W&L’s Bob Strong Gives Talk at Church of the Presidents Strong spoke on President Jimmy Carter’s pre-White House days and his complicated relations with the civil rights movement in Georgia.

By Erica Turman
February 20, 2020

Robert Strong, William Lyne Wilson Professor in Political Economy at Washington and Lee University, gave a public talk at Saint John’s Church in Washington, D.C, also known as the  “Church of the Presidents” on Feb. 16. Strong’s talk was titled “The Jimmy Carter Presidency.”

Strong spoke on Carter’s pre-White House days and his complicated relations with the civil rights movement in Georgia.

According to the church’s website, “Beginning with James Madison, until the present, every person who has held the Office of President of the United States has attended a service at St. John’s. Several early presidents were communicants, as were more recent ones. Thus, St. John’s is known as ‘the Church of the Presidents’ and is registered as a National Historic Landmark. Pew 54 is the President’s Pew and is reserved for the president’s use when in attendance at the church.”

Given its unique history, the church began a tradition of devoting its talks in February, Presidents’ Month, to the life and times of a given president. This year the church chose President Carter.

Strong is the lead scholar on the University of Virginia’s Miller Center’s webpage about Jimmy Carter  and is the author of “Working in the World: Jimmy Carter and the Making of American Foreign Policy.”

In 2019, Strong participated in a panel on Carter at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.

Strong was also recently quoted in a AboutHowStuffWorks article titled “A Portrait of Jimmy Carter, America’s Oldest Living President Ever,” and was interviewed for a C-SPAN radio episode titled “President Jimmy Carter and Iran Hostage Crisis.”