On Human Rights (1977)
Jimmy Carter
For too many years, we've been willing to adopt the flawed and erroneous principles and tactics of our adversaries, sometimes abandoning our own values for theirs. We fought fire with fire, never thinking that fire is better quenched with water. . . .
First we have reaffirmed America's commitment to human rights as a fundamental tenet of our foreign policy. . . . What draws us together, perhaps more than anything else, is a belief in human freedom. We want the world to know that our Nation stands for more than financial prosperity.
This does not mean that we can conduct our foreign policy by rigid moral maxims . . . .
Throughout the world today, in free nations and in totalitarian countries as well, there is a preoccupation with the subject of human freedom, human rights. And I believe it is incumbent on us in this country to keep that discussion, that debate, that contention alive. No other country is as well-qualified as we to set an example.
-Jimmy Carter's speech addresses debates about

Question

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Jimmy Carter's speech emphasizes the importance of human rights in American foreign policy, contrasting it with previous strategies that might have involved combating communism (rooting out communism) through similar tactics used by adversaries, rather than adhering strictly to American values.