Jimmy Carter, who considered himself an outsider even as he sat in the Oval Office as the 39th U.S. president, will be honored Thursday with the pageantry of a funeral at Washington National Cathedral before a second service and burial in his tiny Georgia hometown.

Georgia politicians, leaders and activists are voicing their admiration for the life and legacy of former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, who passed away Sunday at the age of 100.

The late President’s priorities were remarkably prescient, and his personal qualities offered a dismaying contrast to so much of the present state of American politics.