A major priority of President Carter was the U.S. policy of energy consumption. The nation was suffering from rising oil costs due to OPEC which resulted in gas rationing, long gas lines, and energy shortages just to name a few. Before the formal part of this energy policy speech, President Carter explored reasons for lack of action by Congress with energy issues. He saw the threat as a “crisis of confidence” in our ability to forge a national priority to work together to deal with this and other issues. That section of the speech is why some call this the “Crisis of Confidence” speech. In addition to this audio recording, I also provide three PDF documents you can download: