Nation: Come Rain or Come Shine

Carter weathers a tour of four hostile states—and even finds some friends

Sunlight broke through the dark, rolling thunderheads last week as Jimmy Carter's presidential motorcade headed toward a desolate plateau near Golden, Colo. He was on his way to deliver a speech marking Sun Day. Then, suddenly, it began to rain and hail.

The incident was an inauspicious beginning for Carter's three-day fence-mending tour of four Western states and seemed typical of his fitful fortunes recently. Indeed, all kinds of trouble were raining down on the President as he left Washington. The 38...