How Jimmy Carter's roots in the rural south shaped his politics, and how his life and impending death shape his home town

As former President Jimmy Carter enters hospice care, his biographer, Kai Bird, writes in the New York Times:  

Mr. Carter remains the most misunderstood president of the last century. A Southern liberal, he knew racism was the nation’s original sin. He was a progressive on the issue of race, declaring in his first address as Georgia’s governor, in 1971, that “the time for racial discrimination is over,” to the extreme discomfort of many Americans, including a good number of his fellow Southerners. And yet, as someone who had grown up barefoot in the red soil of Archery, a tiny hamlet in south Georgia, he was steeped in a culture that had known defeat and occupation. This made him a pragmatist.

I'd like to know more about Bird's thinking regarding how growing up in the rural south makes one a pragmatist.  My instinct, however, is that Bird is correct.   

Rick Rojas for the New York Times filed this story about Plains, Georgia, Carter's hometown.  Not surprisingly, news organizations have poured in since the announcement of the 39th president's hospice care.  Here are some excerpts that depict small-town life: 

The appeal of Plains, Mr. Carter has said, was its promise of the kind of humble, small-town existence he desired after the presidency. 

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As much as Mr. Carter wanted a semblance of a regular life, the result of his living in Plains turned it into no ordinary town. The signs marking town limits boast that Plains is home to the 39th president. The farm where he was raised just outside of town is a National Park. His modest house is surrounded by black security fencing and guard posts.

Other small towns in this part of Georgia, linked together in a constellation of country roads, have withered or have streets lined with fast-food joints and convenience stores. The center of Plains has a cafe and a row of gift shops that bustle with tourists.

Without Mr. Carter, “you wouldn’t have the downtown atmosphere that you have,” said Jeff Clements, an owner of the Buffalo Peanut Company, a commercial peanut sheller and seed treater that owns what was once the Carter family’s warehouse.