Your Majesties, Members of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, Excellencies,
Ladies and Gentlemen, it is with a deep sense of gratitude that I accept this
prize. I am grateful to my wife Rosalynn, to my colleagues at The Carter
Center, and to many others who continue to seek an end to violence and
suffering throughout the world. The scope and character of our Center's
activities are perhaps unique, but in many other ways they are typical of the
work being done by many hundreds of nongovernmental organizations that strive
for human rights and peace. Most Nobel Laureates have carried out our work in
safety, but there are others who have acted with great personal courage. None
has provided more vivid reminders of the dangers of peacemaking than two of my
friends, Anwar Sadat and Yitzak Rabin, who gave their lives for the cause of
peace in the Middle East. Like these two heroes, my first chosen career was in
the military, as a submarine officer. My shipmates and I realized that we had
to be ready to fight if combat was forced upon us, and we were prepared to give
our lives to defend our nation and its principles. At the same time, we always
prayed fervently that our readiness would ensure that there would be no war. Later,
as President and as Commander-in-Chief of our armed forces, I was one of those
who bore the sobering responsibility of maintaining global stability during the
height of the Cold War, as the world's two superpowers confronted each other.
Both sides understood that an unresolved political altercation or a serious
misjudgment could lead to a nuclear holocaust. In Washington and in Moscow, we
knew that we would have less than a half hour to respond after we learned that
intercontinental missiles had been launched against us. There had to be a
constant and delicate balancing of our great military strength with aggressive
diplomacy, always seeking to build friendships with other nations, large and
small, that shared a common cause. In those days, the nuclear and conventional
armaments of the United States and the Soviet Union were almost equal, but
democracy ultimately prevailed because of commitments to freedom and human
rights, not only by people in my country and those of our allies, but in the
former Soviet empire as well. As president, I extended my public support and
encouragement to Andrei Sakharov, who, although denied the right to attend the
ceremony, was honored here for his personal commitments to these same ideals. The
world has changed greatly since I left the White House. Now there is only one superpower,
with unprecedented military and economic strength. The coming budget for
American armaments will be greater than those of the next fifteen nations
combined, and there are troops from the United States in many countries
throughout the world. Our gross national economy exceeds that of the three
countries that follow us, and our nation's voice most often prevails as
decisions are made concerning trade, humanitarian assistance, and the
allocation of global wealth. This dominant status is unlikely to change in our
lifetimes. Great American power and responsibility are not unprecedented, and
have been used with restraint and great benefit in the past. We have not
assumed that super strength guarantees super wisdom, and we have consistently
reached out to the international community to ensure that our own power and
influence are tempered by the best common judgment. Within our country, ultimate
decisions are made through democratic means, which tend to moderate radical or
ill-advised proposals. Constrained and inspired by historic constitutional
principles, our nation has endeavored for more than two hundred years to follow
the now almost universal ideals of freedom, human rights, and justice for all.
Our president, Woodrow Wilson, was honored here for promoting the League of
Nations, whose two basic concepts were profoundly important: "collective
security" and "self-determination." Now they are embedded in
international law. Violations of these premises during the last half-century have
been tragic failures, as was vividly demonstrated when the Soviet Union
attempted to conquer Afghanistan and when Iraq invaded Kuwait. After the second
world war, American Secretary of State Cordell Hull received this prize for his
role in founding the United Nations. His successor, General George C. Marshall,
was recognized because of his efforts to help rebuild Europe, without excluding
the vanquished nations of Italy and Germany. This was a historic example of
respecting human rights as the international level. Ladies
and gentlemen: Twelve years ago, President Mikhail Gorbachev received your
recognition for his preeminent role in ending the Cold War that had lasted
fifty years. But instead of entering a millennium of peace, the world is
now, in many ways, a more dangerous place. The greater ease of travel and
communication has not been matched by equal understanding and mutual respect.
There is a plethora of civil wars, unrestrained by rules of the Geneva
Convention, within which an overwhelming portion of the casualties are unarmed
civilians who have no ability to defend themselves. And recent appalling acts
of terrorism have reminded us that no nations, even superpowers, are
invulnerable. It is clear that global challenges must be met with an emphasis
on peace, in harmony with others, with strong alliances and international
consensus. Imperfect as it may be, there is no doubt that this can best be done
through the United Nations, which Ralph Bunche described here in this same
forum as exhibiting a "fortunate flexibility" - not merely to
preserve peace but also to make change, even radical change, without violence. He
went on to say: "To suggest that war can prevent war is a base play on
words and a despicable form of warmongering. The objective of any who sincerely
believe in peace clearly must be to exhaust every honorable recourse in the
effort to save the peace. The world has had ample evidence that war begets only
conditions that beget further war." We must remember that today there are
at least eight nuclear powers on earth, and three of them are threatening to
their neighbors in areas of great international tension. For powerful countries
to adopt a principle of preventive war may well set an example that can have
catastrophic consequences. If we accept the premise that the United Nations is
the best avenue for the maintenance of peace, then the carefully considered
decisions of the United Nations Security Council must be enforced. All too
often, the alternative has proven to be uncontrollable violence and expanding
spheres of hostility. For more than half a century, following the founding of
the State of Israel in 1948, the Middle East conflict has been a source of
worldwide tension. At Camp David in 1978 and in Oslo in
1993, Israelis, Egyptians, and Palestinians have endorsed the only reasonable
prescription for peace: United Nations Resolution 242. [Whatthefuck?] It
condemns the acquisition of territory by force, calls for withdrawal of Israel
from the occupied territories, and provides for Israelis to live securely and in
