Voice of the National Federation of the Blind
SEPTEMBER 1971
The National Federation of the Blind is not an organization speaking for the blind--it is the blind speaking for themselves.
THE BRAILLE MONITOR
Published monthly in inkprint, Braille, and on talking book discs
Distributed free to the blind by the National Federation of the Blind
President: Kenneth Jernigan, 524 Fourth Street, Des Moines, Iowa 50309
EDITOR: Perry Sundquist, 4651 Mead Avenue Sacramento, California 95822
Associate Editor: Hazel tenBroek, 2652 Shasta Road, Berkeley, California 94708
News items should be sent to the Editor
Address changes should be sent to 2652 Shasta Road, Berkeley, California 94708
If you or a friend wish to remember the National Federation of the Blind in your will, you can do so by employing the following language:
"I give, devise, and bequeath unto NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND, a District of Columbia non-profit corporation, the sum of $______ (or, "_______ percent of my net estate", or "the following stocks and bonds:_______") to be used for its worthy purposes on behalf of blind persons and to be held and administered by direction of its Executive Committee."
If your wishes are more complex, you may have your attorney communicate with the Berkeley Office for other suggested forms.
Printed at 2652 Shasta Road, Berkeley, California 94708
REPORT FROM THE BERKELEY OFFICE
THE BANQUET
TO MAN THE BARRICADES
The President's Address
THE NATIONAL ACCREDITATION COUNCIL FOR AGENCIES SERVING THE BLIND (NAC)
WHAT PRICE ACCREDITATION?
by Kenneth Jernigan
BETTER SERVICES TO THE BLIND THROUGH ACCREDITATION
by Arthur L. Brandon
EXCERPTS FROM DISCUSSION SESSION
THE BRANDON-JERNIGAN POST-CONVENTION CORRESPONDENCE
THE FISHBECK CASE--SUCCESS ON THE BARRICADES
Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2010 with funding from National Federation of the Blind (NFB) http://www.archive.org/details/braillemonitorse1971nati
Photo: 1971-72 EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
Photo: THE BANQUET ADDRESS
Photo: Councilman Dick Gottlieb, Member of the Houston City Council, Presents the Key to the City to NFB President Jernigan
Photo: Presidential Report--Jay Freid, Franklin VanVliet, John Nagle listen attentively
Photo: Traffic at one of the floor mikes
Photo: Student Division Meets
Photo: JIM OMVIG GOES OFF THE THREE METER BOARD
Photo: THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE MEETING
Photo: BOB HUNT, DR. ISABELLE L.D. GRANT, IFB PRESIDENT RIENZI ALAGIYAWANNA
Photo: FRANK CUTA RECEIVES HOWARD BROWN RICKARD SCHOLARSHIP
Photo: STATE CHARTERS PRESENTED BY NFB PRESIDENT AT THE BANQUET
NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND
31st Annual Convention
Shamrock Hilton Hotel, Houston, Texas
July 5-9, 1971
It was the greatest Convention in NFB history. The high spirit among the delegates was charged and recharged by the events on platform and floor. Papers and panels were followed by lively discussion with and from the delegates. Certainly the President's sparkling banquet address and brilliant presentation and discussion on NAC were highpoints. The Texas host affiliate outdid itself making sure that everyone enjoyed himself.
Registration broke all records at 1001--in distant Houston. The banquet was attended by 968. Over 1300 people crowded the regular sessions, and division meetings were enthusiastic.
While Convention sessions started on Tuesday, July 6, much business was conducted on Monday. The morning Executive Committee meeting was, as usual, well attended by the delegates. The work of the Committee during the interim between Conventions was reported, new business was introduced, and a report from the General Manager of FEDCO, Bernard Gerchen, was heard.
Though only Committee members have the vote, several consensus votes were taken from the delegates assembled. The Executive Committee approved a number of actions which were later taken to the floor for consideration by the whole Convention.
Dr. Isabelle L. D. Grant, Dr. Jacob Freid, and the President of the Student Division, now Marc Maurer, were all approved for one-year terms on the Board of Directors.
The afternoon Division meetings were very successful. Some of the groups had invited speakers of interest to their fields. As is frequently the case at our Conventions, the speakers who came to impart knowledge and information went home with at least as much as they gave, to everyone's advantage. These meetings generated interest in other areas of activity and as a result two groups were added: one for those involved in music; and one for those concerned about the welfare of sheltered shop workers.
The following groups elected new officers at this session:
NFB Merchants Division: James Ryan of Minnesota, president.
NFB in Computer Science: Curtis Willoughby of Iowa, president.
NFB Sheltered Workers Division: Ysidro Urena of California, president.
NFB Student Division: Marc Maurer of Iowa, president.
NFB Teachers Division: Robert Acosta of California, president.
NFB Lawyers Division: Louis Corbin of Florida, president.
National Association of Blind Secretaries and Transcribers: Anita O'Shea of Massachusetts, president.
NFB Music Division: Janiece Conard of Washington, D.C., chairman.
[Reports of these Division meetings will appear in future issues of The Monitor.]
Three important matters dealing with the Federation's enormous growth in size and development were among the many items reported by the President. Two resolutions and one proposed amendment to the Constitution, prepared by the officers, recommended by the Executive Committee, were presented to the Convention for action.
The first dealt with the establishment of a Braille press. We have already purchased a small press and a stereotyper, but if we are really going into a modern Braille printing plant, it will take a sizeable amount of money But the Braille edition of The Monitor and the overruns of speeches and papers, plus the work for affiliates who do Brailling, creates a good base of operations and we could also sell job lot Brailling to others After discussion, the following resolution was then unanimously adopted:
BE IT RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled in Houston, Texas, this 6th day of July, 1971, that the President (in consultation with the Executive Committee) is authorized to do such things and make such expenditures as are necessary to establish a Braille printing plant if, in the discretion of the President, funds are available and satisfactory arrangements can be made.
On introducing the second resolution, President Jernigan said, in part: "We are just growing like everything, as you know. The week or so before I left, we received sixty-odd big boxes of records at one time. We have been renting office space like mad and we can't keep track of the files and the rest of the materials. There is some ground to believe that if we had a headquarters building we might rent space in it to somebody else and have some income of our own out of it. If we're going to set up a Braille printing press, we're either going to have to rent a lot more space or else we're going to have to build or buy something. In Berkeley we recently had to rent more space, and the same in Des Moines, just for storage of the things we're beginning to accumulate. Office space in my town costs about four dollars per square foot per year. We now have in the headquarters office of the NFB between four and five thousand feet of office space which means that we would be paying, at the regular price, something like $18,000 a year for it; but we're not paying that. I've dickered and bargained and maneuvered and talked and agreed to do some renovation of the space. I talked with the Executive Committee about it and we agreed that we would put something under $10,000 into renovation of that space and in exchange we are getting it for a little less than one dollar and fifty cents a square foot. Since we have a long term option on it, it will pay out so that we are ahead of the game to do it that way. But we're growing: we are not standing still. It has been said that buildings outlast presidents. The same argument would hold true for some other building and some other president as with this president and with this building; and, therefore, if you follow this argument, no organization should ever have a building. I think that it isn't sensible to have a building in some other place when I'm already straining every effort to administer this organization. To try to look after it in another part of the country and at the same time pay $15,000 or $16,000 and later perhaps more, on office space in Des Moines doesn't make any sense. Therefore, I think that we ought at this stage to try, if we can do it, to have our own building. But this is a major enough matter so that I didn't want to enter into this, nor did the Executive Committee, without coming to the Convention. I think there is no question but that the Executive Committee has the power to do it, and I think that there is no question but that I have the power, in view of certain constitutional provisions. But, I think, on the other hand that I certainly would not go into it alone and I don't think the Executive Committee would go into a thing like this alone. As I have mentioned, there are some covenants between executive and legislature in this Convention." The following resolution was approved by the Convention:
BE IT RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled in Houston, Texas, this 6th day of July, 1971, that the President (in consultation with the Executive Committee) is authorized to do such things and make such expenditures as are necessary to acquire for the Federation (in Des Moines, Iowa, or elsewhere) a building (or buildings), together with appurtenant real property, if (in the discretion of the President) funds are available and satisfactory arrangements can be made.
Such authorization shall include the power to borrow money and otherwise obligate the organization.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that an existing structure (or structures) may be purchased and remodeled, or that a new building (or buildings) may be erected, or that a long-term lease or other appropriate arrangement may be made.
The President then proposed an amendment to the NFB Constitution dealing with the confusion created by similarity in names used by organizations, some of whom were formerly but are not now affiliated with the NFB. After full discussion, the amendment to Article VI, State Affiliates, which adds a sentence at the end of the first paragraph was adopted. It reads:
"The name National Federation of the Blind, Federation of the Blind, or any variant thereof is the property of the National Federation of the Blind; and any affiliate, or local chapter of an affiliate, which ceases to be part of the National Federation of the Blind (for whatever reason) shall forthwith forfeit the right to use the name National Federation of the Blind, Federation of the Blind, or any variant thereof."
The importance of communication in our movement was emphasized by the President. The largest portion of the Federation's budget goes to keeping members informed through The Monitor, and the biggest single item is the talking book edition. We could save some money, he pointed out, and lose a little quality, if we were to go from 16-2/3 rpm to 8-1/3. It may be that the quality of the 8-1/3 is such that we can not do it. The President put the question to the Convention and it was agreed that the possibility of using 8-1/3 rpm recordings be explored and that one issue of The Monitor if it be found practical be published on an experimental basis.
An important link in our communications system is the Presidential Releases. Some, the President said, continue to read them and some continue not to. There is no way currently of keeping you informed without this system. Releases are sent to State and chapter presidents not to entertain but to inform. They should be made available to all members and should be read and discussed at every local meeting. If your elected officers do not make them available--well, you elected them and they are accountable to you.
Communications would be greatly improved if NFB Headquarters and the Berkeley Office were informed of changes in local and State officers as promptly as possible. Phone numbers should be included along with names and addresses, and, in the case of chapters, the name of the chapter.
Available to State and chapter presidents, and in some cases to individuals, are a number of items designed, as are the other methods of communication, to inform our membership, educate the public, and improve programs for the blind. THE FIRST THIRTY YEARS A HISTORY OF THE NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND is still in good supply. The full banquet program including addresses for 1968, 1969, 1970, and, of course, for 1971 can be had on records or in print. The supply of Jacobus tenBroek: The Man and the Movement on records has been replenished. Three thirty-minute films are now ready for loan to State affiliates and local chapters: "For the Record," the NFB film done in 1969, and two which are new--"The Blind Guys--The Iowa Center for the Blind," and "A Demand to be Heard," which is an HEW release containing a segment featuring John Nagle talking about the organized blind. All of this material is available from the Berkeley Office.
The NFB had a very active year on the barricades protecting the rights of the blind in the employment and other fields, especially in the courts. In two cases in Michigan involving teachers there has been progress. The Fucinari case was won and the Weckerly case is on appeal to the State Supreme Court. Glen Fishbeck is at work in a civil service position in Minneapolis; David Weddle got his safety deposit box in California; and in Philadelphia a derogatory statement about the NFB was retracted by the Better Business Bureau.
In new actions, the NFB has taken the FCC to court for not allowing a fully qualified blind radio operator to take the tests for a First Class Radio License and for issuing, without notice, regulations for restrictive endorsements on others. The city of Chicago has been hailed into court because it will not permit qualified blind people to apply for positions as social workers. Illinois has enacted the White Cane Law and violation of that statute will be charged in this case.
A new policy on the Howard Brown Rickard Scholarship has been instituted. In the past we have given $200 and $300 scholarships and we never heard from the recipients and sometimes we wondered if they were blind. Most of them didn't ever attend meetings in their States or participate in the movement in any way either before or after receipt of the scholarship. Now there will be one scholarship each year of about $1200. In addition to meeting the demands of the Rickard Trust, applicants in States where we have affiliates will be required to obtain the recommendation of their chapters if their applications are to be considered. The winner will have to attend the Convention to receive the award.
We have, as you know, created a cultural exchange international program committee. It will be handling our relations with students and with the blind generally in foreign countries.
The President, during his report, spoke of the nature of the democratic process in a social movement: "I want to talk to you a little bit about the function of the presidency of this organization, as we grow, and the function of the Convention, and the Executive Committee. I think that it's important that we understand each other; that I do the kind of thing that you want done. I can't do that unless we have some notion about what it is that I ought to be doing. There is a kind of covenant m this organization between the membership in Convention, and the Executive. I would say that we have written into our constitution more authority for the Executive than almost any volunteer organization I know. And I think we have done that on the theory that the faith would be kept and that if it wasn't kept we would get somebody who would--that a new President would be elected. I've tried to keep that faith with you and I think you have kept it with me.
"Here's what I mean by democracy. I know some States where they have three and four people sign a check. That's democracy. I suppose it would be even more democratic if you couldn't issue a check until every member of the organization had signed it. The only trouble is that you never would get anything done, I told somebody this: Democracy means that you have only the treasurer sign the check and if he doesn't do what you think is right you put him in jail or throw him out of office. That's what democracy means. As I see it, people who have acted surprised that the administration of this organization indulges in politics are violating the very democratic process itself. The President of this organization is not simply an impartial chairman presiding over a group of disjointed affiliates. That's not what he is at all. I believe that you elect a President to conduct an administration; that you expect him to take stands on issues; and that you expect him to lead. I believe that if he doesn't lead the way you want him to lead that you can and will rise up and throw him out. And that's what democracy means.
"I think you ought to throw me out of office just as much for inaction or for over-caution, for not leading, for not doing things to help blind people as you would for rash or precipitous actions and for ill-timed judgments. In other words, I believe that you elected me to lead a movement to try to improve the conditions of the blind, and as long as I'm President, so help me God, I'm going to lead.
"We are a cohesive, spiritual movement. We are a crusade. We are an army of liberation for blind people. We are a tough, fighting force. We are a responsible organization. We are a call to conscience and I think, incidentally, that we're unstoppable and I think we're unbeatable."
Hazel tenBroek was again brought to tears by the generous words of the President and the warm welcome given by the delegates when she was introduced to give the report from the Berkeley Office.
The activities of the President had much to do with the volume of work in Berkeley. Consequently, Berkeley had a busy year. The first concern in the Berkeley Office is The Monitor. To our Editor, Perry Sundquist, goes the chore of reading and choosing articles for The Monitor, writing to you urging you to send material for publication, and of getting out endless letters of request for permission to reprint.
The principal emphasis in the Berkeley Office is production. From July 1, 1970 to June 30, 1971, 4,092,437 pages were printed. This required 8,185 reams of paper. Most had to be collated and stapled. Many, in addition, were folded and stuffed into envelopes.
There were 832 individual requests for materials involving 33,957 separate items; and 1752 requests for particular issues of The Monitor were addressed and mailed. Over 18,000 envelopes for Presidential Releases alone were addressed.
The Monitor continues to grow. This list is now well over the 10,000 mark. From July 1, 1970 to June 30, 1971, 4517 names were handled. The list grew by somewhat over twenty percent, that is, 2219 new readers were added, eighteen percent moved and five percent of our list was discontinued, mainly because of decreasing physical abilities and some by death.
The theme of the panel discussions and many of the individual papers heard throughout the Convention was "Today and the Decade Ahead." Each presented its own particular interest.
The panel on "Employment for the Blind--New Careers and Initiatives," chaired by NFB President Kenneth Jernigan, lived up to its title. The participants all indicated that it took not only imagination and initiative to gain and hold their present employment but high motivation to be successful, which is another way of saying that it took a lot of persistence and hard work. In some cases it also took a not inconsiderable amount of assistance from the organized blind.
Sam Lentine who teaches physics, chemistry, and math at Bishop Duffy High School in Niagara Falls, New York, is a man who intends to be successful in his chosen field. His enthusiasm for his work and his firm belief that he could teach if given the opportunity, paved the way for the job he holds today. Proper training is basic to any successful employment and Mr. Lentine had a good background in teaching techniques along with a fine working relationship with his instructors. His belief in himself and his delight in his work is contagious and he is able to project this interest to his students.
Glenn Fishbeck, data processor, knew that he had the ability to do the job he applied for with the City of Minneapolis. When the city fathers did not agree that a blind man could function in the position, he and the NFB convinced them that he could. That story is set out elsewhere in this issue.
Prior to losing his sight, Don Morris had been employed by the Bell System as a service representative. Inability to find employment after becoming blind led to the conclusion that he would have to create his own work. Using his imagination, he successfully exploited his past experience into a new business. Don now operates and is president of Creative Communications Consultants in Des Moines, Iowa. Motor carriers use his services, for example, to communicate with customers and keep track of equipment.
NFB First Vice President Don Capps represents what motivation and persistence can accomplish. He started at the bottom of the employment hierarchy in his company and by thoroughly learning the work of each job assigned, got for himself the invaluable knowledge of the business which makes him a successful executive. Mr. Capps is now Assistant Vice President, Claims Department, Colonial Life and Accident Insurance Company in South Carolina.
An occurence most unusual in the history of NFB Conventions took place when the scheduled panel on "Library Services--Today and the Decade Ahead" was introduced at the Thursday morning session. It seemed that one panel member, James M. Hahn, Assistant Chief For Reader Services, Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress in Washington, was not on the platform. After calling for him through the Convention's public address system and having him paged by the hotel, it was decided to proceed with the program and meanwhile make further inquiries.
