Was Jimmy Carter able to get congress to help him pass his ideas into law?

The short answer to this question is no. When Jimmy Carter came to Washington, he brought with him his team from when he was a governor of Georgia, and a general dislike of the glad-handing and schmoozing that are the staples Washington politics. Due to the fact that Carter refused to "play the Washington game," and did not engage in the kind of elbow-rubbing that defines so many Washington deals, members of Congress were reluctant...

The short answer to this question is no. When Jimmy Carter came to Washington, he brought with him his team from when he was a governor of Georgia, and a general dislike of the glad-handing and schmoozing that are the staples Washington politics. Due to the fact that Carter refused to "play the Washington game," and did not engage in the kind of elbow-rubbing that defines so many Washington deals, members of Congress were reluctant to help him enact his agenda.

Yet even if members of Congress had been more personally inclined toward Carter, his ideas were not very mainstream at the time, and they faced opposition from vested interests like oil companies and banks. For instance, Carter was very prescient in warning that the United States needed to embrace solar and wind energy, as well as other emerging forms of renewable energy, in order to protect the environment and reduce our dependence on foreign oil.

Unfortunately, his disastrous handling of foreign policy (the Iranian hostage crisis and the OPEC oil embargo) overshadowed his domestic agenda, and gave him little to no political capital with which to push that agenda through congress. Carter's desire to address materialism and an economy that he felt was too dependent on consumption, went over poorly with both the general public, which was nervous about pocketbook issues, and with members of Congress, who were either against his plans or simply felt that they lacked specifics.

As for Carter's push toward renewable energy, the notion of addressing the oil shortages that were plaguing the nation by investing in long term strategies struck most Americans as "pie in the sky thinking," which would not change the immediate problems of gas rationing and stagflation. Ultimately, Carter's style and policy prescriptions were at adds with voters' sentiment, which was defined by anger, fear and a demand for quick fixes.