MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
Next week former President Jimmy Carter's state funeral will be held at Washington's National Cathedral. President Joe Biden is expected to be among the speakers at the service. As our colleague Scott Detrow reports, the relationship between these two men stretches back decades.
SCOTT DETROW, BYLINE: On Presidents' Day in 1978, Jimmy Carter flew on Air Force One to Wilmington, Delaware. He was there to raise money for the state senator, Joe Biden. The politics-adverse Carter didn't spend too much time doing campaign events or fundraisers, and Biden seemed moved.
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PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: ...By thanking you all. This is not characteristic for a Delaware Democrat to have such an august body to raise so damn much money, and I want to thank y'all for it.
DETROW: Biden and his family had met Marine One at the airport and Carter had given them a ride to the Hotel Du Pont in the presidential limousine. You can hear the excitement in 35-year-old Biden's voice.
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BIDEN: My sons, Beau and Hunt, were here, Mr. President, at - met the president at the plane. But priorities are priorities. They had their Cub Scout meeting tonight, Mr. President, and they said as far as they'd go was the helicopter. And when they found out Amy wasn't coming, they weren't sure they were going to do that. But at any rate...
DETROW: After that introduction, Carter told the ballroom about the first time he had met Biden. It was four years earlier. The Senator was in Atlanta to address a convention of young business leaders, the Jaycees. And Carter, then Georgia's governor, couldn't get over Biden's youth.
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JIMMY CARTER: And we got a chance to talk for several hours at the governor's mansion. I felt a little bit ill at ease. I thought that Joe should have been talking to my children...
CARTER: ...Instead of to me.
DETROW: Still, Biden came with advice. Carter said the two men talked about the possibilities and realities of running outsider campaigns. He said Biden encouraged him to run for president.
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CARTER: I was so intrigued with Joe that I departed from my normal practice, which is to be polite and then withdraw. And I went to the Jaycee convention with him that night.
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CARTER: And I listened to his speech.
DETROW: Carter went on to make a long-shot bid, and Biden endorsed him. He went all over the country on Carter's behalf.
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CARTER: When I would go to Wisconsin and say, you know, what can I do in this city to explain my position, they would say, well, you don't have to explain your position. Joe Biden's already done it for you. And when I would campaign through Pennsylvania, those tough days when Pennsylvania was the crucial primary, Joe Biden spent three times as many days and nights in Pennsylvania campaigning for me as I spent campaigning for myself.
DETROW: Biden's longtime adviser, Ted Kaufman, saw the Carter-Biden relationship develop firsthand. He says it was real and deep and was strengthened by the fact that Jill Biden and Carter's wife Rosalynn got along, too.
TED KAUFMAN: When you and your spouse both have a relationship with someone and their spouse, that's like a booster jet for a friendship.
DETROW: Because of all of that, the young first-term lawmaker suddenly found himself as a key congressional point man for the president. White House logs show Carter made frequent phone calls to Biden, including from the middle of the Camp David peace talks. Biden came to the cabinet room and Oval Office for meetings.
KAUFMAN: This was when he was still in his 30s. It was, you know, at a time when you - normally you don't get a chance to learn about these things at a high level.
DETROW: Carter struggled in the White House. In a 2007 memoir, Biden praised Carter, but he also admitted the initial hopes of his endorsement fell short. Biden said Carter didn't invest in personal relationships. He held too many grudges, and he held people at arm's length, and he didn't consult America's allies enough - all things that, decades later, President Biden did the opposite of. Still, Kaufman says Biden and Carter remained friends through the years and stayed in close touch. The first year of Biden's presidency, he and Jill traveled to Plains to spend time with the Carters.
KAUFMAN: I think both of them, in times of trouble, reached out to each other. I think they had a deep personal relationship at times in their lives when it would be good thing to have a call.
DETROW: A long time has passed since that 1978 fundraiser. Now Biden is the president flying on Marine One from Washington to Wilmington.
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BIDEN: In today's world, some look at Jimmy Carter and see a man of a bygone era, with honesty and character, faith and humility. It mattered. But I don't believe it's a bygone era. I see a man not only of our times but for all times, someone who embodied the most fundamental human values we can never let slip away.
DETROW: Scott Detrow, NPR News, Washington.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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