While the Convention listened to Mrs. Lois F. LaBauve, Director of the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Texas State Library speak with interest about the work of a Regional Library, the search for Mr. Hahn continued. It was eventually discovered that he was not in Houston. Since the date, place, hour, and subject had all been confirmed by phone and correspondence, the effort to locate Mr. Hahn was extended and he was finally reached by telephone at his desk in Washington, D. C. His failure to appear before the largest group of consumers of his services was the first time a scheduled speaker did not deem it important enough--for whatever extenuating circumstance--to inform the officers of the organization that he would not be present.
The Convention unanimously adopted a strong resolution asking that Mr. Hahn and his supervisor, Robert S. Bray, be reprimanded. Copies of the resolution and Mr. Hahn's correspondence with the President of the National Federation of the Blind accepting the invitation have been sent, under a cover letter from our Chief Executive, to the President of the United States, the Librarian of Congress, and to every member of the United States Congress.
With five State directors of programs for the blind as participants, the panel on "State Agencies for the Blind--Today and the Decade Ahead," had built-in audience interest. The panelists, Burt L. Risley of Texas, Dr Fred L. Crawford of South Carolina, T. V. Cranmer of Kentucky, Kenneth Hopkins of Idaho, and Kenneth Jernigan of Iowa, engaged in a free-flowing discussion of common problems.
NAC and government reorganization which results in administrative consolidation in large umbrella agencies pose the major threats to programs for the blind. Super-agencies lead to super-control. And the way to control is through the structure of the agency.
A commission for the blind or other administrative arrangement which prevents the submergence of programs for the blind is the only way to save them. The role of the director in preserving these programs as clearly identifiable entities serving the blind was discussed. Emphasis was given to the necessity of making these programs not only responsive to the needs of the blind client, but responsible to the organized blind movement.
A lively exchange occurred when it was asked whether or not they, as directors of State agencies, spoke for the blind. The Federationists on the panel insisted that no one could represent and speak for the blind unless elected to do so by the blind.
The most exciting panel of this or any other NFB Convention took place on the last morning. The principal proponents were our President, Kenneth Jernigan, and the President of the National Accreditation Council Board, Arthur L. Brandon, who was assisted in the question and answer period by Alexander Handel, Executive Director of NAC By the time the session was finally called to a halt, many others had participated. The subject was "The National Accreditation Council of Agencies Serving the Blind (NAC)--Today and the Decade Ahead."
The ground covered a good deal of NAC's past as well as its present stance and its future directions. Its relation, or lack thereof, to the organized blind movement was thoroughly reviewed. The direction and value of its standards and methods of accreditation came in for sharp criticism.
President Jernigan's brilliant, incisive critique and Mr. Brandon's explanation of the operations and goals of NAC are included elsewhere in this issue along with some of the discussion generated by the exchange.
An experimental model of a device to scan the printed word was demonstrated and the history of its development was presented by Harvey Lauer, Electronic Reading Specialist with the Veterans Administration. The scanner produces a musical chime as it travels over the reading matter which must then be interpreted by the reader.
Enlivened with his usual wit and wisdom, Dr. Jacob Freid, Executive Director of the Jewish Braille Institute of America, gave a thoughtful address on "Public Education Concerning the Blind and Blindness." Aids, appliances, and specialized equipment for the blind were discussed by Harry J. Freidman, Manager of Howe Press, Watertown,
Massachusetts.
John Taylor, Assistant Director of the Iowa Commission for the Blind, discussed basic eligibility factors in Social Security Disability Benefits; and Perry Sundquist, Editor of The Braille Monitor and retired Chief of the California Division for the Blind, presented a paper on policy standards and appeal procedures in aid to the blind.
These papers will appear in future issues of The Monitor as their availability and space permit.
Four NFB Executive Committee positions were up for election at this Convention. Nellie Hargrove of Tennessee and Perry Sundquist of California were re-elected. Kenneth Hopkins of Idaho and James Couts of Missouri are the newcomers. To retiring Executive Committeemen Anita O'Shea of Massachusetts and Ray Dinsmore of Indiana go our thanks for their service on the Committee.
Rienzi Alagiyawanna, President of the International Federation of the Blind here for the occasion from Ceylon, was joined by IFB Treasurer, Dr. Isabelle L. D. Grant, for a panel discussion. Presiding was the Chairman of the NFB Cultural Exchange and International Program Committee, Robert Hunt of West Virginia. The spread of Federationism around the world was discussed and the IFB President recounted his efforts to bring to active participation the IFB Student Division.
John Nagle, Chief of the Washington Office of the NFB, gave a spirited and detailed legislative report concerning those bills sponsored by this organization in the 92d Congress.
Led by NFB First Vice President Don Capps, the NFB's Ambassador-at-Large, Mrs. Mary Ellen Anderson, along with Sam Sitt of the Florida affiliate, Dick Parker of the Nebraska affiliate, and George Dubeil (who replaced Ken Brackett of Rhode Island who could not attend because of the serious illness of his wife) participated in a lively discussion on organizing techniques.
Concluding the internal business sessions were the reports from the chairmen of Standing Committees. Anthony G. Mannino, National White Cane Week Chairman, reported that more States are becoming involved in this increasingly successful fundraising effort. Lawrence Marcelino, Chairman of the NFB's growing Endowment Fund, gave his report and then garnered another $9000 in cash and pledges when he read the Honor Roll of the States which had contributed. These contributions and pledges came not only from State organization treasuries and special events but from many individuals as well. The report of the Subcommittee on Budget and Finance was given by its Chairman, Perry Sundquist.
The Resolutions Committee, ably chaired by Manuel Urena, presented twenty-one resolutions for Convention action. They are printed in full in this issue.
There was spirited bidding for the 1973, 1974, and 1975 Conventions. New York won the vote for 1973, Washington State for 1974, and the District of Columbia for 1975.
It was agreed that in view of our growth and the increasing difficulty in finding accommodations at the prices we can afford, some of these arrangements may have to be changed.
The 1972 Convention is firmly fixed for The Sherman House in Chicago. In view of the number of rooms over that committed by the hotel which were used in Houston, all members are advised to watch for the Convention announcement and to make reservations as soon as possible thereafter.
The Thursday evening banquet was spectacular in content, in size, in the liveliness of the crowd, and in food. The beautifully appointed tables for eight filled rapidly. Because the anticipated "no shows" did show, the hotel was faced with making some last minute additions. Fortunately the large hall had a good public address system so no one missed anything no matter how far from the head table. The unusually good meal was topped off by a dessert of baked Alaska--quite an undertaking for a crowd that size. First Vice President Don Capps served as Master of Ceremonies.
The President's magnificent speech was interrupted frequently by applause. His message was clear. "We are free men, and we intend to act like it. We are free men, and we intend to stay that way. We are free men, and we intend to defend ourselves. Let those who truly have the best interests of the blind at heart join with us as we move into a new era of equality and integration." A thunderous standing ovation at the end of the address spoke the Convention's approval.
Charters were presented to nine States. Alabama, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico, and Rhode Island had all reorganized and expanded during the last year, and, except for Alabama, all had adopted the National Federation of the Blind of [State] name. Connecticut, Iowa, and Maryland also received new charters to mark their change of name to the NFB of [State] designation. And a rousing welcome was given to our new affiliate, the Florida Association of the Blind.
Also at the banquet, Frank Cuta of Montana received the Howard Brown Rickard Scholarship which this year amounts to $1200. He is an engineering student who is active in the State affiliate. Mr. Cuta was the first to receive the award under a new rule which requires the presence of the winner at the Convention.
The festivities were interspersed with drawings for prizes. The grand(daddy) prize was a $700 grandfather clock donated by the Texas affiliate.
by Kenneth Jernigan
Some of you may remember the story Will Rogers liked to tell about his early career as a comedian in vaudeville. "I used to play a song called 'Casey Jones' on the harmonica with one hand," he said, "and spin a rope with the other, and then whine into the old empty rain barrel . . . and then in between the verses I used to tell jokes about the Senate of the United States. If I needed any new jokes that night, I used to just get the late afternoon papers and read what Congress had done that day, and the audience would die laughing."
This story reminds me of my own activities over the past twenty years. I have gone all over the country as the guest of blind groups and civic associations; and, like Will Rogers, I tell stories about the government of the United States-particularly the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, and the other "professionals" doing work with the blind. And when I need any new jokes, I just get the latest reports from the agencies and foundations and read what they have been doing recently-and the audience dies laughing. Unless, of course, there are people in the audience who are blind, or friends of the blind--and they die crying.
Which is a roundabout way of saying that much of what goes on in the journals and laboratories and workshops of the agencies for the blind these days is a cruel joke. It is a mockery of social science and a travesty on social service. Far from advancing the welfare and well-being of blind people, it sets our cause back and does us harm.
The blind, along with some other groups in our society, have become the victims of a malady known as "R and D"--that is. Research and Demonstration. The R and D projects are largely financed by the Federal Department of Health, Education and Welfare and account for an ever-increasing chunk of its budget. The whole tone and direction of programs for the blind in the country--rehabilitation, education, social services, and the rest--have been altered as a result. The art of writing grant applications, the tens of millions of dollars available to fund the approved R and D projects, the resulting buildup of staff in universities and agencies for the blind, the need to produce some sort of seemingly scientific results in the form of books and pamphlets to justify the staff salaries and the field trips and conferences, and the wish for so called "professional" status have all had their effect. Blind people have become the objects of research and the subjects of demonstration. They are quizzed, queried, and quantified; they are diagnosed, defined, and dissected; and when the R and D people get through with them, there is nothing left at all--at any rate, nothing of dignity or rationality or responsibility. Despite all of their talk about improving the quality of services to blind people (and there is a lot of such talk these days), the research and demonstration people see the blind as inferiors. They see us as infantile, dependent wards. The signs of this creeping condescension--of this misapplied science, this false notion of what blind people are, and of what blindness means--are all about us. Some things are big, and some are little; but the pattern is conclusive and the trend unmistakable.
Consider, for instance, what has happened to the talking book. From the very beginning of the library service back in the 1930's, the first side of each talking book record has concluded with these words: "This book is continued on the other side of this record." The flip side has always ended with: "This book is continued on the next record." Surely no one can have any serious quarrel with this language. It serves a purpose. The reader, absorbed in the narrative, may well not remember whether he is on the first or second side of a record, and the reminder is useful and saves time.
In the last three or four years, however, something new has been added. After the familiar "This book is continued on the next record," the statement now appears: "Please replace this record in its envelope and container." That one, I must confess, crept up on me gradually. Although from the very beginning I found the statement annoying, it took some time for its full significance to hit me.
Here I was, let us say, reading a learned treatise on French history--a book on Gallic statesmanship--one which presupposes a certain amount of understanding and mental competence. The narrative is interrupted by a voice saying "Please replace this record in its envelope and container." Then it strikes me: These are the words one addresses to a moron or a lazy lout. These words do not appear on records intended for the use of sighted library borrowers. They are intended for the blind. To be sure, they are not an overwhelming or unbearable insult. They are only one more small evidence of the new custodialism, the additional input of contempt for the blind recipient of services which is in the air these days.
I have heard that the words were added at the request of some of the regional librarians because certain blind borrowers were careless with the records. Are sighted people never careless with books or records? Are such words at the end of the record really likely to make the slob less slobby? The ordinary, normal human being (blind or sighted) will, as a matter of course, put the record back into the envelope and container. What else, one wonders, would he do with it?
Regardless of all this, one thing is fairly certain: My remarks on the subject will undoubtedly bring forth angry comments from library officials and others that I am quibbling and grasping at straws, that I am reading meanings that aren't there into innocent words. To which I reply: I am sure that no harm was meant and that the author of the words did not sit down to reason out their significance, but all of this is beside the point. We have reasoned out the significance, and we are no longer willing for our road to hell to be paved with other people's good intentions, their failure to comprehend, or their insistence that we not quibble.
Here is another illustration--again, a slight and almost trivial affair. I had occasion recently to visit a public school where there was a resource class for blind and partially seeing children. The teacher moved about with me among the students. "This little girl can read print," she said. "This little girl has to read Braille." Now, that language is not oppressively bad. Its prejudice is a subtle thing. But just imagine, if you will, a teacher saying of a pair of children: "This little girl can read Braille; this little girl has to read print." The supposition is that the child possessing some sight, no matter how little, is closer to being a normal and full-fledged human being; the one without sight can't cut it and has to make do with inferior substitutes.
Confront that teacher with her words, and she will be hurt She will say, "But that is not how I meant it. It was simply the way I said it." It is true that she was not consciously aware of the significance of her statement and that she did not mean to say what she said; but she said exactly what she meant, and how she felt. And her students, as well as visitors to her classroom, will be conditioned accordingly. I don't wish to make too much of the teacher's terminology, or the words on the talking book record. Neither exemplifies any great cruelty or tragedy. They are, however, straws in the wind, and either of them could be the final straw--the straw that breaks the blind man's back, or spirit. Far too many backs and spirits have been broken in that way, and the breaking must stop.
As I have said, some of the recent incidents in our field are small, and some are big; but they fit together to make a pattern, and the pattern is conclusive. During the past decade, for instance, the vocational employment objective of rehabilitation has steadily receded before the advancing tide of "social services" and 'research and development," and the Division for the Blind in the Federal Rehabilitation Service has diminished accordingly in prominence and importance. By 1967 rehabilitation had taken such a back seat that it became submerged in a comprehensive pot of Mulligan stew set up by the Department of Health, Education and Welfare called "Social and Rehabilitation Services," with the emphasis clearly on the "social." A new public-information brochure turned out by HEW, listing all the department's branches and programs, placed rehabilitation--where do you suppose?--dead last.
As far as the blind were concerned, the ultimate blow fell late last year. Federal Register document 70-17447, dated December 28, 1970, announced the abolition of the Division for the Blind altogether, and its inclusion in the new Division of Special Populations! And who are these "special populations"? They include, and I quote, "alcoholics, drug addicts, arthritics, epileptics, the blind, heart, cancer, and stroke victims, those suffering communication disorders, etc." (I leave the specifics of that "etc." to your imagination.) Therefore, half a century after the establishment of the Federal vocational rehabilitation program, and almost as long after the development of a special division of services for the blind (and still longer since the creation of separate agencies or commissions for the blind in most of the States) the blind of America were to lose their identity and return to the almshouse for the sick and indigent.
This was too much, and every major national organization and agency (both of and for the blind) combined to resist it. By February of 1971, the HEW officials had made a strategic withdrawal. They announced that they had never intended to downgrade or de-emphasize services to the blind, but that in order to clear up any possible misunderstanding they were establishing a new "Office for the Blind," to be on a par with the "Division of Special Populations," and in no way connected with it. Thus (for the moment) the tide was reversed and the power of united action demonstrated; but the tide is still the tide, and the trend is still the trend.
It is not difficult to find the evidence. For example, under date of February 4, 1971, the Federal Rehabilitation Services Administration issued an information memorandum entitled "Subminimum Wage Certificates for Handicapped Workers." The document is self-explanatory; it is damning; and it is all too indicative of what is happening to the blind in America today. "A recent revision to the wage and hour regulations," the memorandum begins, "broadens State vocational rehabilitation agencies certification responsibility with respect to employment of handicapped workers at subminimum wages. The responsibility was previously limited by regulation to certain categories of handicapped persons employed by sheltered workshops.
"The revision to the wage and hour regulations, effective February 4, 1971," the memorandum continues, "authorizes State rehabilitation agencies to certify certain disabled persons for work in competitive employment at less than fifty percent of the statutory minimum wage but not less than twenty-five percent."
So said HEW in February of this year! No longer must the pay be even fifty percent of the minumum wage! No longer is it limited to the sheltered shop! It may now be extended to private industry, to so called "competitive" employment! And this, we are told, is rehabilitation. We are not to quibble. We are not to read meanings into things which are not there. We are not to find patterns or trends or hidden significance. No! We are to take our twenty-five percent "competitive" employment, and be grateful for it. That is what we are expected to do, but I doubt that we will do it.
I have already spoken about R and D--the so-called "research and demonstration"--financed ever more heavily and lovingly by the Department of Health, Education and Welfare. I have at hand a typical product of "R and D”---a comprehensive two hundred thirty-nine-page publication of the American Foundation for the Blind, entitled A STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE TO PERSONAL MANAGEMENT FOR BLIND PERSONS.1 I invite you now to accompany me on a step-by-step guided tour through its pages and mazes. But let me warn you: It may be a bad trip.
"One of the areas," we are told at the outset of this guidebook, "where independence is valued most highly by a broad spectrum of blind persons ... is personal management." I myself would put that a little differently. I would say that the blind person should, and commonly does, take for granted that independence begins at home--that self-care comes before self-support--but that what he values most highly in life is not his ability to master the simple rituals of daily living, such as are detailed in this manual. It is not his ability to wash his face, take a shower, clean his nails, brush his hair, sit down on a chair, rise from a chair, stand upright, wash his socks, light a cigarette, shake hands, nod his head "yes," shake his head "no," and so on and so on through two hundred-plus pages of instruction. No, these are not the supreme attainments and values in the life of the blind person, or of any other civilized person. They are merely the elementary motor and mechanical skills which represent the foundation on which more meaningful and significant achievements rest. The skills of personal management are rudimentary, not remarkable.
However, the American Foundation's guide to personal management for blind persons does not put the matter in such modest perspective. Rather, it is blown up to majestic proportions, as if it were not the beginning but the end of self-realization and independence. Most of all, it is presented as a very difficult and complicated subject--this business of grooming and shaving, bathing and dressing-virtually as the source of a new science. Much is made of the "need for an organized body of realistic and practical personal management techniques." The American Foundation, out of a deep sense of professional obligation and the excitement of pioneering on new scientific horizons, agreed as long ago as 1965 (in its own words) "to undertake the responsibility for developing, over a period of years, workable personal management techniques for blind persons." To begin with, an AFB staff specialist was assigned to coordinate the project, and he proceeded immediately to carry out a massive survey of agencies throughout this country and Canada--on such life-and-death questions and critical issues as how to teach blind persons to shake hands correctly and put the right sock on the right foot.
But surveys at a distance, no matter how thorough and scientific, were not good enough for such profound subject-matter. No. What was needed was (to quote the report) "the pooled thinking and experience of a fairly large number of persons from diverse backgrounds and programs." In short, what was needed was a conference, or better yet, a series of conferences--in big hotels in major cities, complete with workshops, round-tables, lunches, dinners, social hours, and sensitivity sessions. In the words of the report: "For three years, 1967, 1968, and 1969, national meetings were held in New York, Chicago, and New Orleans at which key personnel from representative agencies met both to develop techniques and methods and to refine and improve already existing ones."
Here, to illustrate, is a typical technique--developed and refined over the years in New York, Chicago, and New Orleans, representing the distilled wisdom (if that is the proper expression) of key personnel from diverse backgrounds and specialized programs. Here, under the broad classification "Bathing," is the sixteen-step procedure for the "Sponge Bath." I quote in full:
“Orientation: Discuss how equipment can be most efficiently used when taking a sponge bath.
“Equipment: Water, two containers, soap, cloth, towel, bath mat.
"Technique:
1. Disrobe.
2. Put water of desired temperature in sink or container.
3. Thoroughly wet washcloth and gently squeeze cloth together.
4. Take one comer in right hand, the other in left hand, bring comers together and grasp in whole hand.
5. With other hand grasp remaining cloth. Hold washcloth in closed fist.
6. Hold one hand stationary while turning other hand to squeeze excess water.
7. Unfold cloth and drape over palm of one hand. With other hand pick up soap and dip into water, then rub back and forth from wrist to tips of fingers on cloth.
8. Place soap back in dish.
9. Place soaped cloth in dominant hand.
10. Starting with face and neck, rub soaped cloth over skin portion.
11. Place soaped cloth in water and wring as described above several times until soap has been removed.
12. Use same motion as step 10 to rinse soap from face and neck.
13. Unfold towel. Using either or both hands, dry using a vigorous rubbing motion.
14. Continue to each section of body washing, rinsing, and drying.
15. As towel gets damp, shift to a dry section.
16. For drying back, put bath towel over right shoulder, grasp lower end hanging in back with left hand and grasp end hanging in front with right hand. While holding towel pull up and down alternately changing position of towel until entire area of back is dry."
Immediately following this highly developed and refined technique--the product of five years of national conferences and international surveys--is the step-by-step guide to taking a "tub bath." I feel that you will want to know that this affair of the tub represents a more advanced and elaborate enterprise in personal management. The greater complexity is evident at the outset. You will recall that the first step in the sponge bath technique was: "Disrobe." But the first step in the tub bath exercise is: “Disrobe and place clothing where it will not get wet." That is, of course, a substantial increase in subtlety over the sponge bath.
Let us pause here for a moment and contemplate the significance of that instruction: "Disrobe and place clothing where it will not get wet." What does it tell us about the Intelligence--the presumed intelligence--of the blind person under instruction? It tells us that he has not the sense to come in out of the rain; or, more exactly, that he has not the sense to bring his clothes in out of the shower. He is presumed to be either a mental case or a recent immigrant from the jungle, who has never taken a bath before. This latter possibility is given additional credence by instruction number 15: "As towel gets damp, shift to a dry section." If the trainee has ever bathed before, he will know about that. Only if he is a babbling idiot or Bomba, the Jungle Boy, does he need to be given that extraordinary advice. This presumption of incompetence or newborn innocence on the part of the blind person is, indeed, pervasive of the entire two hundred thirty-nine-page guidebook.
What else can it mean to say, with regard to the technique for shaking hands: "If desired, the hands may be moved in an up and down motion?" What else can it mean to say, with regard to the technique for nodding the head: "The head is held facing the person to whom you wish to communicate . . . With the head held in this position, move the chin down towards the floor about two inches then raise it again to the original position. Make this movement twice in quick succession."
One last quotation, before we leave this magisterial work of applied domestic science. Under the general heading of "Hand Gestures," we find, the technique for "Applauding." It goes like this:
"a. With elbows close to the body, raise both hands until the forearms are approximately parallel to the floor.
"b. Move each hand towards the other so that they come in contact with one another towards the center of the body.
"c. The thumb of both hands is held slightly apart from the other four fingers which are held straight and close together.
"d. The fingers of the right hand point slightly toward the ceiling and the fingers of the left hand slightly toward the floor so that when the hands come in contact with each other the palms touch but the fingers do not.
"e. The thumb of the right hand rests on the knuckle of the left thumb, the fingers of the right hand being above the fingers of the left hand.
"f. The hands are brought back to a position about eight to twelve inches apart then brought together in a quick slapping motion.
"g. Polite applause would require slapping the hands together about twice each second. More feeling would be expressed by the rapidity, rather then the volume or loudness of the individual's applause.
"2. Hands Inactive: When the hands are not being used for some specific purpose, the most common position is resting the hands in the lap. For example, the back of the left hand might rest on the left or right leg, or in between, with the palm turned up; the right hand with the palm turned down over the left hand and the fingers of each hand slightly curled around each other."
I cannot leave this great book and its truly vital subject without reading to you the Foreward as written by Mr. M. Robert Barnett, Executive Director of the American Foundation for the Blind: "We would like to take this opportunity," he writes, "to express our appreciation to the many persons professionally involved in work for the blind across the country whose five years of hard work, creativity, and experience have made A STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE TO PERSONAL MANAGEMENT FOR BLIND PERSONS a reality. For many years, countless persons have expressed a need for such a manual and we hope that this publication will help to fill that need."
I would like to know who those "countless persons" are who have expressed a need for such a manual, wouldn't you? Are they blind persons--and if so have they been waiting all these years without being able to test the water, clap the hands, lift the bale, tote the barge, nod, shake, shimmy, rattle and roll? How have they managed their lives all these years without this personal guide from the American Foundation and its cohorts?
But maybe they aie not the ones who have expressed a need for such a manual. Perhaps it is not the blind at all but as the Foundation puts it those "professionally involved in work for the blind" to whom this definitive guidebook is addressed. Not our blind brothers, but our blind brothers' keepers. Presumably they are the ones who are to conduct the "orientation" sessions which precede each of the various procedures and techniques--such as: "Discuss types of ties and materials from which ties are made (silk, linen, leather, knit, synthetic, and wool)." And: "Discuss reasons for brushing hair regularly and the suitability of different types of brushes" (scrub brushes, tooth brushes, horse brushes, sagebrushes, brushes with the law, etc.). Well, admittedly, I added the last part of that sentence myself; but I maintain that it is no different in character, and no more foolish, than the trivial and vacuous material set forth in most of the two hundred thirty-nine pages.
Indeed, the very triviality and vacuity of this misguided guidebook may deceive some readers into dismissing it as an unfortunate exception, not characteristic of the main body of work turned out today by serious scholars and professionals in the field of work with the blind. Let me emphasize, therefore, as strongly as I can, the typical and conventional character of this manual. It is not the exception. Its name is legion; its approach, its philosophy, and its superficial contents have been duplicated many times over in the research and demonstration projects of the American Foundation for the Blind, the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, the college institutes, and the State agencies caught up in the profitable cycle of grants, surveys, tests, and questionnaires.
There is another potential objection to dispose of. That is the supposition that this set of instructions, simple-minded as it is, is not really intended for the ordinary, capable blind person but only for a minority. Moreover, it is true that the book itself makes a verbal nod in this direction, admitting modestly that its techniques are not the only ones possible and that there may be other ways to approach the same goals. But the book also contains an opposite disclaimer, to the effect that the proposed techniques may be too complicated and advanced for some blind persons to handle without preliminary instruction. However that may be, it is clear that this lengthy five-year report is meant to be circulated generally to agencies and schools, to parents and counselors, to guides and custodians, without reservation or qualification.
The best evidence of how this book is intended to be read is to be found in its title. It does not say that it is a step-by-step guide to personal management for mentally retarded or extremely backward blind persons. It does not say it is a guide for tiny children. It says what it means, and means what it says--namely, that it is a STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE TO PERSONAL MANAGEMENT FOR BLIND PERSONS.
And we can do no less than that ourselves; we must also say what we mean. As long as such insulting drivel about us continues to be issued in the name of science by agencies doing work with the blind--as long as Federal money continues to be available to support it--as long as the climate of general public opinion continues to tolerate it--as long as blind persons continue to be found who can be coaxed or hoodwinked into participating in it--then, for just so long must we of the National Federation of the Blind raise our voices to resist it, denounce it, and expose it for the pseudo-science and the fraud which it is.
The Federal research and demonstration projects, the wording on the talking book records, the attempt to abolish the Division for the Blind in Federal rehabilitation, the payment of subminimum wages in sheltered shops and private industry, and the guidebooks to tell us how to run our daily lives are all straws in the wind, signs of the times. But there are other, more hopeful signs. Though the Library of Congress tells us to replace our records in the envelopes and containers, its book selection policies have been refreshingly updated. More and better books are now available to the blind than ever before, including best sellers and popular magazines. Likewise, though the Division for the Blind was abolished at the Federal level, the move was successfully resisted and reversed. And although teachers still talk of blind people who have to read Braille and can't read print, although subminimum wages are still allowed in sheltered shops and private industry, and although the Foundation's guidebook is still distributed by the hundreds and thousands to slow our progress, we (the organized blind) are abroad in the land in growing numbers--aware of the peril and prepared to fight it. It is just that simple: We are prepared to fight, and we will fight. We don't want conflict or trouble with anyone; we don't want to quibble or be aggressive or militant; we don't want strife or dissension but the time is absolutely at an end when we will passively tolerate second-class citizenship and custodial treatment. We are free men, and we intend to act like it. We are free men, and we intend to stay that way. We are free men, and we intend to defend ourselves. Let those who truly have the best interests of the blind at heart join with us as we move into the new era of equality and integration. Let those who call our conduct negative or destructive make the most of it!
I want to say a few words now to those agencies doing work with the blind who march with us in the cause of freedom, who are glad to see the blind emancipated, and who work with us as human beings--not as statistics or case histories or inferior wards. To such agencies I say this: You have nothing to fear from the organized blind movement. Your battles are our battles. Your cause is our cause. Your friends are our friends. Your enemies are our enemies. We will go with you to the legislatures and the Federal Government to secure funds for your operation. We will urge the public to contribute to your support. We will defend you from attack and work with you in a partnership of progress.
Now, let me say something to those agencies who still look back to yesterday, who condescend to the blind, who custodialize and patronize. To them I say this: Your days are numbered. Once men have tasted freedom, they will not willingly or easily return to bondage. You have told us as blind people and you have told the community at large that we are not capable of managing our own affairs, that you are responsible for our lives and our destinies, that we as blind people must be sheltered and segregated--and that even then, we are not capable of earning our own keep. You have told us that we as blind people do not really have anything in common and that we, therefore do not need an organization--that there is no such thing as an "organized blind movement." But you have not spoken the truth.
If you tell us that you are important and necessary to our lives, we reply: It is true. But tear down every agency for the blind in the Nation, destroy every workshop, and burn every professional journal; and we can build them all back if they are needed. But take away the blind, and your journals will go dusty on the shelves. Your counselors will walk the streets for work, and your broom corn will mold and rot in your sheltered shops. Yes, we need you; but you need us, too. We intend to have a voice in your operation and your decisions since what you do affects our lives. We intend to have representation on your boards, and we intend for you to recognize our organizations and treat us as equals. We are not your wards, and there is no way for you to make us your wards. The only question left to be settled is whether you will accept the new conditions and work with us in peace and partnership or whether we must drag you kicking and screaming into the new era. But enter the new era you will, like it or not.
Next, I want to say something to those blind persons who are aware of our movement and who have had an opportunity to join it but who have not seen fit to do so. In this category I also place those blind persons who are among us but not really of us, who (technically speaking) hold membership in the Federation but are not really part of the movement. The non Federation and the non committed blind are a strange phenomenon. Some of them are successful in business or the professions. I have heard them say, "I really don't need the Federation. Of course, If I could do anything to help you people, I would be glad to do it, but I am independent. I have made it on my own." I have heard them say: "You really can't expect me to go down to that local meeting of the blind. Nobody goes there except a few old people, who sit around and drink coffee and plan Christmas parties. I am a successful lawyer, or businessman, or judge; and I am busy. Besides, they never get anything done. They just talk and argue." I have heard them say: "I don't know that I necessarily have anything in common with other blind people just because I'm blind. Almost all my friends are sighted. My life is busy with bowling, hiking, reading, or my business or profession." I have heard them say: "You people in the Federation are too aggressive. You are always in a fight with somebody, or bickering among yourselves. I am an individualist and never was much of a joiner."
I have heard some of them say: "I am an employee of a governmental or private agency doing work with the blind, and I think it would destroy my professional relationship with my clients if I were to work actively in the Federation. Anyway, we all have a common concern, the betterment of blind people; so I'll make my contribution by working as a 'professional' in the field. Besides, not all blind people agree with you or want to join your organization, and as a 'professional' I have to represent and work with all blind people."
I have heard them say all of these things, and to such blind persons I say this: You are patsies! Not only that but you are also deceiving yourselves and failing to act in your own best interest. Further, you are profiting from the labor and sacrifice, and are riding on the backs, of the blind who have joined the movement and worked to make it possible for you to have what you have. Some of you feel superior to many of the blind who belong to the Federation (especially those who work in the sheltered shops or draw welfare), but your feelings of superiority are misplaced; for collectively these people have clothed you and fed you. They have made it possible for you to have such equality in society and such opportunity as you now enjoy. Resent what I say if you will, but it is the truth, whether you like it or not and whether you admit it or not. It is true for those of you who work in the agencies as well as for those of you who work in private endeavor.
If you think this movement should be better or that it should be of higher caliber, then join us and help make it that way. If you think the local meetings or the State conventions are dull or uninspiring, then do your part to make them different. Even animals in the jungle have sense enough to hunt in packs. The blind ought to be at least as intelligent.
We need you, and we want you as active participants in the movement; but until you will join, we must do the best we can without you. We must carry you on our backs and do your work for you, and we will do it. The fact that we say you are patsies does not mean that we resent you. Far from it. You are our brothers, and we will continue to look upon you as such, regardless of how irresponsibly you behave. We are trying to get you to think about the implications of your actions. We are trying to get you to join with us to help make things better for other blind people and for yourselves. We are trying to get you to stop being patsies.
Finally, I want to address myself to the active members of the NFB--to the blind, and to our sighted brothers who have made our cause their cause. To the active Federationists I say this: We are not helpless, and we are not children. We know our problems, and we know how to solve them. The challenge which faces us is clear, and the means of meeting that challenge are qually clear. If we fail in courage or nerve or dedication, we have only ourselves to blame.
But, of course, we will not fail. The stakes are too high and the need too great to permit it. To paraphrase the Biblical statement: Upon the rock of Federationism we have built our movement, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it! Since 1969 we have talked a great deal about joining each other on the barricades. If there was ever a time, that time is now. What we in the Federation do during the next decade may well determine the fate of the blind for a hundred years to come. To win through to success will require all that we have in the way of purpose, dedication, loyalty, good sense, and guts. Above all, we need front-line soldiers, who are willing to make sacrifices and work for the cause. Therefore, I ask you again today (as I did last year and the year before): Will you join me on the barricades?
____________
1. American Foundation for the Blind, A STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE TO PERSONAL MANAGEMENT FOR BLIND PERSONS, New York, New York, 1970.by Kenneth Jernigan, President
National Federation of the Blind
When the Commission on Standards and Accreditation on Services for the Blind (COMSTAC) and its successor organization, the National Accreditation Council for Agencies Serving the Blind and Visually Handicapped (NAC), came into being during the 1960's, the leaders of the organized blind movement sounded the alarm. It was pointed out that the American Association of Workers for the Blind had unsuccessfully tried, during the 1950's, to gain control of the field of work for the blind by instituting what it called a "seal of good practices." Of the several hundred agencies and organizations in this country doing work with the blind only twenty or thirty ever applied for and received this "seal." Several of those which did were not regarded by the blind as either very effective or very progressive. As the decade of the '60's approached, the proponents of rigid agency control apparently decided to change tactics. The American Foundation for the Blind and certain other leading agency officials adopted the idea of establishing a so-called "independent" accrediting system for all groups doing work with the blind. Although individual blind persons who were agency officials were involved in the establishment and development of COMSTAC, the blind as a group were not consulted--that is, the representative organizations of the blind were not given a voice, except occasionally as a matter of tokenism. Thus, the consumers of the services were not heard in any meaningful way, and they had no part in developing or promulgating the standards to govern the agencies established to give them assistance.
