President Carter will be eulogized at his funeral next month by two longtime friends from beyond the grave — President Ford and Vice President Mondale, who had both written eulogies for Carter before their own deaths in 2006 and 2021, respectively. 

Steven Ford and Ted Mondale plan to address the crowd assembled for Carter’s funeral at the National Cathedral on January 9, reading the eulogies that their fathers wrote, according to a report. Carter, Ford, and Mondale became close friends in their later years despite the Democrats’ success at booting Ford from the White House in 1976. 

“Toward the end of our time in the White House, the President and I were talking about how we might describe what we tried to do. We came up with this sentence which to me remains an important summary of what we were trying to do. ‘We told the truth, we obeyed the law and we kept the peace,’” states Mondale’s eulogy for Carter, which was obtained by the New York Times. “That we did, Mr. President.”

Mondale’s own funeral following his April 2021 death was delayed to 2022 due to the Covid pandemic, and by that time, Carter’s advanced age made it impossible for him to travel. Upon Mondale’s death, Carter in a statement called him a “dear friend” and “the best vice president in our country’s history.”

Speaking at Ford’s funeral in 2007, Carter remembered his onetime rival and longtime friend fondly. 

“‘For myself and for our nation, I want to thank my predecessor for all he has done to heal our land.’ Those were the first words I spoke as president,” Carter said. “I still hate to admit that they received more applause than any other words in my inaugural address.”

“My staff and my diary notes as I prepared for this eulogy reveal a list of more than 25 different projects on which Jerry and I have shared leadership responsibilities,” Carter recalled. “He and I were both amused by a New Yorker cartoon a couple years ago. This little boy is looking up at his father and he says, ‘Daddy, when I grow up, I want to be a former president.’ Jerry and I frequently agreed that one of the greatest blessings that we had after we left the White House during the last quarter century was the intense, personal friendship that bound us together.”

Rosalynn Carter and Betty Ford similarly grew close in the years after the Carters left the White House in 1981. The two former first ladies coordinated events, fundraisers, and advocacy for mental health and substance abuse treatments, as well as the advancement of women’s rights through the Carter Center and the Betty Ford Center. The two women testified before Congress alongside one another in 1994 to demand Congress fund additional programs for substance abuse treatments.