harmony with their neighbors. There is no other mandate whose
implementation could more profoundly improve international relationships. Perhaps
of more immediate concern is the necessity for Iraq to comply fully with the
unanimous decision of the Security Council that it eliminate all weapons of
mass destruction and permit unimpeded access by inspectors to confirm that this
commitment has been honored. The world insists that this be done. I thought
often during my years in the White House of an admonition that we received in
our small school in Plains, Georgia, from a beloved teacher, Miss Julia
Coleman. She often said: "We must adjust to changing times and still hold
to unchanging principles." When I was a young boy, this same teacher also
introduced me to Leo Tolstoy's novel, "War and Peace." She
interpreted that powerful narrative as a reminder that the simple human
attributes of goodness and truth can overcome great power. She also taught us
that an individual is not swept along on a tide of inevitability but can
influence even the greatest human events. These premises have been proven
by the lives of many heroes, some of whose names were little known outside
their own regions until they became Nobel laureates: Albert John Lutuli, Norman
Borlaug, Desmond Tutu, Elie Wiesel, Aung San Suu Kyi, Jody Williams and even
Albert Schweitzer and Mother Teresa. All of these and others have proven that
even without government power - and often in opposition to it - individuals can
enhance human rights and wage peace, actively and effectively. The Nobel prize
also profoundly magnified the inspiring global influence of Martin Luther King,
Jr., the greatest leader that my native state has ever produced. On a personal
note, it is unlikely that my political career beyond Georgia would have been
possible without the changes brought about by the civil rights movement in the
American south and throughout our nation. On the steps of our memorial to
Abraham Lincoln, Dr. King said: "I have a dream that on the red hills of
Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slaveowners will be
able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood." The scourge of
racism has not been vanquished, either in the red hills of our state or around
the world. And yet we see ever more frequent manifestations of his dream of
racial healing. In a symbolic but very genuine way, at least involving two
Georgians, it is coming true in Oslo today. I am not here as a public official,
but as a citizen of a troubled world who finds hope in a growing consensus that
the generally accepted goals of society are peace, freedom, human rights,
environmental quality, the alleviation of suffering, and the rule of law. During
the past decades, the international community, usually under the auspices of
the United Nations, has struggled to negotiate global standards that can help
us achieve these essential goals. They include: the abolition of land mines and
chemical weapons; an end to the testing, proliferation, and further deployment
of nuclear warheads; constraints on global warming; prohibition of the death
penalty, at least for children; and an international criminal court to deter
and to punish war crimes and genocide. Those agreements already adopted must be
fully implemented, and others should be pursued aggressively. We must also
strive to correct the injustice of economic sanctions that seek to penalize
abusive leaders but all too often inflict punishment on those who are already
suffering from the abuse. The unchanging principles of life predate modern times.
I worship Jesus Christ, whom we Christians consider to be the Prince of Peace.
As a Jew, he taught us to cross religious boundaries, in service and in love.
He repeatedly reached out and embraced Roman conquerors, other Gentiles, and
even the more despised Samaritans. Despite theological differences, all great
religions share common commitments that define our ideal secular relationships.
I am convinced that Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, Jews, and others
can embrace each other in a common effort to alleviate human suffering and to
espouse peace. But the present era is a challenging and disturbing time for
those whose lives are shaped by religious faith based on kindness toward each
other. We have been reminded that cruel and inhuman acts can be derived from
distorted theological beliefs, as suicide bombers take the lives of innocent
human beings, draped falsely in the cloak of God's will. With horrible
brutality, neighbors have massacred neighbors in Europe, Asia, and Africa. In
order for us human beings to commit ourselves personally to the inhumanity of
war, we find it necessary first to dehumanize our opponents, which is in itself
a violation of the beliefs of all religions. Once we characterize our
adversaries as beyond the scope of God's mercy and grace, their lives lose all
value. We deny personal responsibility when we plant landmines and, days or
years later, a stranger to us - often a child – is crippled or killed. From a
great distance, we launch bombs or missiles with almost total impunity, and
never want to know the number or identity of the victims. At the beginning of
this new millennium I was asked to discuss, here in Oslo, the greatest
challenge that the world faces. Among all the possible choices, I decided that
the most serious and universal problem is the growing chasm between the richest
and poorest people on earth. Citizens of the ten wealthiest countries are now
seventy-five times richer than those who live in the ten poorest ones, and the
separation is increasing every year, not only between nations but also within
them. The results of this disparity are root causes of most of the world's
unresolved problems, including starvation, illiteracy, environmental
degradation, violent conflict, and unnecessary illnesses that range from Guinea
worm to HIV/AIDS. Most work of The Carter Center is in
remote villages in the poorest nations of Africa, and there I have witnessed
the capacity of destitute people to persevere under heartbreaking conditions.
[RooneyMara and that mother of hers.] I have come to admire their
judgment and wisdom, their courage and faith, and their awesome accomplishments
when given a chance to use their innate abilities. But tragically, in the
industrialized world there is a terrible absence of understanding or concern
about those who are enduring lives of despair and hopelessness. We have not yet
made the commitment to share with others an appreciable part of our excessive
wealth. This is a potentially rewarding burden that we should all be willing to
assume. Ladies and gentlemen: War may sometimes be a necessary evil. But no
matter how necessary, it is always an evil, never a good. We will not learn how
to live together in peace by killing each other's children. The bond of our
common humanity is stronger than the divisiveness of our fears and prejudices.
God gives us the capacity for choice. We can choose to alleviate suffering. We
can choose to work together for peace. We can make these changes, and we must. Thank
you.
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