Profiting by the earlier failure of the AAWB "seal of good practices" experiment, the authors of COMSTAC built more carefully. The American Foundation for the Blind appointed an "independent" commission--the Commission on Standards and Accreditation for Services for the Blind (COMSTAC). The full time staff consultant for COMSTAC was a staff member of the AFB, on loan to the group, purely as a means of demonstrating the Foundation's concern with the improvement of services for the blind. To add respectability, people of prestige outside of the field of work with the blind were placed on the commission--public officials, business executives, the dean of the Temple Law School, etc. These were people of good will and integrity, but they were not knowledgeable concerning the problems of blindness. Obviously they took their tone and orientation from the Foundation appointees on COMSTAC. All of these appointees, it must be borne in mind, were high-ranking officials of agencies doing work with the blind. Not one of them represented the blind themselves. Not one of them came from a membership organization of blind persons.
As its work developed, COMSTAC divided into subcommittees, involving hundreds of people throughout the country, since the subcommittees further subdivided into smaller groups. Again, the pattern was followed. The subcommittees, or the subcommittees of the subcommittees, had, in every instance, at least one of the COMSTAC agency officials as a member, plus people of prestige and ordinary rank and file agency workers or board members. In fact, at the sub-subcommittee level a few members of the organized blind movement were even added.
The American Foundation for the Blind and COMSTAC were later to proclaim with pride that they had sought and achieved a broad consensus throughout the field of work with the blind. However, the method of arriving at that consensus was, to say the least, novel. At Denver in the summer of 1965, for instance, the AAWB convention was largely taken up with a discussion of the COMSTAC standards--to gather opinions and achieve consensus, it was said. Only the discussion leaders had copies of the standards (there had been a delay in mimeographing), and any touchy point which was raised was answered either by the statement that it was covered somewhere else in the COMSTAC standards or that another group was discussing that matter and it was not properly the concern of the group in which it had been raised.
Home teachers from throughout the country were present and were considering the standards affecting their specialty. The overwhelming majority apparently disagreed with a particular item in the COMSTAC document and suggested that a vote be taken to determine the sentiments of the group. They were informed by the discussion leader that a vote certainly would not be taken but that their views would be reported to COMSTAC, which had the sole responsibility for deciding such matters.
Throughout the summer and fall of 1965 promises were repeatedly made that copies of the proposed COMSTAC standards would be made available. They were forthcoming, hundreds of pages of them--three days prior to the final conference in New York City, which brought together hundreds of agency representatives for the announced purpose of arriving at a final consensus. Dr. Jacobus tenBroek and I attended that conference. Again, the democracy and fair play with which it was conducted were novel. One had to indicate in writing ahead of time which particular group discussion he would like to attend. There was no assurance that his choice would be honored. He might be assigned to another group. He could not move from group to group at will. If he had not received a special invitation, he could not attend the meetings. COMSTAC appointees were stationed at the door to check credentials, and I personally witnessed the turning away of one agency director who had been critical of COMSTAC.
It is no wonder that the blind people of the country felt apprehensive. What type of standards were likely to emerge from a commission so appointed and so conducted? Not only the blind but also many of the agencies expressed concern. Many felt that the AFB and Federal rehabilitation officials (unwittingly aided by people of prestige in the broader community) would impose a system of rigid controls-which would stifle initiative, foster domination, and take the emphasis off of real service and place it on bureaucracy, red tape, and professional jargon. It was further felt that what purported to begin as a voluntary system would (once firmly established) become mandatory. The AFB and other proponents of COMSTAC and its successor organization, NAC, vigorously denied these assertions. COMSTAC and NAC were to be truly independent. Their very watchword was to be objectivity. They were to be the means of improving services to blind people throughout the country and the vehicle for progressive thought and constructive change.
Readers of The Braille Monitor will remember that from 1965 through 1968 a detailed analysis was made of the COMSTAC and NAC reports and activities. The fact that the Federation has not called attention in recent months to COMSTAC and NAC should not lead the blind to believe that the threat has passed or the situation improved. Quite the contrary is the case.
The question of NAC's independence, for example, is no longer a matter for serious debate. The Scriptures tell us that "where a man's treasure is, there will his heart be also." In an official NAC document entitled "Budget Comparison--1968-and 1969," dated April 15, 1968 the following items appear.
"Total approved budget calendar year 1968, $154,034; total projected calendar year 1969, $154,000. Estimated income 1968: grant from American Foundation for the Blind $70,000; grant from Department of Health, Education and Welfare $75,000. Estimated income 1969: grant from American Foundation for the Blind $70,000; grant from Department of Health, Education and Welfare $70,000."
Today (in 1971) the overwhelming majority of NAC's funds still come from HEW and the American Foundation for the Blind. Many of the NAC meetings are held at the AFB building in New York, and the executive director of NAC is a former Foundation staff member, the same one who was on "loan" to COMSTAC. When the first annual NAC awards were given, in 1970, it may be of significance that two recipients were named: Mr. Jansen Noyes, President of the Board of the American Foundation for the Blind; and Miss Mary Switzer, the long time head of rehabilitation in the Federal Department of Health, Education and Welfare. Even more to the point may be Miss Switzer's comments upon that occasion as reported in the NAC minutes of April 24, 1970: "She predicted that difficult times might lie ahead if agencies accept the idea of standards but do nothing about them. The expending or withholding of public money can provide the incentive that is needed."
Thus spoke Miss Switzer confirming what Federation leaders had predicted and COMSTAC spokesmen had denied a decade ago. The full meaning of Miss Switzer's statement was spelled out by Alexander Handel, Executive Director of NAC, as reported in the NAC minutes of April 25, 1970: "Mr. Handel reported a new and important step in encouraging accreditation. The Council of State Administrators has passed a resolution that by July 1, 1974 State rehabilitation agencies will require that agencies from which they purchase services be accredited." The use of the word "encouraging" in this context is almost reminiscent of George Orwell's double-think and new-speak of 1984--only thirteen years away, at that. Perhaps sooner. The "encouraging" of agencies to seek accreditation from NAC will probably be called by some by the ugly name of blackmail. The pressure for conformity and the concentration of power could well be the most serious threat to good programs for the blind in the decade ahead.
Federationists who attended the 1966 Louisville Convention will remember that a report on COMSTAC and NAC was given at that time. I had been officially asked to serve on the NAC board. The offer was, of course, tokenism of the most blatant sort; and the question was whether to accept, leaving the Federation open to the charge of approving NAC actions, or to reject, exposing us to the charge of non-cooperation and leaving us with no means of observing and getting information. Federationists will remember that it was decided that I should accept the invitation. Thus, I have been a member of the NAC board since its inception. In the spring of 1970 I was elected to another three-year term. There are more than thirty NAC board members, of whom I am one.
While expressing my minority views, I have tried to be personally congenial and friendly with the NAC board members. Nevertheless, tokenism remains tokenism. The other members of the board not only seem unconcerned with but unaware of the non-representative character of NAC. It is as if General Motors, Chrysler, Ford, and American Motors should set up a council and put six or seven officials from each of their companies on its board and then ask the UAW to contribute a single representative. What would the unions do in such a situation? What would racial minorities do if their representative organizations were offered such tokenism-in the establishment and promulgation of standards affecting their lives? I think we know what they would do. They would take both political and court action, and they would instigate mass demonstrations. Perhaps the blind should take a leaf from the same book. We cannot and should not exhibit endless patience. We cannot and should not forever tolerate the intolerable. I continue to sit on the NAC board, but I often wonder why. It does not discuss the real problems which face the blind today or the methods of solving those problems. In fact, NAC itself may well be more a part of the problem than the solution. I repeat that tokenism by any other name is still tokenism. In May of 1969, for instance, I received a document from NAC entitled "Statement of Understanding Among National Accreditation Council, National Industries for the Blind and the General Council of Workshops for the Blind." This document was sent to all NAC board members with the request that they vote to approve or disapprove it. It contained six points, of which one and five are particularly pertinent. They are as follows: "1. By June 30, 1970, all NIB affiliated shops shall have either: a. applied to NAC for accreditation and submitted a self-study guide (or) b. applied to the General Council for a Certificate of Affiliation with NIB and submitted a self-study guide. 5. Certificates of Affiliation with NIB entitle shops to membership in the General Council and to access through NIB to: a. Government business allocated by NIB, b. Commercial business allocated by NIB, c. Consulting services of NIB, d. Any and all other benefits of NIB affiliation." In other words if a workshop for the blind wishes any contracts from the Federal Government it had better get into line and "volunteer" for accreditation by NAC. No pressure, of course, merely a system of "voluntary accreditation!" As you might expect I voted no on the NIB agreement. Along with my ballot, I sent the following comments:
"I do not approve this statement because I do not believe government contracts and other benefits to workshops should be conditioned upon their accreditation by NAC. Rather, receipt of government contracts and other benefits should depend upon the quality of performance of the workshop in question: Does the shop pay at least a minimum wage? Do its workers have the rights associated with collective bargaining? What sort of image of blindness does it present to the public?
"Prior to NAC (in the days of COMSTAC) many of us said that NAC would become a vehicle for blackmail--dressed out nicely, of course, in professional jargon. It would appear that the prophecy is beginning to come true, earlier assurances to the contrary notwithstanding."
As I say, I voted no. What do you suppose the final tally of the ballots indicated? Twenty-seven yes votes and one no vote. How different the results might have been if there had been equal representation of the blind themselves and the agencies! Yes, tokenism is still tokenism.
In order that my position cannot be twisted or misinterpreted I would like to say that the quarrel is not with the concept of accreditation itself. Rather, we object to what is being done in the name of accreditation. Proper accreditation by a properly accredited group is a constructive thing. What NAC is doing is something else altogether.
There is, of course, not time here to go into the details of all of the standards originally developed by COMSTAC and now being fostered by NAC, but a brief sample is sufficient to make the point. Federationists will remember that The Braille Monitor for February, 1966 carried an analysis of the COMSTAC standards on physical facilities. That analysis said in part: "The standards" [on physical facilities] "are perhaps notable chiefly in that they are so vague and minimal as to be equally applicable to office buildings, nursing homes or universities by the simple substitution of the names of these other facilities. . . .
"Perhaps a brief rundown of the standards themselves would serve as the best and most complete illustration (headings theirs).
"1. Overall Suitability--The total facility is constructed to best serve the needs of the particular agency. It will adequately serve everyone concerned. It will meet the requirements of its governing body, the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, and the city building code. The physical facilities will be helpful to the program.
"2. Location--The facility is located where it can easily be reached by staff, clients, and others who need to use it. The facility should be close to shopping and other community interests. The location is reasonably safe, with hazards minimized.
"3. Grounds--The grounds will be large enough to allow for future expansion. They will be pleasant ('free of undue nuisances and hazards'), with parking areas and roadways. Signs will be posted to help people locate the proper areas.
"4. Activity Area--The layout of the facility will be efficient. The facility will be designed for the planned activities, will be large enough and well organized (reception rooms next to entries, work areas together, etc.). Sufficient maintenance will be provided for.
"5. Privacy--People will have as much privacy as individual cases call for. Confidentiality will be maintained.
"6. Health and Safety--The health and safety codes of the community will be met. Sufficient heat and light will be provided. Sanitary conditions will be as good as possible. Suitable entries will be provided for wheelchairs, etc. Safety features will be related to the level of competence of the occupants, the activities undertaken and the equipment used. Adequate first aid facilities are provided.
"7. Fire and Disaster Protection--All buildings will be so designed and equipped as to minimize the danger of fire. The buildings will be inspected by local authorities and/or independent authorities and records of inspection kept. Smoking areas are clearly specified. Proper protection shall be provided the occupants of the facility to minimize danger should fire or disaster occur. Suitable fire extinguishers will be provided. Fire alarms will be installed as to be heard throughout the facility. Fire drills will be held irregularly. Special provision will be made for fire warnings to deaf-blind.
"8. Maintenance--'The condition of the physical facility gives evidence of planful and effective maintenance and housekeeping.'
"9. Remodeling--When remodeling is undertaken, it should be to best suit the needs of the program.
"The preceding is an inclusive summary! One can imagine the breadth of interpretation that can result from application of these standards. One can also imagine the range of individual whim and axe-grinding, not to say blackmail and favoritism, that can enter into the proposed accreditation of agencies for the blind based on such vague and capricious requirements. The danger to be constantly anticipated is the possibility of varying application of standards to friends and foes when 'accrediting' agencies. . . .
"One is tempted to dismiss this entire report of 'Standards for Physical Facilities' with the single word, 'Blah!' But more intensive study indicates otherwise. Tucked away among the platitudes and the generalities are the age-old misconceptions and stereotypes.
"What, for instance, is meant by the requirement that a facility for the blind be located near to shopping and other community interests, and that it be in a location reasonably safe, with hazards minimized? The exact words of the committee are, 'Where undue hazards cannot be avoided, proper measures are instituted to assure the safety of all persons coming to the agency. (For example, where an agency is on a street with heavy traffic, a light, or crosswalk or other means is available for safe crossing by blind persons.)'
"If this standard is simply meant to express the general pious platitude that everybody ought to be as safe as possible, then what a farcical and pathetic waste of time and money to assemble a committee to spell out what everybody already knows. On the other hand, if the standard means to imply that the blind are not able to live and compete among the ordinary hazards of the regular workaday world and that they need more shelter and care than others, the implications are not only false but they are insidiously vicious.
"Of a similar character is the committee's statement that the grounds must 'provide pleasant and appropriate surroundings, and be free of undue nuisances and hazards.' Surely we do not need a special commission on Standards and Accreditation to tell us that people should live in pleasant surroundings that are free of undue hazards, if this is all that is meant. If, however, the committee is saying that the blind require surroundings that are more 'pleasant and free from hazards' than the surroundings required by other people, one cannot help but be unhappily reminded of the 19th Century concept that the blind should be entertained and provided with recreation, that they should be helped in every way possible to 'live with their misfortune.'
"If this type of analysis seems blunt, one can only reply that this is no time for nice words and mousey phrases." The people who were formerly the Commission on Standards, and are now the National Accreditation Council, "hold themselves out to the public at large as the qualified experts, the people who have the right to make standards and grant or refuse accreditation to all and sundry. These are not children indulging in the innocent games of childhood. They are adults, playing with the lives of hundreds of thousands of people."
Federationists should review The Braille Monitor from 1965 through 1968 to study the COMSTAC reports in light of present developments. I have not tried here to analyze the content of those reports. Mostly it is bad, and the standards and rules established by COMSTAC and NAC harmful. Let anyone who doubts this assertion read the COMSTAC reports and the Monitor analyses. They speak for themselves.
One final matter requires comment. At a recent meeting of the National Accreditation Council I was telling a new member of the board (a prominent businessman totally uninformed about the problems faced by the blind) that I thought most of the actions of NAC were irrelevant. He seemed surprised and said something to this effect:
"If you think what we are doing here is not relevant, what is relevant?"
To which I said, "Last fall a blind man in Minneapolis (a person who had worked for several years as a computer programmer at Honeywell and was laid off because of the recession) applied to take a civil service examination for computer programmer with the city of Minneapolis. His application was rejected, on the grounds of blindness. The National Federation of the Blind helped him with advice and legal counsel. As a result, he took the examination, and he now has a job with the city of Minneapolis as a computer programmer.
"How many of the people who are on the NAC board," I asked, "are even aware that such an incident occurred? How many of them think it is important?"
"Or," I went on, "consider another incident. A few weeks ago in Ohio a blind high school senior (duly elected by her class) was denied the right to attend the American Legion Girls' State. The story was carried nationwide by United Press, and the matter is still pending. Do you see any of these people here today concerned or excited about this case? Do you see them trying to do anything about it?"
"Well," my companion replied, "your organization seems to be working on matters like this. Maybe NAC is doing good in other areas."
"The difficulty," I told him, "is that the actions of NAC are helping to create the kind of problem situations I have been describing to you."
"How?" he asked me.
"NAC," I said, "accredits workshops, for instance. What kind of standards does it use in determining whether a shop should be approved and presented to the public as a worthy and progressive institution? NAC is concerned about whether the workshop has a good accounting system. It is concerned about good pay and good working conditions for the professional staff (almost all of them sighted). It is concerned with the physical facilities and (perhaps) whether there is a psychologist or psychiatrist available to minister to the blind workers. But what about minimum wages for those same blind workers, or the right of collective bargaining, or grievance committees? On such items NAC is silent. It will accredit a sheltered shop which pays less than fifty cents an hour to its blind workers. By so doing, it puts its stamp of approval on such practices. It helps perpetuate the system that has kept the blind in bondage and made them second-class citizens through the centuries. It helps to slam the door on the computer programmer in Minneapolis and the high school student in Ohio. Worst of all, perhaps, it reinforces and helps to continue the myth that blindness means inferiority, that the blind are unable to compete on terms of equality in regular industry or the professions, that the blind should be grateful for what they have and stay in their places. The workshop example is only that, an example. The same theme is everywhere present in NAC's action and standards--and, for that matter, in its very makeup."
As we talked, my businessman companion seemed shocked that there were sheltered shops paying less than the minimum wage to blind workers. Yet, he is on the NAC board, lending his name to the accreditation. I pointed out to him a variety of other ways in which the work of NAC is helping to promote misconceptions about blindness and add to our problems. I can only hope that the seeds I planted will bear fruit.
To round out the picture we are considering today, one further item might be mentioned: The April 25, 1968 minutes of NAC report as follows:
"Over thirty agencies and schools have indicated, in writing, an interest in applying for accreditation. Official applications have been received from six agencies. Some of these have already paid the application fee. The American Council of the Blind is the first membership association to apply for membership in the National Accreditation Council."
In a letter dated July 11, 1968 from Alexander Handel, Executive Director of the National Accreditation Council for Agencies Serving the Blind and Visually Handicapped, to members of the NAC Board of Directors an article is discussed which appears in the July, 1968 issue of The Braille Forum (the official publication of the American Council of the Blind). The article says in part:
"It should be emphasized, however, that from the first, ACB officers and members actively consulted with the various committees developing the standards, and ACB was the only national organization of the blind which both participated in and financially supported the National Conference on Standards which led to the formation of the National Accreditation Council."
I give you this quotation without comment. It speaks for itself. So do the actions of NAC. I presume all of you have read the exchange of correspondence concerning the appearance of NAC representatives at this meeting today. The contempt and condescension inherent in NAC's bland assumption that it was proper to reject our invitation to appear at this convention because a debate might occur are clear for all to see. Likewise, the agreement just concluded between NAC and the American Foundation for the Blind whereby the Foundation will work with agencies and help prepare them for accreditation is equally revealing.
In any case the one central point which must be repeatedly hammered home is the total irrelevance of NAC as it is now constituted and as it is now performing. What we need today and in the years ahead is not more detailed standards but a real belief in the competence and innate normality of blind people, a willingness on the part of agency officials to help blind people secure meaningful training and competitive employment, a recognition that the blind are able to participate fully in the mainstream of American life. We need acceptance and equality, not shelter and care.
When seen in this light, NAC must be viewed as one of our most serious problems in the decade ahead. The blind of the nation should thoroughly inform themselves about its activities and should insist upon a voice in determining the character of programs affecting their lives. We should insist that State and Federal Governments not delegate their powers of setting standards for State agencies to a private group, which is not responsive to the needs or views of the consumers of the services. It is true that many of the agencies doing work with the blind need to be reformed and improved, but NAC is not the entity to do it. We the organized blind intend (in the best tradition of American democracy) to have something to say about the scope and direction of the reform and the improvement. We are not children, nor are we psychological cripples. We are free citizens, fully capable of participating in the determination of our own destiny, and we have every right and intention of having something to say about what is done with our lives.
Address for the
National Federation of the Blind
National Conference
Shamrock-Hilton Hotel
Houston, Texas-July 9, 1971
by Arthur L. Brandon, President
National Accreditation Council
New York City
Your invitation for me to speak before the annual meeting of the National Federation of the Blind is one I value highly. The appreciation of the National Accreditation Council for Agencies Serving the Blind and Visually Handicapped is further evidenced by the presence also of Mr. Alexander Handel, Executive Director.
We bring you greetings from fellow officers, staff and the board of directors and wish for you a happy and successful meeting in this great Texas city, Houston. Mr. Jernigan has accepted NAC's invitation to speak at the board's meeting next December on some matters that concern him and you, and upon which he speaks and writes with great fervor, as you must have noted.
In appearing before the Federation one is impressed with your zeal for making life for blind persons one of self-determination, of mutual helpfulness, of achievement, of enjoyment. The National Accreditation Council puts it in another way, but with a similar meaning or goal: to improve the services available to blind men, women, and children. It seems most appropriate, therefore, that we try to find ways of working together to reach our common goals and desires. I hope this meeting today and the one next December will be helpful to that end. If we can clear up some misunderstandings, develop a respect for each other's aims, and if we can overlook some frailties or disagreements over methods, and base our trust on our strengths and agree on the worth of our hoped-for accomplishments, then we will find solutions. We will be helping the blind, not fighting over procedures or semantics, though these do have their values if they develop strengths.
One of the stories of my native State of West Virginia which I have remembered for more than sixty years is about an eight-year-old boy reporting a disagreement between his father and mother over who would eat the last few pieces of cheese in the house. While they were arguing, a rat slipped in (or was it the boy) and ate the cheese.
You may be sure that if all the persons and agencies concerned with improving services for blind and visually handicapped spend much of their time in argument over the methods, procedures, or structures, the blind will suffer. This does not mean we should not discuss these where they are essential to success of a program. Let us make common efforts to find where we are together and what we can do to improve services. I am confident that this is your wish, for many of you have so reported.
A recent example of the Federation's effectiveness working with others such as the National Industries for the Blind, the National Council of Directors of State Agencies for the Blind, the American Association of Workers for the Blind, the American Council of the Blind, and the American Foundation for the Blind, and others suggests the value of cooperation. I refer to the reversal in the proposed reorganization plan for the United States Rehabilitation Services Administration. Had it not been for the Federation and other groups, the Division of Services to the Blind probably would have been submerged under an umbrella known as Special Populations. I recognize that blind is a special population all right, but the way to treat the blind specially is by giving specific and identified service, not by hiding it, or merging it. Later I shall return to the values of cooperation. Now let us examine some of NAC's activities.
The National Accreditation Council is now only four and one-half years of age. While it has been praised by many people, it nevertheless is faced with some problems, including the financial one. Perhaps foremost is its growing pains as a pioneer in the accreditation field, rehabilitation as contrasted with education, or hospitals, or the professions such as law or medicine or engineering. These institutions and professions have long had required standards to meet, ethical principles to uphold, and public as well as individual responsibilities. Admittedly, there have been weaknesses, and some low standards in the well-established institutions and some quacks and charlatans and even crooks in the professions, but that is to judge by the worst, the unusual, not the best or the normal. On academic matters, meeting today's standards for accreditation has aided the colleges to advance in strength as much as the bull-dozer has gone ahead of a man with a plow.
No accreditation ageny can revolutionize the whole program of institutions or agencies overnight, nor should it. Despite the ridicule of COMSTAC and NAC standards you have heard today, genuine standards are evolving, and today's successes will lead to tomorrow's improvements, to the benefit of the users of services and facilities. It can also lead to that constant burr or stimulus of "what have you done for me lately?"
As with the colleges, where the student is the chief beneficiary and with hospitals where the patient is, so with agencies serving the blind, the blind person, the consumer, profits most from improved quality of service.
You may properly ask, what is happening, what is NAC doing?
You will recall that for a half century or longer, many leaders in the field of services to the blind, and most individuals visually handicapped had been seeking ways and means of obtaining better service. Nearly a decade ago a prominent committee recommended the creation of an independent agency that would study and make recommendations about what should be done to reach the desired results. At this point, the American Foundation for the Blind agreed to arrange for the financing of such an agency. Thus, there was created The Commission on Standards and Accreditiation of Services for the Blind, soon to be known as COMSTAC.
After three years of research, hearings, a national conference, study of existing literature, with the help of a thousand or more persons, including some of the Federation's members, and the detailed work of a dozen committees in many meetings, a Report: "Strengthened Services for the Blind," was published. That the Report was wanted and needed is evidenced by its acceptance.
One leading authority in the field of the blind wrote, "It is a document that became almost overnight the most praised as well as the most widely distributed piece of professional literature in the field." May I remind you that this Report codified standards in seven fields of service to the blind and five areas of administration applicable to all fields.
A basic recommendation of the Commission was that a permanent independent accreditation body be created. Thus, the National Accreditiation Council for Agencies Serving the Blind and Visually Handicapped was born.
Although the accreditation process may be familiar to most of you, it seems appropriate to review it.
In the first year of its existence, the NAC worked on and published guidelines for agencies and schools that would seek accreditation. Organizations desiring accreditation after study of the guidelines go through a rather extensive self-evaluation, perhaps the most valuable step in the whole process. If an agency or school feels it is qualified, it asks NAC to send an "on-site review team." These reviewers are well-qualified men and women who serve as volunteers, and are reimbursed only for their travel expenses. About eight hundred such volunteers are on NAC's rolls. Obtaining their service is one of the Council's greatest achievements. More than two hundred have already given excellent service.
The visiting team reviews the organization's self-study, examines all parts of its operation and facilities, holds conferences with board and staff members, and consults community leaders. In fact, the visiting team does about anything that will help it determine whether the agency does what it claims, or what it can and should do.
One problem in the "on-site" visits is the difficulty in interviewing consumers. The agency, unlike the school, does not have its clients around at the time of the review. For example, the services of State agencies are diversified and extend to the borders of the State. Please remember the visitors are unpaid volunteers, and that travel costs are heavy. Nevertheless, study is being given as to how information may be gathered in a way that it will be useful in the evaluation of an agency's consumer relationships. This would appear to be an area where you could be helpful, and where both your knowledge and your concern could be combined to develop better service through accreditation. If sufficient interviews are not practicable, perhaps some instrument, such as a questionnaire, might be.
No agency or school is perfect. Nor does it have to be perfect to achieve accreditation. A visiting team may uncover weaknesses that familiarity with their organization caused the self-evaluators to overlook. Correction quite often is not difficult. The on-site team drafts an extended report, and a copy is sent to the applicant organization, as well as to the Council's Commission on Accreditation. These reports have been very helpful to agencies, enabling them among many things to get budget increases, salary adjustments, and tenure provisions. One, known to NAC, was able to get money for a much needed building, and in all cases, they have become capable of offering better services to the blind. A significant by-product in some cases is that there evolves a more desirable client-staff-board-community relationship.
Following the self-evaluation, the on-site review, and the REPORT, NAC's Commission on Accreditation may take one of three actions: I, It may accredit; 2, It may deny accreditation; or 3, It may defer accreditation, pending improvement in one or more phases that are significant. Minor deficiencies are noted but are not critical in the decision. Only in case of accreditation does the Commission make any public announcement of its decision, though the school or agency not accredited is free to use the report if it chooses in its effort to effect the changes necessary to obtain accreditation. One agency got off the deferred list in a year; a school was able to eliminate its tentative status within the alloted time.
To date 33 agencies and schools are accredited in 22 States and the District of Columbia and as many more are in some stage of the process. The goal for the year is a total of 58 accredited members. While the number accredited may not appear large, it is indeed a remarkable achievement when one considers the detail involved, or measures it alongside other accreditation bodies in the beginning years.
NAC's total impact cannot be judged by the number or organizations accredited. It's influence should be measured by the catalytic effect it has had with many agencies and schools and the persons working in them or for them. An example underscores this effect. In one of our major cities a local non-accredited agency serving the blind released a blind staff member without stated cause. A group of blind people called the agency's attention to NAC's standards on tenure, on required notice of discharge, of written evaluation of the person's work, and proper notice of alleged shortcomings. The agency responded that it is in process of revising its personnel practices to meet NAC standards. Under NAC standards, a staff member is no longer subject to an unfair whim or prejudice of a supervisor.
Several factors are combining to make it more and more essential for agencies to improve, to add to their efficiency. Along with greater attention to all social and welfare conditions, our national population is growing, the life span of persons is increasing, and the visually handicapped man like all others is demanding and expecting better services. Let me accent this by quoting and adapting from a paper I wrote a few months ago on the "Implications of Accreditation for the 1970's."
"Blind persons and agencies serving the blind do not live in a world all their own, though at times it must seem like it. Such agencies and people live also in a world at war, with inner-city conflicts or crowded urban environments, or in unconcerned small towns or rural communities, in polluted atmosphere or waterways, or blighted lands, in an economy at cross purposes.
"The blind man, woman, or child senses the problems he may not actually see. Indeed, he may feel the results of pollution or inflation or repression more deeply than the sighted person. Add these to the everyday necessities of mobility, of gathering information, of enjoying reading, of communication of all sorts, along with earning a living, expending his funds in the most desirable manner, and one can understand why the agencies that serve him have manifold tasks ahead.
"The agency itself is being asked more and more to justify its existence, to show proof of its services, to establish its worthiness for public support, both financial and moral. Merely enlarging its program to include more people or more services is not enough. The question more frequently asked than how much do you do, is how well do you do it? Quality control is more to be desired in service to human beings than it is in the manufacture of products.
"Let me emphasize this demand for quality with two brief examples:
"1. Federal and State Governments with steadily increasing emphasis will inquire into the quality of performance before they will make grants of funds for rehabilitation. This is specifically illustrated by a Resolution passed on April 22, 1970, at the Spring Meeting of the Council of State Administrators of Vocational Rehabilitation. It reads:
By June 30, 1974, all facilities providing services to clients of State Divisions of Vocational Rehabilitation will have:
'1. Applied for accreditation to
a. The Commission of Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities (CARF), or
b. The National Accreditation Council (NAC), or
c. The National Policy and Performance Council (NPPC) (applicable only to agencies applying for Training Service Grants).
'2. Received an on-site survey from either CARF, NAC, or NPPC; or completed the self-study guide prerequisite to NIB certification.
'3. Outlined written plans (by June 30, 1974) to meet the accreditation no later than June 30, 1976.'
"2. Our United Way (formerly. The United Fund) or Community Chests throughout the nation, facing growing needs for careful allocations of their monies, also are showing evidence in advance of a demand for greater control of quality. Uniform accounting is only a first step.
"Recently, some of my colleagues of the National Accreditation Council and I appeared before the National Budget and Consultation Committee that represents the United Way to explain the program of NAC. We learned from the questions asked and we were there primarily to urge support for blind agencies, since we do not solicit United Way for support for NAC, that probably within this decade all blind service agencies in the fund must meet quality requirements if they are to remain on approved lists for gifts."
You can appreciate from this trend that NAC's fear is that it will not be able to move fast enough in reviewing and accrediting agencies. But with the wonderful cooperation being received, we are optimistic.
NAC, like any organization, must be concerned not only with its own purposes but also with its structure and its finances for meeting its responsibilities.
NAC is incorporated under the laws of the State of New York as a non-profit, public service organization. Its by-laws provide for membership control through an annual meeting, and through a Board of Directors elected by the members, and not by any other body, as was stated here today. The Board in turn is charged to engage staff, set up committees, authorize budgets, and be responsible for policies concerning program and management.
Each member agency or school may have two voting members on the Council, one a professional and one a volunteer, which means neither has absolute control. All Board members are elected by the Council, which is member controlled. Because of the Council's youth, some present board members are the original incorporators; but they too are elected by the Council--a normal procedure in most organizations. Most of the original Board members will rotate off within the next two years. NAC meets the standards it recommends to agencies for Board membership.
If you examine the makeup of the present NAC board, you will note that most are so-called public members. Yet any board would be handicapped if it did not have on its roll some professional workers such as your President, Mr. Jernigan. The NAC Board has an excellent mixture of public or volunteer members and professionals in service to the blind.
Seven of the thirty-five NAC Board members make their living in services to the blind. Four of these seven are themselves blind. Occupations of the other twenty-eight members are varied--lawyers, educators, engineers, business men, industrialists, physicians, a banker, an accountant, government officials and civic leaders. Two of the twenty-eight are blind.
Let me comment for sake of illustration about four or five of the Board members. To omit any name on the Board is an injustice, but I am sure you and they will understand. One Board member is a noted ophthalmologist. Dr. Richard Hoover, known in person or by reputation by most of you also as the man who devised the Hoover Cane Method of Travel. His work on low vision aids for enhancement or conservation of sight is also well known.
Mr. J. Kenneth Cozier is a nationally acclaimed industrialist who despite his blindness has organized and conducted successful manufacturing enterprises. He devotes much of his time to helping other blind persons achieve education and skills that will enable them to advance their own potential for success and enjoyment in life.
Mr. Melvin Glasser is director of the Social Security Department of the United Auto Workers of America, and chairman of the governing board of Tuskegee Institute. You may remember him also as one of the key men raising funds for the National Foundation that led to a cure for infantile paralysis.
Your own Kenneth Jernigan, as you well know, is an influential administrator of a State agency. His special knowledge of management, along with his point of view about you the consumer, adds a significant dimension to the Board's deliberations. And where does one find a greater statesman in the field of the blind than Peter Salmon, or a more effective leader in rehabilitation services than Miss Mary Switzer? Some have attained national, even world-wide recognition for their professional achievements or social viewpoints. At times, the Board has had as members two former university presidents, one of whom was a governor of a State and then an ambassador to a foreign country. We have tried to obtain the interest of a broad public in order to lay a base of strong moral and financial support for needed services for the blind.
I take your time to note the type and varied membership of the Board in order to call your attention to a basic principle of NAC, and that is that accreditation serves all the public--the blind consumer of service, the provider of service, and the financial supporter of service, whether he be donor or taxpayer. Why, you ask? Because the latter two are essential to the first. Of course, without the consumer, the user of service, there need be no provider or supporter. But in our country we have, what is it, a million persons who are blind or have serious visual handicaps, some say more, and some also say the proportion as well as the actual number is growing. Be that as it may, with estimates by the National Eye Institute that approximately 50,000 persons a year will be added to the number who will be legally blind, you can appreciate the growing need for services, for personnel to do the work, and for money to support the programs.
Agencies, public and private, are said to spend in excess of a half billion dollars a year, and individuals perhaps as much, in providing or obtaining services.
It is no more reasonable to expect that all workers, professional and others, or all agency board members or indeed NAC Board members themselves be blind than it is to expect that cancer research or medical service to the cancer patient be provided only by fellow cancer victims. And if the public, sighted and blind, is to pay the cost of agency program operations, then we must expect the public to exercise some leadership or guidance, some form of financial auditing as well as of giving.
As I said earlier, no person, blind or sighted, lives in a world all his own, nor does an agency exist without multiple responsibilities. Services to clients is the primary one, getting money to pay for the service is another. It makes a difference to the person needing service whether the agency is properly financed in order that it may employ competent staff and provide adequate facilities. It makes a difference to the provider of funds whether his money is properly spent, and whether the quality of service meets reasonable standards. Hence, accreditation.
It is appropriate at this stage to consider some of the specifics in the work of the Council. Within the Council there are two basic commissions, one for accreditation, and the other for standards. The Commission on Accreditation has been headed until recently by Dr. Ewald B. Nyquist, President of the University of New York and that State's Commissioner of Education, and now is headed by Dr. Jack W. Birch, Associate Dean of the School of Education, the University of Pittsburgh. Its work has been explained largely by what I have said about the Council to date. The Commission on Standards is headed by Dr. J. Max Wooley, Superintendent of the Arkansas School for the Blind. This Commission has the dual role of up-dating existing standards and of developing standards for services not included in the original COMSTAC Report. In 1970 standards for the production of reading material in Braille, large type and recorded forms were developed and published. Plans for others soon will be on the drawing boards.
In addition to Board members, these commissions are complemented by other established leaders who add further dimensions to the knowledge and quality of the commissions.
Other work of the Council when it and the Board cannot be in session is carried on by responsible committees. The Executive Committee considers recommendations of all committees and acts for the entire Board. Among other active committees are the one on Program Support now under the leadership of Mr. Morton Pepper, prominent attorney in a New York firm he heads. The Finance Committee is headed by the Council's Treasurer, Mr. Daniel D. Robinson, C.P.A., of Peat, Marwick, Mitchell Company. Mr. Robinson, one of the Board's youngest members, is that large firm's senior partner for accounting procedures of educational and welfare institutional clients throughout the world.
The Personnel Committee is chaired by Warren Thompson, Assistant Regional Director, Denver office of U. S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare, and a nationally-known leader in the rehabilitation field. The Personnel Committee checks on the Council's own procedures in regard to staff.
Mentioning staff, brings us to the fundamental work of the Council. In any organization or company, accomplishment can be measured by the abilities and dedication of the day-by-day working staff. NAC has been very fortunate in having a competent staff headed by Alexander Handel, the Executive Director. Mr. Handel also was director of the COMSTAC activities, and before that had a long and effective role as dean of a School of Social Work and as a top staff associate for the American Foundation for the Blind. His sympathetic understanding of the needs and desires of the visually handicapped coupled with his research and administrative talents, his fairness and his firmness, his poise and his persistence explain the thoroughness, the efficiency, the overall excellence of COMSTAC and NAC achievements.
I wish to conclude by further comments about finances, relationships, and cooperation. At the beginning of NAC, the Board of Directors took the position that with few exceptions agencies and schools for the blind would not have sufficient money to pay the cost of accreditation and large membership dues. Consequently, dues have been kept low, hence the members so far contribute very little to NAC's budget. Where does the non-dues money come from? There are three main sources. Largest supporter, as Mr. Jernigan stated, is the United States Government, through the Department of Health, Education and Welfare, or more specifically, the Rehabilitation Services Administration and the Office of Education. Why, you ask? It is because of the Department's concern for the blind and others with serious visual handicaps. There is a supplementary reason. The Government has found NAC's materials useful in its consideration of other types of programs it must evaluate and sometimes finance. In no way have Department or other Government officers sought to dictate NAC policies or procedures. The Government has its own standards of reports which NAC must meet. HEW's commitment is scheduled to end this year. If it continues beyond the year, it probably will be at a declining rate.
The second largest financial supporter of NAC is the American Foundation for the Blind, which currently is providing about four dollars of each ten dollars spent, or thirty-nine percent. The amount is to be reduced year by year until AFB's share is phased out.
In my forty-five years of working in educational institutions and on occasion with foundations and other national organizations, I have known no one to keep "hands off" to the extent the American Foundation for the Blind has in its relationship both to COMSTAC and to NAC. I emphasize this largely because of what you have heard this morning. This does not mean the Foundation, its Executive Director, Dr. Robert Barnett, its presidents, first Mr. Jansen Noyes, and now Mr. Jack Crowley, or Board members, have not given guidance or responded to our requests for counsel or other help, but always it has been at our initiative, and not the Foundation's. Always it has been very useful counsel designed for the benefit of the visually handicapped.
In addition to the Federal Government and the American Foundation, there have been other grantors, in smaller amounts, and also personal donors, including Board members. One Director has given $5,000 each of the last two years.
As we look ahead one of the great needs for NAC will be adequate financing. What applies to NAC applies in due course, perhaps in a different way, to the Federation and to all agencies. And this emphasizes the necessity for good relationships and cooperation among us all, otherwise we could fall into that trap so clearly noted by Sydney Harris in one of his columns. He wrote: "We must learn the ancient lesson that the only true enemy is within, not without. The enemy is that part within us which makes our differences seem more important than our similarities. If we can . . . avoid this trap, then we can unite against our real and common enemies--injustice and inequality."
If you examine objectively the many NAC standards, and not to ridicule them, you'll note throughout the compelling reason for them is you, the blind. Most of you are leaders of State affiliates of the National Federation of the Blind. To increase the value of your leadership, we urge you to become familiar with all NAC standards. These are available to you in Braille and in talking book editions at regional libraries for the blind. After studying the standards, form your own judgments. If you have suggestions about them, please send them to Mr. Handel at NAC.
The National Federation of the Blind is one of the leading organized bodies of consumers in the nation. You and NAC must be concerned about the standards of services agencies provide for you. Concern for improved services to the blind, and a better life for your fellow citizens has a top place in all your planning. It is most natural for you to be among the groups most appreciative of efforts not only to set ever-higher standards but as well to see that such standards are maintained, and continually improved. You and the National Accreditation Council should have similar goals. Let us resolve here today to work together and with others in the common purpose of enrichment of life for all our people.
President Jernigan: One more thing with respect to Mr. Brandon's offer of putting me on the finance committee. That's a problem for this reason. Sure I could help raise money for NAC. Sure, we could if we chose, today, give $10,000 out of our treasury, or $20,000 or $30,000 to NAC. We have the money, we could do it. But I don't believe in NAC the way it's scheduled and structured. I have steadfastly refused when I've been asked, I've not done it offensively, but I have not responded when I've been asked to find grants and funds for NAC because I think what NAC is doing is harmful. I think it's hurting blind people. I'm not going to get out and raise money for NAC, Mr. Brandon. I can't do it in conscience. I'll sit on your board as a matter of tokenism unless, indeed, the board chooses to toss me off, and I'm not meaning to imply that it will, but I won't go out and raise money for you, because I don't believe in what you are doing. It's just that simple. I can't, conscientiously. So, I don't know how to answer that except that if you choose to put me on the committee, I'll be there but I won't raise any money for you because I don't believe in what you're doing. [applause]
Mr. Handel: One of your criticisms about the domination, or alleged domination of NAC by the sources, the AFB and the HEW, and we have assurances of funds from these organizations only through the end of this calendar year. Both organizations are interested in the decline of their role and their contribution to the particular organization. One of the alternatives, you've made a point, of course, about the way the treasury is, something else is, one of the answers, of course, would be and one of the things that we're trying to do is to find a more extensive and other bases and this we will continue to do and of necessity as well as of our own interest.
President Jernigan: I'll make you a counter offer then, Mr. Brandon and Mr. Handel. Tell you what you do. You give us the same rights that the Foundation has had in setting the policies; you give us the same prerogatives; and offer us the awards; you let us do the appointing, and give us an equal voice and we'll give you the $70,000 the Foundation gives you. [instantaneous loud applause and cheers]
We have or can get $70,000 a year. We'll be glad to buy in.
Mr. Handel: Now I understand that that's on the record.
President Jernigan: Oh, it is. It's a firm offer. It's meant to be a firm offer. We'll give you $70,000. [more applause and cheers]
Mr. Brandon: Is this yearly for five years, Mr. Jernigan, or one time?
Pres. Jernigan: Nope. We'll do it year after year. Look, let me show you the sentiment of the audience. I put the question to the Convention. If we can buy in at $70,000, I don't know that I particularly like to have to buy love, but if we can buy in, at $70,000 a year and if we can have all the rights and privileges and perquisites that the Foundation got, are you willing for your President to commit that year after year we'll get them $70,000. All those who are say "aye." [great shout of "aye"; loud applause and cheers] O.K. You have your answer. We'll buy in.
Mr. Brandon: May I ask a question, Mr. Jernigan?
Pres. Jernigan: Yes.
Mr. Brandon: The American Foundation asked me to be chairman of COMSTAC and the Board later--
Pres. Jernigan: I might not ask you to be. [laughter] If we're going to buy in we'll want all the privileges. Go ahead, Mr. Brandon.
Mr. Brandon: What I want to ask you is, would you give the new chairman you might select the same opportunities that I had when I was chairman of trying to find some board members, myself? There are three members of that board that the American Foundation never heard of and I personally have known them for many years.
Pres. Jernigan: Oh, I'll be willing. You let me pick the chairman. He'll do the rest. [Brandon and the audience laugh]
Pres. Jernigan: [Pounding gavel] I think we understand the basics of the political problem, Mr. Brandon.
Mr. Brandon: That is not a very fair comment, and you should know that.
Pres. Jernigan: You set the forum, not I. Let me make clear what I'm saying. It is not a fair comment if you interpret what I say to mean that you have not behaved fairly in the context, that you were appointed. You have. It is not asperse your integrity at all. You have integrity. It is not to say that you are not in every way a gentlemen. You are. It is not to say in any sense that you have not done according to your likes as was right and proper, and fair. I want that to be clearly understood. It is to say that in the context and framework, you could have done nothing else. And it is to say further, it surely is a fair comment to point out side by side that a) Rehab and the Foundation gave you $70,000 each, and you made each one of their heads your first award recipients. Now that is fair. You know, you did that. And, I say it is no reflection on anybody's character. Those are facts. O.K. Now, you can consider this fine offer of ours. I don't believe you'll accept it. . . .
Mr. Omvig: We could, I suppose, talk all day about the past. We have our position and you people have yours, and I'm not sure we can ever come to an agreement on that. Mr. Brandon, you suggested, however, that the time has come when we could cooperate and work together towards a common goal. I would like to ask something specifically about standards. When we're dealing with sheltered workshop employment, we're not particularly concerned about the pleasant surroundings, the hazards or lack of hazards, of things of that sort. What we're concerned about and one of our goals in the Federation is decent wages for the employees. Workmen's compensation for the employees. Unemployment insurance for the employees. What kind of committment would you be willing to make to us, today, in the name of working together and future cooperation, towards common goals, that you would do whatever you could do to change the existing standards so that no workshop could be accredited unless it fulfills all of these goals? [loud applause]
Mr. Handel: The standards set up a vast array of conditions fulfilling goals. The specific items you mentioned which you rolled off so fast I didn't get them all.
Pres. Jernigan: They're the rights of organized labor generally, that's what he's talking about.
Mr. Handel: Now, there is the standard should begin to be under revision that in 1972, that is next year, there will be opportunity, as there has been opportunity, for anyone to express their views. There is a forum. There are journals, The Monitor is one, and others that can put forth responsible, thoughtful materials that could be used in the revision of standards. The projection is that we will in 1973 and 1974 introduce the process, providing we can secure financing, that--good, I'm counting on the funds that exact same privileges that Mr. Jernigan is under some illusions about--
Pres. Jernigan: The Foundation had and has.
Mr. Handel: That the Foundation has?
Pres. Jernigan: And had.
Mr. Handel: I believe you're on the nominating committee, this year. I don't know that there's any Foundation representative on the nominating committee. I doubt it, but nevertheless you wall have your opportunity to participate in that process and I think that if there is--that you can contribute to the development of these standards if you only will. You can do it through your literature, through your correspondence to us, and you can be sure that The Monitor reports were used and were a factor in revising standards originally; that anything you produce will be considered seriously, will be used.
Pres. Jernigan: Mr. Handel, would you though, and Mr. Brandon, commit yourself, yes or no, that you would advocate not accrediting a shop unless it paid the minimum wage. Now, you know, you may say that as a staff man you can't and if you do, O.K. Mr. Brandon's not a staff man. Would you commit yourself to use your influence to that or that that would be a goal with you.
Mr. Brandon: I would commit myself as a member of the Board of Directors not only in regard to an agency serving the blind or other agencies, to the minimum wage standard; I think it is necessary for living in today's society; I think that the standards, if anything, would be too low, instead of too high. I do not have the wisdom. I'm not an economist to know what the minimums ought to be but I am confident that in your organization and in other organizations, there are the people who have the wisdom to determine what these ought to be, and I would support the action of a committee on this basis.
Mr. Omvig: Would you at least agree that the Federal minimum wage established by the Congress of the United States ought to exist in any sheltered workshop, anywhere? Would you agree to that? They are, in essence, setting the standards.
Mr. Brandon: This would seem a reasonable thing to me but I am not familiar with all of the details.
Mr. Omvig: But would you fight with us to gain that standard?
Mr. Brandon: I've already answered that--that I would favor that in the NAC.
Mr. Marcelino: I have two questions, or three. First of all, is it not true that NAC voted not to endorse the principle of the minimum wage in the sheltered workshops?
Mr. Handel: I don't believe that's true.
Mr. Jernigan: It did not come up in that way, but we attempted to deal with some of this and it was not done. There is no requirement of NAC standards, is there Mr. Handel, that you have to have minimum wage?
Mr. Handel: You have to conform to the Federal minimum wage and hour law.
Pres. Jernigan: For sheltered shops. Well, sure, but sheltered shops do not have to conform to it.
Mr. Handel: Yes, they do. And that's in the standards.
Mr. Marcelino: How about the certificate of exemption. They have that, don't they?
Pres. Jernigan: Are you saying, Mr. Handel, if I understand you correctly but maybe I've been under a misapprehension, are you saying that NAC wall not accredit or will withdraw accreditation from any sheltered workshop which doesn't pay its blind workers a minimum wage? Is that what I understood you to say?
Mr. Handel: You didn't understand me correctly.
Pres. Jernigan: O.K. Fine.
Mr. Handel: That's what I thought. I said that the standards do call for conformance with the wage and hour law.
Pres. Jernigan: Right.
Mr. Marcelino: But that enables the shop to secure a certificate of exemption.
WHEREAS, the National Accreditation Council for Agencies Serving the Blind and Visually Handicapped (NAC) holds itself out to the general public as the setter of standards and the accrediting authority for agencies doing work with the blind in the United States; and
WHEREAS, NAC is undemocratic and unrepresentative in its character and operation; and
WHEREAS, the members of the NAC Board were (at least indirectly) appointed by one single agency in the field of work with the blind, the American Foundation for the Blind; and
WHEREAS, The American Foundation for the Blind is not representative of the field but only of its own viewpoint, which is often less than constructive or progressive; and
WHEREAS, NAC is now, and has always been, primarily financed by the American
Foundation for the Blind and the Federal Department of Health, Education and Welfare; and
WHEREAS, it is well known that the power of the purse is the power of control; and
WHEREAS, representative organizations of blind people have only token representation on NAC's Board and the voice of the consumer is not effectively heard in NAC's deliberations; and
WHEREAS, NAC has created and applied standards which are not only irrelevant but in many cases detrimental to the best interests of the blind; and
WHEREAS, it is not in the best interests of blind persons for NAC to continue to exist and function in its present form; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 8th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that we deplore the undemocratic and unrepresentative character of NAC and that we will do all that we can to oppose its increase in power, influence, and prestige; and be it further
RESOLVED that we do all that we can to make our views known to lawmakers, government officials, the field of work with the blind, individual blind persons, and the public at large; and be it further
RESOLVED that it be made clear to all concerned that we do not oppose proper accreditation properly done and that we will be happy to participate in and cooperate with any appropriately organized and democratically constituted accrediting body.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that if the time should arise when NAC is restructured along democratic lines and blind citizens are given more than token representation regarding its policies and practices, the NFB pledges its willingness to work with NAC truly to make services for the blind more relevant and responsive to the needs of the blind.
Adopted unanimously.
COPY
July 13, 1971
Mr. J. Kenneth Jernigan, President
Iowa Commission for the Blind
524 4th Street
Des Moines, Iowa 50309
Dear Kenneth:
I am sending by air mail as requested a copy for printing in The Monitor of my manuscript "Better Services to the Blind Through Accreditation," read before the National Federation of the Blind on July 9.
As is customary, I have exercised a speaker's prerogative for publication purposes of making slight editorial changes without modifying basic content. Because of the time pressure, I did not include in my oral presentation a few paragraphs or sentences which were and are in the manuscript.
I was surprised when a resolution opposed to the National Accreditation Council prepared in advance of delivery of your address and mine was submitted at the conclusion of the session for consideration. It appeared as a sort of "fair trial and hang him" procedure. It caused some doubts about the objectivity or purposes of the session. Nevertheless, I was pleased that there were several persons present who later expressed to me their faith in NAC and its programs.
Thank you again for making it possible for National Federation of the Blind members present and those who will read my manuscript to know something further about the NAC. In my personal opinion, as we look ahead we must search for ways of working together effectively.
Now that the arduous tasks of a well-directed national convention are behind you, I hope you have a pleasant summer.
Sincerely yours,
Arthur L. Brandon, President
National Accreditation Council
COPY
July 20, 1971
Mr. Arthur L Brandon, President
National Accreditation Council for Agencies
Serving the Blind and
Visually Handicapped
Alderson-Broaddus College
Philippi, West Virginia 26416
Dear Arthur:
Thank you for sending me the manuscript of your NFB address. We will, of course, respect your right to make the changes indicated, even though some of them may be substantive However, the readers of the talking book Monitor will hear your remarks as they were actually taped at the Convention.
It seems to me that one point in your July 13 letter requires comment.
"I was surprised when a resolution opposed to the National Accreditation Council prepared in advance of the delivery of your address and mine was submitted at the conclusion of the session for consideration. It appeared as a sort of 'fair trial and hang him' procedure. It caused some doubts about the objectivity or purposes of the session."
