The nation pauses to honor Jimmy Carter for his service as a naval officer, governor and president, and his four decades of humanitarian work after leaving the White House.

At a pomp-filled state funeral, mourners paid tribute to Mr. Carter and argued that he was a more successful leader than many remember. “It’s time to redeem his presidency,” a former aide said.

“Jimmy Carter was always an outsider ,” said biographer Jonathan Alter, explaining how Carter capitalized on the fallout of the Vietnam War and Watergate scandal that toppled Richard Nixon. “The country was thirsting for moral renewal and for Carter, as this genuinely religious figure, to come in and clean things up."