To the Editor:

Conservative commentators are setting up former President Jimmy Carter as a Democratic whipping boy, to mitigate President Trump’s governance problems. It is not true that Mr. Carter “got nothing done,” as Ross Douthat states in “The Empty Majority” (column, July 30), nor that he “was carried to the White House on the winds of change he did not fully understand,” as Matthew Continetti claims in “Trump Goes Rogue” (Op-Ed, July 31).

Mr. Carter fully understood the conservative temper of his times, and his major legislative accomplishments are ranked by the Congressional Quarterly and the Miller Center of Public Affairs as among the very top of recent presidents, only slightly below Lyndon B. Johnson’s unmatched record.

Mr. Carter pushed through three comprehensive energy bills that laid the foundation for America’s energy security today by deregulating natural gas and crude oil, stressing conservation and supporting alternative energy.

To actually drain the swamp after Watergate, he established strict limits on gifts; financial disclosure rules for his appointees and for himself; inspectors general in every department; and the independent Ethics Office, now under siege. He revolutionized America’s transportation system by deregulating trucking and railroads, and brought air travel to the middle class by deregulating the airlines. He created the Department of Education and, with the Alaska Land Acts, doubled the size of the national park system.