Surely the purpose for having you and Mr. Handel appear on our program was not obscure. It was not to determine whether COMSTAC and NAC were formed in a democratic way or whether NAC has functioned in a democratic way since coming into being. These were and are matters of objective fact, hardly subject to dispute or debate. NAC does not now have any real consumer representation or participation but only tokenism. NAC does not now function democratically, in any meaningful sense of the word. The NFB was not trying to determine whether it likes the state of affairs. It doesn't. It was not trying to determine whether it intends to try to change the situation. It does. As long ago as 1966 at its Louisville Convention, the Federation passed a resolution decrying the undemocratic character and presumptuous behavior of NAC. This year's resolution was simply a reiteration of that long standing policy and a reaffirmation of the intention to do something to change it.
What, then, was the purpose for having NAC representatives present and discussing the matter at all? At the NFB Convention in Houston there were assembled in one room the largest group of blind people (the consumers) who will be meeting anywhere in this Nation this year. They were not only consumers themselves but representatives of thousands of other consumers back home. NAC purports to set the standards and give or withhold accreditation for the agencies established to give services to these consumers. NAC is (and always has been) heavily subsidized by tax dollars.
Therefore, there is a problem of accountability. The consumer organization wished to discuss NAC and to hear from NAC officials themselves in their own words what they were doing and why. Also, the consumer organization wished the NAC officials to reexamine their function and position and to hear from the consumers themselves what their feelings were.
The tone of your letter (especially that part which says "as we look ahead we must search for ways of working together effectively") indicates a conception of what occurred at Houston and of the attitudes and intentions of the blind not, in my opinion, in accord with the facts. At Houston we did not simply have a friendly little debate which allowed people to "blow off steam." We did not meet before that audience of a thousand people simply to exchange ideas and go back home to business as usual.
What that audience was telling you, and what I have been trying to tell NAC for several years is simply this: The blind of this Nation are not going to allow all of their service programs to come under one uniform system of control with the tune called by the American Foundation for the Blind and the accompaniment played by HEW. The blind are not opposed to reasonable and proper accreditation--far from it. The blind do not oppose good agencies, government or private, which are doing good work. However, the Federation does not believe that NAC is properly constituted, that its standards are reasonable, that it is responsive to the aspirations and desires of consumers, or that it is a positive factor (as now structured) in the field of work with the blind.
It was to this end that the NAC item appeared on the NFB program at Houston. It is to this end that we are now publicizing the matter in The Monitor, more than 10,000 copies of which will carry the message throughout the country and the world. We have no personal ill will toward the members of the NAC Board or its officials. I am sure they are people of integrity, doing a job as they think it should be done.
On the other hand, the present situation can not be allowed to continue unchallenged. The blind are citizens, too, with legitimate likes and aspirations.
Cordially,
Kenneth Jernigan, President
National Federation of the Blind
COPY
July 26, 1971
The Honorable Richard M. Nixon, President
The United States of America
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, D. C. 20500
Dear President Nixon:
I write this letter to call to your attention a matter involving the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress and its behavior toward the organized blind citizens of this Nation. Mr. Robert Bray, chief of that division, has repeatedly demonstrated during the past few years an attitude of disrespect and contempt for the very people he is employed to serve. The tone he sets has pervaded his staff to such an extent that silence arid passive submission are no longer possible.
The enclosed resolution adopted unanimously by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled in Houston, Texas is self-explanatory. We call your attention to this matter in the hope and belief that you will take action to remedy this situation.
Very truly yours,
Kenneth Jernigan, President
National Federation of the Blind
NATIONAL FEDERATION OF THE BLIND RESOLUTION 71-21
WHEREAS, James Hahn, Assistant Chief for Reader Services, Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress, was extended an invitation to appear and speak at the Houston Convention of the National Federation of the Blind; and
WHEREAS, James Hahn (with the full knowledge and approval of his superior, Robert S. Bray, Chief of the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress) accepted such invitation and agreed in discussion with President Kenneth Jernigan on the day and hour for his Convention presentation (as witness the enclosed correspondence); and
WHEREAS, said day and time came and passed without the presence or any word at all from James Hahn in the Convention hall or in the Convention hotel or in the city of Houston, Texas; and
WHEREAS, James Hahn, when reminded of his commitment to speak to the Convention of the National Federation of the Blind, said (with great and shameful indifference) that he intended to send a telegram and was most offensively casual about his discourteous neglect to honor his pledged appearance before the largest gathering of blind persons ever held in this nation and in the world; and
WHEREAS, James Hahn's action exemplifies the attitude generally encountered in other and directing personnel of the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress in their dealings toward the blind to whom they owe accountability for their stewardship for the manner in which they function in administering services to blind people; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 8th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization is most justifiably indignant at the treatment accorded the members of the National Federation of the Blind by the insulting and boorish manner and actions of James Hahn; and the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress; and be it further
RESOLVED that this organization directs its officers to take all actions necessary, including the forwarding of this resolution to President Richard M. Nixon, L. Quincy Mumford, Librarian of the Library of Congress, Robert S. Bray, Chief of the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress, James Hahn, Assistant Chief for Reader Service, Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress, all members of the United States Senate and House of Representatives, and to any and all others deemed by the President of the National Federation of the Blind to be among those who should be apprised of the conduct and behavior of a Federal public servant to the segment of the public whom he is hired to serve; and be it further
RESOLVED that appropriate officials be asked to reprimand James Hahn and Robert S. Bray for their failure to act with responsibility toward the persons they are engaged to serve and that the members of the National Federation of the Blind fully expect and are entitled to a full explanation and apology for their reprehensible behavior; and be it further
RESOLVED that the President of this organization is directed to take all steps required to assure that employees of the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress, hired only for the purpose of serving the blind and the physically handicapped, do serve the blind and the physically handicapped, and to do all things necessary and reasonable to see that such employees act in all ways required of them as public servants toward the blind and physically handicapped whom they are engaged and paid to serve.
Adopted unanimously.
COPY
February 25, 1971
Mr. James M. Hahn, Assistant Chief for
Reader Services, Division for the Blind and
Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress
Washington, D. C. 20542
Dear Mr. Hahn:
I very much appreciate your acceptance of my invitation for you to appear on the program of the National Federation of the Blind Convention this summer at the Shamrock Hilton Hotel, Houston, Texas. The registration, exhibit, and other activities will begin on Sunday morning, July 4, and the final adjournment will occur at 5:00 P.M. on Friday afternoon, July 9.
As I told you on the phone, we have scheduled an item for Thursday morning, July 8, which we call "Library Services for the Blind--Today and the Decade Ahead" from 9:35 A.M. to 10:20 A.M. You will share this time with representatives from the regional library, your remarks being entitled "A National Overview: The Cassette Program; What's New in Book Selection." I would suggest that you might talk for fifteen or twenty minutes and that the regional library people should talk for fifteen minutes. This would leave ten or fifteen minutes for questions from the floor. If you should care to bring anything to demonstrate or display in the exhibit room, we would be delighted to have you do so.
I can not, of course, be certain as to the number of people we will have in attendance, but I would guess there will be close to 1,500. These will be representatives of state and local organizations of the blind throughout the nation. Therefore, what you say will be carried to blind persons in every part of the country.
I very much appreciate your accepting our invitation, and I know that our members will enjoy what you have to say.
Cordially,
Kenneth Jernigan, President
National Federation of the Blind
COPY
April 20, 1971
Mr. James M. Hahn, Assistant Chief for
Reader Services, Division for the Blind and
Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress
Washington, D. C. 20542
Dear Mr. Hahn:
In checking my letter to you of February 25 I note that I did not invite you to bring a written copy of your remarks for publication. I would now like to do so. This is, of course, entirely up to you, but I would like to have your remarks presented in your own words to readers of The Braille Monitor. The magazine now has a circulation of approximately 10,000 copies.
Again, let me say how much I appreciate your acceptance of our invitation to appear on the program. I look forward to seeing you in Houston.
Cordially,
Kenneth Jernigan, President
National Federation of the Blind
COPY
DIVISION FOR THE BLIND AND PHYSICALLY HANDICAPPED
THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
Washington, D. C. 20542
May 13, 1971
Reference Department
1291 Taylor Street, N.W.
Area Code 202-882-5500
Dear Mr. Jernigan:
Your April 20 letter reminded me that I had forgotten to thank you for your invitation to appear on your program in Houston. I truly appreciate the opportunity to speak to so many of our readers at one time.
I will bring a written copy of my remarks. I have been told the rambling nature of my delivery defies accurate reporting, so I am pleased to hear the readers of the "Braille Monitor" will not get second-hand what sometimes defies understanding first-hand.
Sincerely,
/s/ James M. Hahn
Assistant Chief for
Reader Services
Mr. Kenneth Jernigan
President
National Federation of the Blind
524 - 4th Street
Des Moines, Iowa 50309
1910 N. E. McKinley Street
Minneapolis, Minnesota 55418
June 28, 1971
Dr. Kenneth Jernigan
524 Fourth Street
Des Moines, Iowa 50309
Dear Dr. Jernigan:
You Can Fight City Hall and Win!
During the past two years, as a member of the NFB and the United Blind of Minnesota, I have become increasingly aware that the philosophy and action the NFB advocates is one which the blind not only need but must have, if they are ever to attain the equality of citizenship they deserve.
This awareness became a vivid reality to me during the past nine months when I personally needed the advice, support, and action of the NFB and the two Minnesota affiliates in a battle against discrimination while seeking employment with the City of Minneapolis.
As you know, last October I applied for a computer programmer position with an "equal opportunity employer," the City of Minneapolis. My application was promptly rejected on the grounds that "... possibly too many procedural changes would have to be made should you end up 'number one,' and the person hired for the job. It was decided that a person with your disability could not be hired at this time. . ." Of course, neither I nor anyone else had been contacted as to what procedural changes, if any, would be required. It seems their attitude is, if they think you are not able to do a job, you cannot do it. Needless to say, the attitude projected in this letter (of which I have enclosed a copy) is one which should arouse the fighting spirit of any blind person and is one of the obstacles which you. Dr. Jernigan, at the 1970 Convention in Minneapolis referred to as "climbing the barricades."
My efforts to accomplish anything against the discrimination were getting nowhere until I contacted you about the middle of November. After your study of the material I sent you, you advised me to seek local support first, and that the NFB would support me even if the case had to go to the U. S. Supreme Court.
Support was quickly obtained from both the United Blind of Minnesota and the Minnesota Organization of the Blind as both are active groups seeking equality for the blind in all areas. Although legal counsel was obtained locally, satisfactory progress toward resolving the problem was not obtained until after I had contacted you a second time about the middle of December. At that time I spoke with you by phone and, after filling you in on the details of the preceding month, you made the services of your attorney available to me. On December 22 the NFB attorney spoke with me at my home and became my legal counsel, and with his services the matter proceeded toward a successful conclusion. I passed the Civil Service examination and after claiming Veteran's Preference was placed at the top of the eligibility list for the computer programmer position. On April 26 I began employment with the City of Minneapolis.
I am certain that, if it were not for the whole-hearted efforts of the NFB and the local affiliates, I would not have this job today. In this respect I sincerely wish to express my appreciation to the NFB and the local affiliates and to all individuals concerned for their time, effort, and money on my behalf in enabling me to secure this position. I feel it is not a singular gain for only one, but one more step of many which needs to be taken by all the blind.
Sincerely,
Glenn O. Fishbeck
WHEREAS, The Library of Congress, Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, has earned an improved reputation for its service programs to the blind and particularly for the improvement in book selection in the last three years through the production of best selling titles whenever possible; and
WHEREAS, the National Federation of the Blind is vitally concerned in governmental programs established to give services to the blind, including the services of the Library of Congress, Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped; and
WHEREAS, for many years the Library of Congress, has given access to the world of literature to blind citizens of this country through the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped and regional libraries; and
WHEREAS, officials of the Library of Congress, Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped through their administrative procedures make abundantly clear their lack of confidence in the capacity of blind people, implying that visually disabled borrowers cannot be held to the same standard of reliability and accountability as sighted borrowers of a public library system; and
WHEREAS, the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped has adopted the policy of re-issuing talking books which are already available at 16 2/3 rpm, this practice inevitably leading to duplication and needless waste of congressional appropriations for the production of recorded books, one issue costing more than $3,500.00; and
WHEREAS, officials administering the library program to the blind should allocate congressional financial appropriations to expand the collection of book titles available to blind readers; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 8th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization strongly opposes the policy of the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress of re-issuing talking books which are already available at 16 2/3 rpm; and, be it further
RESOLVED that the National Federation of the Blind directs its officers to work with the Library of Congress, Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, so that its collection will become balanced, cutting out duplicative re-issuing of talking books previously recorded in order to achieve this goal; and be it further
RESOLVED that the officers of this organization are directed to bring the matter contained in this resolution to the attention of Congress, appropriate administrative officials, and the public at large.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, the Library of Congress has been rendering service to the blind since before the turn of the century; and
WHEREAS, during the past year a move has been initiated to change the name of the department of the Library of Congress charged with the responsibility of administering services to the blind from the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped to the Division for the Sightless and Physically Handicapped or a similar appellation on the grounds that the word "blind" is "ugly, blunt and tends to brand those who have lost their sight"; and
WHEREAS, the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped is presently soliciting public opinion upon the wisdom of the change; and
WHEREAS, the blind have labored for countless years to alter public attitudes and stereotypes regarding the consequences of blindness and to promote the idea that individuals lacking vision possess proven skills and capabilities; and
WHEREAS, an analogous parallel situation in the efforts for civil rights by American Negroes affords ample evidence concerning the folly of a minority attempting to remove prejudice by denying the existence of a characteristic; and
WHEREAS, it was only when black Americans recognized the dignity and full respectability in the black man that a strong impetus toward equality and first-class citizenship was achieved for the black population of the country; and
WHEREAS, if the plan to change the name of the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped is successful, the result would be to reinforce public misconceptions about the blind, and additionally, changing the name in all likelihood would only have the effect of transferring many of the prejudices associated in the connotations of the word "blind" to the word "sightless" or any other term substituted; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 8th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization makes clear its strong opposition to the plan of altering the name of the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped; and be it further
RESOLVED that this Federation urges all its affiliated chapters and members to express a similar view to the proper authorities; and be it further
RESOLVED that the National Federation of the Blind instructs its officers to take whatever steps are necessary to maintain the present program and the title of the department; and be it further
RESOLVED that copies of this resolution be sent to the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped and to any other appropriate official in order to maintain the integrity of the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, the National Accreditation Council for Agencies Serving the Blind and Visually Handicapped (NAC) holds itself out to the general public as the setter of standards and the accrediting authority for agencies doing work with the blind in the United States; and
WHEREAS, NAC is undemocratic and unrepresentative in its character and operation; and
WHEREAS, the members of the NAC Board were (at least indirectly) appointed by one single agency in the field of work with the blind, the American Foundation for the Blind; and
WHEREAS, The American Foundation for the Blind is not representative of the field but only of its own viewpoint, which is often less than constructive or progressive; and
WHEREAS, NAC is now, and has always been, primarily financed by the American
Foundation for the Blind and the Federal Department of Health, Education and Welfare; and
WHEREAS, it is well known that the power of the purse is the power of control; and
WHEREAS, representative organizations of blind people have only token representation on NAC's Board and the voice of the consumer is not effectively heard in NAC's deliberations; and
WHEREAS, NAC has created and applied standards which are not only irrelevant but in many cases detrimental to the best interests of the blind; and
WHEREAS, it is not in the best interests of blind persons for NAC to continue to exist and function in its present form; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 8th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that we deplore the undemocratic and unrepresentative character of NAC and that we will do all that we can to oppose its increase in power, influence, and prestige; and be it further
RESOLVED that we do all that we can to make our views known to lawmakers, government officials, the field of work with the blind, individual blind persons, and the public at large; and be it further
RESOLVED that it be made clear to all concerned that we do not oppose proper accreditation properly done and that we will be happy to participate in and cooperate with any appropriately organized and democratically constituted accrediting body.
