there for a meal you had to check off a little thing so we'd know who would be there. most of the time i was there when she came home from school. and then as i said earlier jimmy and i would jog. we had a fairly good family

life. i think it was so precious to us because being gone two years. >> does the white house affect a marriage? >> i think it could. it didn't affect ours. because we'd just been partners working together for so long. but i could see if the first lady was not particularly interested in the different issues i think it would be difficult. but jimmy could talk to me, and i think that happens more and more with first ladies because some of the early first ladies were very active but then there were others who were not. >> when you look back at previous first ladies before you served who did you admire, who did you emulate, who did you

learn from? >> well, the closest person i had -- the only first lady that i had knowledge of was lady bird. she came to georgia to help me with the highway beautification program, and i just knew her. the main thing she taught me is enjoy because it's not going to last long. you won't be there forever so just enjoy it. >> burnpone person that had a b impact on my life was margaret and we developed this really wonderful relationship and she would give me advice.

>> your husband in 2010 published his white house diaries. did you keep a diary or a journal during the white house years? >> i kept them at different times. i didn't do very much in the beginning but then i started having my secretary put spaces between events, and i had a desk in my bedroom. and i left it there and i would go to events what was happening and who was going to be there and i'd start writing notes about what happened at that event, and i did that pretty regularly for a while. i have a really good diary about camp david. i kept those notes all the time from the first day. >> are those public? >> no. >> if and when will they be

public? >> i don't know how long -- i just went through them and edited them. i didn't edit anything, i struck out a few. >> why? >> i might not want you to know what i told some of them. it was just my personal thoughts along with what was happening. i didn't sit in any of the meetings but i was there the whole time. and as soon as they would come out of a meeting i was there to see what it was, what's going on. it was incredible. it was from the heights of excitement it was going to happen to the depths of despair it was not. we didn't know we were going to be there 13 day and so the last few days i had to go into town to do some events for jimmy and some for me, and some i had

planned. and we got back one day and this was toward the end and jimmy and hamilton and jody powell and they said it's over. and they thought it was, and it was a bad evening. when i left on sunday the day they came back jimmy said it's either today or not. we're going to just have to end it. we had pbs did our events for a while. i had come in and introduce the artist and got a call about

halfway through it -- no, about halfway through the concert and jimmy said they thought they had it but don't tell anybody. but they didn't know for sure. anyway, when they came in that night the helicopter landed it was dark, dusk or dark. and they came in and we were standing by the door of the blue room. and the prime minister -- >> do you think we're going to see a roselen carter camp david diary accord some time? >> we might. i guess it's all right for me to tell this.

>> will you be there for it? >> i'll be there for it. >> another issue during your husband's presidency i wanted to ask you about, mrs. carter, the iranian hostage crisis. what were your feelings throughout that whole crisis, and how did that affect you as a person? >> it was awful. just waiting for the press conference and iran to decide what happened that day. and the other way we knew what was going on is when they would come out and announce it. and we met with the families all along and thinking about the people who got remembered for

that and what it was doing to jimmy's presidency, and it was awful. it was awful. and i would go out and campaign, and i had found out earlier when a president goes out he's so surrounded. he doesn't get close enough to people to have conversations normally like you would otherwise about what are their hopes and dreams and what they thought about what i was doing or what jimmy was doing or anything that could help them. i had learned that early during his presidency. but i would go out and everybody would say tell the president to do something, and tell him he's got to do something. i would come home and i would say why don't you do something. and he said what do you want me to do? do you want me to mind the

harbors and then have them bring out one prisoner every day and hang in public? well, maybe that's not the best thing to do. but, you know, i wanted it over and of course he did, too. everybody did. people in the country every night a new tv program started and nobody got over at all, i mean could get over it because it was every day, every night. it was awful. and kept up with what i was doing. i never stopped doing the things i was doing. >> by the time four years were over how tired were you? >> you know, you lose the election in november and that's depressing. it was depressing and then january, november, december, january, i just wanted to go home. and then when i got home i don't

know that i was tired. i guess i was tired, but i just remember coming home, we lived right on the edge of the woods. and we'd been gone ten years since he was governor for the campaign. the woods had come up around our house and the vines and things. and we both had agreed to write books. and it was overwhelming. i actually didn't have time to really worry about it and to really mourn it. i think i mourned it before i left the white house. i think i realized how important it is for a president to have a second term. jimmy carter would not have changed anyway. he would not have changed

anything. >> in your book first lady from plains written in 1984 you closed by saying i would be out on the campaign trail again today if jimmy carter would run again. >> i kept just knowing he was going to run. i would have been there. >> you have a grandson who's just announced for governor of georgia. >> i know. i'm thrilled. >> are you going to be out on the campaign trail? >> i'll do whatever he asks me to do. he's a great young man. went to the peace corps for a few years, came home and went to law school, has a law firm now and has two terms as a state senator. >> roselyn carter, you've had 33 years, the longest in history now, and you president carter have been very active. what do you say to your legacy first of all as first lady or

what would you like it to be? >> i hope my legacy continues more than just first lady and i hope that i have contributed something into mental health issues and helped improve a little bit the life of people living with mental illness. but i also hope -- i have had great opportunities for so long now. and to go through africa and we have programs and we go to africa two, three times a year. and to go through those and thing tuesday come to fruition all these years. to go to a village where there's

no longer guinea worms it is a celebration. we don't give money to the government. we send people in to teach -- to help people in that country how to do something. and we work with the people in the villages. and the health department does, too, and we work with them. and they do the work and to go to a village and plain to them -- but if they see or hear about if from another country they're happy you're there. but just to see -- to go back when it's gone from a village or almost gone and the hope it gives to them, most of the time it's the first thing they have ever seen that's successful, and it's just so wonderful.

just to see the hope on their faces that something good is happening. i didn't mean to get emotional. >> roselyn carter, we're here in atlanta for this interview. >> we schedule one week ahead of time to be here. most of the time we have to come back more than that. this week is my weekend and we have to come back more than that. but we schedule that so we can plan our travel around it. this year i'll be interested to see how much we've been gone. it's maybe not half, but most of the time -- i guess most of the time -- it's not half the time most of the time but it's

getting pretty close. i mean like to go to africa. we put global 2000 on our work in africa because we found out if the heads of state get credit for what they do -- if somebody gets rid of guinea room for a village what they've produced has grown three times as much as they used to they get so excited, the head of state does. my agriculture program -- one time we were in the village there was a farmer who had been named the farmer of the year.

and we went to this village. and there was a little girl and she held up this sign and said go away jimmy carter, jimmy is coming. so when we get to that village the word is already around. it gives hope to people who have never had any hope of their life ever being better. >> and finally, roselyn carter, what's your advice to future first ladies or first husbands?

>> well, in the first place i would say enjoy it. but i think i have learned that you can do anything you want to. people asked me if a first lady should get paid, but you can do anything you want to do. and it's such a great opportunity, so i would advise any first lady to do what she wanted to do. and another thing you learn is you're going to be criticized no matter what you do. and i got a lot of criticism, but you learn to live with it as

you said earlier and never let you influence you. but just enjoy it. what women do now changed from what women did when i grew up. i could be a secretary, a schoolteacher, a librarian, a few things. but now most women will -- just do what you want to do and don't worry about the criticism. >> thank you. tonight on american history tv beginning at 8:00 p.m. eastern a look at the lives of nancy reagan and barbara bush.

c-span in cooperation with the white house historical association produced a series on the first ladies examining their private lives and the public roles they play. first ladies, influence and image, features individual biographies of the women who served in the role of first lady over 44 administrations. watch american history tv tonight and over the weekend on c-span 3. today debate on spending levels for the transportation and housing development and urban department. watch the house appropriations subcommittee debate live at 11:00 a.m. eastern on c-span 3, online at c-span.org or listen live with the free c-span radio app. >> this is a crisis. people are losing their lives. >> with police reform taking center stage in congress watch our live unfiltered coverage of the latest developments. plus the government's response to the coronavirus pandemic.

>> we were going down some 30,000 to 25 to 20 and now we saw the state about flat, and now we're going up. >> and briefing from the white house on foreign affairs, inside administration officials. >> i do think there's a line one should not cross where governmental power is used essentially exclusively for personal benefit. >> we will stand proud, and we will stand tall. >> and the latest from the campaign 2020 trail. join in the conversation every day on our live call-in program, "washington journal." and if you missed any of our live coverage watch anytime on demand at c-span.org or listen on the go with the free c-span radio app. >> joining us from new york john dickerson, his newest book "the hardest job in the world, the american presidency." also a correspondent on cbs