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that if the time should arise when NAC is restructured along democratic lines and blind citizens are given more than token representation regarding its policies and practices, the NFB pledges its willingness to work with NAC truly to make services for the blind more relevant and responsive to the needs of the blind.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, it is the policy of the National Federation of the Blind to assist where possible and practical our fellow blind throughout the world in raising their status to equality with sighted citizens; and
WHEREAS, cultural exchange programs are beginning to be utilized as a means of changing outdated attitudes toward blind persons and increasing contact among the blind of the world (e.g., the exchange of swimmers between Sweden and the USA extending over two summers and the development of the Student Division of the International Federation of the Blind with planned student exchange); now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 9th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization directs its President to take the necessary steps toward establishing an exchange of blind persons between the USA and other countries, with possibly five representatives of different countries visiting this country' for a substantial period of perhaps four to five months, selection from the other countries to be made from those in such fields as agriculture, poultry raising, telephone operation, computer programming, insurance and other occupations feasible in the foreign countries as sources of potential job placement. This would be followed by the exchange of a like number of USA blind for a similar period the following year, these U.S. persons to assist in matters of the organization of the blind, as well as in sericulture, education, vocational training and job placement according to the needs and opportunities of the countries involved, as well as to familiarize themselves with the cultures in which they may be visiting; and be it further
RESOLVED that this Federation take the necessary steps to present the need and method of execution of such an exchange to the Department of State and to pertinent private organizations and philanthropic foundations with a view toward requesting financial assistance, guidance and advice on such a plan.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, the Randolph-Sheppard Act Amendments (S. 2461) of 1970 were defeated in the House of Representatives; and
WHEREAS, these Amendments were adopted by the United States Senate; and
WHEREAS, the problems of the stand operators are as acute as ever in regard to the right of the blind to operate stands on Federal property; and
WHEREAS, in many cases vending machine earnings go to other groups rather than to blind stand operators--for example, employee welfare committees; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 6th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization continues to support such legislation as S. 2461, the Randolph-Sheppard Amendments, of 1970; and be it further
RESOLVED that the individual operator have recourse to the appropriate agency in the event of a grievance concerning these problems.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, in 1962, a Special Subcommittee of the Committee on Government Operations of the United States Senate conducted public hearings on a bill to amend and improve the Randolph-Sheppard Vending Stand Act; and
WHEREAS, one provision of this bill was intended to create and establish a presidentially-appointed appeals board to hear and resolve differences and disputes that arise between Federal departments and agencies in control of Federal buildings and other Federal property and State-licensing agencies of vending stand programs; and
WHEREAS, speaking for the Federal administration, the Bureau of the Budget expressed strong opposition to this provision of the vending stand amending bill, recommending instead the institution by each department and agency of the Federal Government of an administratively-based appeals procedure as a regularized method of handling and solving Federal-State vending stand problems; and
WHEREAS, each Federal department and agency did adopt and institute such administratively-based vending stand hearings procedures; and
WHEREAS, the National Federation of the Blind considers such a vending stand hearings procedure as an inadequate and unsatisfactory substitute for a presidentially-authorized vending stand appeals procedure; and
WHEREAS, it is the only Federal-State vending stand hearings mechanism available, the National Federation of the Blind believes that this hearings procedure be used by State licensing agencies whenever and as often as difficulties and problems arise between Federal and State officials re administration and operation of the vending stand program; and
WHEREAS, at the national Convention of the National Federation of the Blind held in Des Moines, Iowa, in 1968, spokesmen for the Federal Post Office Department and the General Services Administration urged State vending stand licensing agencies to unravel vending stand differences by taking advantage of the administratively-based hearings mechanism, and strongly declared their intention and determination to do all they and their Federal agencies could do to see that all vending stand problems were fairly considered and justly adjudicated; and
WHEREAS, in spite of such assurances very few State vending stand licensing agencies have availed themselves of the existing Federal vending stand hearings procedure, and this reluctance continues even though both national and State officers and representatives of the National Federation of the Blind have requested and, sometimes, even demanded that State vending stand licensing agencies try to untangle vending stand difficulties by taking these difficulties into hearings; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 9th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization regrets and deplores the failure of State vending stand licensing agencies to employ as a problem-solving mechanism the administratively-based hearings procedure, and calls upon such State vending stand licensing agencies to act forthrightly and promptly and unequivocally in asking for, conducting and pressing through to successful conclusions hearings on vending stand matters by using the only formalized hearing procedure available in the vending stand program; and be it further
RESOLVED that this organization directs its President to transmit this resolution to the Chief of the Federal Division of Services to the Blind, RSA, Department of Health, Education and Welfare, and also to transmit a copy of this Resolution to the head of each State vending stand licensing agency, with the offer to the Federal and State officials of the willingness and determined desire of the National Federation of the Blind to aid, assist and cooperate in all ways possible with such Federal and State officials in preparing for and in conducting such vending stand healings that blind persons already employed in or wanting to be employed in earning a living in the Randolph-Sheppard vending stand program shall be fully protected and well and expeditiously represented in their basic American right to earn a living without denial or restraint or qualification; and be it further
RESOLVED that where agencies fail to utilize the administratively based hearing procedures, means be developed whereby the individual be enabled to appeal without recourse to such licensing agencies for support.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, Congressman Rarick of Louisiana has introduced in the House of Representatives of the 92nd Congress H.R. 9102, a bill to provide for paper money of the United States to carry a designation in Braille indicating the denomination; and
WHEREAS, the requirements of this legislative proposal would only serve to strengthen and more firmly entrench the too generally accepted stereotype of the blind person as dependent for participatory functioning upon special gimmicks and inconveniencing adjustments to the sighted; and
WHEREAS, it is the fear and concern of the National Federation of the Blind that ways soon would be found and devised to corrupt and alter Braille designations of paper money values by which blind persons would be defrauded and cheated; and
WHEREAS, the overwhelming and always present problem of blind persons is not the ability to differentiate the various dollar values of paper money but the great and constant problem of blind persons is to obtain employments commensurate with their talents, training, and abilities which will enable them to earn dollars as competing and functioning members of the labor force; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 6th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization directs its officers to take all actions necessary, including the presentation of testimony in congressional hearings and otherwise, to defeat H.R. 9102.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, Congressman Celler of New York has introduced in the House of Representatives in the 92nd Congress H.R 3802, a bill to amend the Federal books for the blind and physically handicapped law so as to allow the furnishing of musical recordings and tapes to blind and physically handicapped persons; and
WHEREAS, this further extension and expansion of the original Federal books for the blind program would continue the disastrous trend adopted by Congress several years ago when the library-by-mail for the blind program was diluted and diminished m efficiency and effectiveness for the blind by the inclusion of the physically handicapped within the scope of those to be served by this program; and
WHEREAS, most public libraries have available good collections of musical recordings easily accessible to blind and physically handicapped borrowers; and
WHEREAS, musical recordings and tapes are available commerically and thus are accessible to the blind and physically handicapped for purchase if they wish them just as they are accessible to the sighted and the physically fit for purchase if they wish them; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 8th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization condemns and deplores the purpose and provision of H.R 3802 and directs its officers to take all actions necessary, including the presentation of testimony in congressional hearings and otherwise, in order that this measure may be defeated; and be it further
RESOLVED that this Federation strongly urges that all additional congressional funding of this program be used to increase the collection of books available to blind and physically handicapped readers.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, it is the firm and unalterable belief of the National Federation of the Blind that when Congress enacts legislation such as the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the Higher Education Act, the Federal Housing Act and similar measures through which Federal funds are provided to create, extend and broaden, strengthen and support certain programs, activities and institutionalized services to all citizens or to certain classes of citizens or specified segments of the population, that discrimination by reason of blindness or physical impairment should not exist or be allowed to continue to exist whereby blind persons or other physically disabled persons are denied the plural benefits available under such Federal legislation; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 9th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization establishes and confirms as its fundamental and most basic policy opposition to discrimination by reason of blindness or other physical disability in all Federal and State laws, legislative measures, programs, functions, and activities, as contrary to equal rights guaranteed to all Americans without respect to their visual acuity and physical soundness and normality; and be it further
RESOLVED that this organization directs its officers to take all actions necessary and whenever and wherever necessary, whether by presentation of testimony in legislative hearings or commencement of actions in the courts or otherwise, in order to defeat, modify, improve, or strengthen such laws, proposals, programs, functions, and activities that blind and other physically impaired citizens may not be or may never be injured, disadvantaged, or restricted in any way by the laws of the land or limited in any way in having available to them publicly provided services intended for all Americans alike.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, sheltered workshops are authorized to pay and do pay sub-minimum wages to their handicapped employees in accordance with Section 14 of the Fair Labor Standards Act; and
WHEREAS, since 1959, the National Federation of the Blind has worked diligently in succeeding Congresses to secure minimum hourly wage protection for sheltered shop workers that there might be established a statutory floor beneath their wages; and
WHEREAS, in 1966, the National Federation of the Blind was successful in obtaining an amendment to the Federal Fair Labor Standards Act requiring that handicapped workers on production in sheltered workshops must be paid no less than 50% of the prevailing minimum hourly wage; and
WHEREAS, the National Federation of the Blind has continued and will continue its efforts to raise the wages in sheltered workshops of handicapped workers until they are entitled by law to receive the same minimum hourly wage as "open industry" workers; and
WHEREAS, spokesmen for sheltered workshops have expressed the view that Federal subsidizing funds should be sought and obtained from Congress to pay increased wages of handicapped workers employed in sheltered workshops; and
WHEREAS, the National Federation of the Blind believes such a Federal subsidy is totally unnecessary since increased wages could be paid from monies saved by eliminating excessive and needless personnel, and by eliminating "free" services, i.e. elaborate testing procedures, social and recreational activities, and services duplicating those available from other agencies and facilities all of which are presently being subsidized from the earnings of handicapped workers in sheltered workshops; and
WHEREAS, the National Federation of the Blind believes that in addition to the foregoing, substantial sums of money could also be saved to be used for paying higher wages to handicapped workers in sheltered workshops if the management instituted efficient operational methods and techniques and made greater efforts to obtain higher-paying subcontract work from local industries; and
WHEREAS, by so doing they could abandon handcraft and similar outmoded and uneconomic types of employment presently predominant as the productive work to be engaged in by the handicapped employees; and
WHEREAS, the National Federation of the Blind also believes that a Federal subsidy to pay increased wages in sheltered workshops is most repugnantly undesirable for with subsidized workshop wages equal to those paid in industry generally, vocational rehabilitation agencies would accelerate their present practice of "dumping" competitively employable blind and other handicapped persons in sheltered workshops, contending that since they could earn minimum wages in sheltered workshops, they would be far better off than if they were employed in open industry; and
WHEREAS, the National Federation of the Blind is deeply concerned by this possibility, knowing that if it occurs, fewer and ever fewer blind and other severely disabled people would be placed by vocational rehabilitation agencies in competitive business and industry, in the professions and in government service; and
WHEREAS, as a consequence all too soon but inevitably, vocational rehabilitation as the only available organized and tax-supported program for assisting disabled people to regain self-confidence, full functioning, and gainful employment and a constructive and worthwhile life, would disappear and would be replaced by a vast array of sheltered workshops that would serve as permanent concentration camps for the blind and other disabled people from which they could not and never would be given the opportunity to escape; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 9th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization condemns the use of Federal or other public funds to subsidize the wages of blind and other handicapped persons in sheltered workshops as socially retrogressive, economically unsound, and disastrously injurious to the rehabilitative hopes and restorative potentialities of all disabled Americans toward a decent, dignified and valued life; and be it further
RESOLVED that this organization orders and directs its officers to do all necessary, including the presentation of testimony in Congressional hearings and otherwise to prevent enactment of any measure or proposal that would provide Federal or other tax funds to subsidize the wages of handicapped workers in sheltered workshops.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, President Nixon has made it clear that his welfare policy is aimed at putting to work all those who can work; and
WHEREAS, many blind people who wish to work are forced by discrimination to find employment in sheltered workshops, and
WHEREAS, the Government, including the Congress, the Department of Labor and the National Labor Relations Board has consistently refused to recognize the rights of workers in sheltered employment; and
WHEREAS, this discriminatory treatment is very damaging to the morale and self respect of these workers; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 9th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this Federation reaffirms its position that sheltered workshop workers are workers, with all the basic rights of workers, such as minimum wage and collective bargaining; and be it further
RESOLVED that a copy of this Resolution shall be transmitted to the President to make him aware of the inconsistency of the retrogressive and discriminatory government policies regarding sheltered workshops with his welfare reform policy.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, full personal security and independence necessitates free access to the services of commercial banks and other financial institutions; and
WHEREAS, numerous instances of discrimination against blind people by banks have been experienced, especially in the rental of safety deposit boxes; and
WHEREAS, the ability of blind persons independently to do business with banks could be markedly improved if some services such as are already provided by some banks were more widespread; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 9th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization directs its officers to devise a means, by statute or by regulation, by which all banks in the Federal Reserve System could be forbidden to discriminate against blind people, and banks could be informed of and encouraged to provide services to blind customers equal to those provided to the sighted; and be it further
RESOLVED that the President be instructed to send copies of this resolution to appropriate officials of the American Banking Association.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, one of the ways in which blind people are kept from first class citizenship is through restriction of their access to public information; and
WHEREAS, some publishers have sought to restrict such access further by denying permission for their copyrighted materials to be transcribed into Braille, large print and recordings; and
WHEREAS, it is an unwarranted and discriminatory use of copyright to deny the freedom to read arbitrarily to an entire class of people; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in convention assembled this 9th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization condemns such improper and discriminatory use of copyrights and is determined to put an end to them; and be it further
RESOLVED that the officers of this organization are directed to do all in their power to obtain an amendment to the copyright law so that a United States copyright implies permission for any government or private, nonprofit agency to reproduce copyrighted material in a form accessible to blind people, and a copy of any such material shall be automatically deposited with the National Collections, Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress.
Adopted unanimously.
Withdrawn
WHEREAS, it is the business of tlie Library of Congress Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped to provide reading material for blind readers; and
WHEREAS, the Library of Congress Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped has initiated a program of recording books on cassettes for which it should be highly commended; and
WHEREAS, currently neither the cassette cartridges nor their containers are marked in Braille; and
WHEREAS, the lack of legible labeling is a great inconvenience to blind readers who must either play the cassette or find a sighted reader; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 8th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this Federation instructs its President to communicate our need for Braille labels to the Library of Congress Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped; and be it further
RESOLVED that we instruct our President to work out with the Library of Congress Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped a usable system for labeling cassettes.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, frequent requests come from overseas blind students for loans of text books in literature, psychology, philosophy, history, and other subjects; and
WHEREAS, these books are not available in the vast majority of emerging countries; and
WHEREAS, some European countries have already arranged for such loans to be made for six to nine to twelve months, the books being sent in care of local libraries, schools for the blind, colleges and similar institutions; and
WHEREAS, such books are absolutely unavailable in transcribed form in these countries; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 9th day of July, 1971, that this Federation take the necessary steps to make the contact with the Library of Congress toward setting up the necessary procedures for making such loans available on request of overseas students, making the necessary safeguard for return of the books through local libraries, United States Information Service libraries and affiliates of the International Federation of the Blind as responsible parties for such returns.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, it is the objective of the National Federation of the Blind that all blind people receive fair and equal services from agencies serving the blind and institutions educating the blind; and
WHEREAS, it has been demonstrated conclusively and repeatedly that the degree of vision has no effect on an individual's ability to do a given job well; and
WHEREAS, as agencies and institutions of education are increasingly making the distinction between totally and partially blind clients resulting in inferior service to and fewer job placements of both the totally blind and the near blind; and
WHEREAS, the use of the term visually handicapped encourages such discriminatory practices toward the totally blind regardless of qualifications; now therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 9th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this Federation deplores and condemns discriminatory treatment of the totally blind; and be it further
RESOLVED that the National Federation of the Blind commends agencies and institutions that use the word blind forthrightly in their names and literature; and be it further
RESOLVED that this organization directs its officers to distribute this resolution to agencies serving the blind and institutions educating the blind throughout this country.
Adopted unanimously
WHEREAS, vast amounts of research are being done throughout the country by private organizations and through universities in an effort to devise new techniques whereby blind persons will be enabled to function more independently and effectively; and
WHEREAS, some of this research is valuable and relevant to the problems of blind persons, a good deal of it is totally irrelevant and inconsequential and simply tends to perpetuate the ancient stereotype of the helpless blind man; and
WHEREAS, blind persons speaking through this organization have the requisite expertise to determine which projects are valuable and would be of real benefit to blind people as well as those which are irrelevant and inconsequential; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 6th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization directs its officers and agents to take all necessary steps to develop a system with the various private and public funding organizations and agencies whereby this organization would be afforded an opportunity to fully evaluate the proposed project and to make recommendations before any grant is awarded; and be it further
RESOLVED that when, after our assessment has revealed a particular project to be sound, this organization throws its wholehearted support behind such project.
Adopted unanimously.
Withdrawn
WHEREAS, in some States the blind are barred from entering the teaching profession by practice, by administrative rule, and by statute, despite the fact that very many of the Nation's blind have demonstrated outstanding capacity in this field; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 8th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this Federation deplores and condemns these nefarious and unlawful practices and calls upon school systems everywhere to extend to qualified blind candidates equal opportunities for training and employment in the teaching field; and be it further
RESOLVED that this Federation urges its affiliates, where necessary, to seek legislation which will assure proper training and employment opportunities for blind teachers and prospective teachers.
Adopted unanimously.
WHEREAS, James Hahn, Assistant Chief for Reader Services, Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress, was extended an invitation to appear and speak at the Houston Convention of the National Federation of the Blind; and
WHEREAS, James Hahn (with the full knowledge and approval of his superior, Robert S. Bray, Chief of the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped, Library of Congress) accepted such invitation and agreed in discussion with President Kenneth Jernigan on the day and hour for his Convention presentation (as witness the enclosed correspondence); and
WHEREAS, said day and time came and passed without the presence or any word at all from James Hahn in the Convention hall or in the Convention hotel or in the city of Houston, Texas; and
WHEREAS, James Hahn, when reminded of his commitment to speak to the Convention of the National Federation of the Blind, said (with great and shameful indifference) that he intended to send a telegram and was most offensively casual about his discourteous neglect to honor his pledged appearance before the largest gathering of blind persons ever held in this nation and in the world; and
WHEREAS, James Hahn's action exemplifies the attitude generally encountered in other and directing personnel of the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress in their dealings toward the blind to whom they owe accountability for their stewardship for the manner in which they function in administering services to blind people; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the National Federation of the Blind in Convention assembled this 8th day of July, 1971, in the city of Houston, Texas, that this organization is most justifiably indignant at the treatment accorded the members of the National Federation of the Blind by the insulting and boorish manner and actions of James Hahn; and the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress; and be it further
RESOLVED that this organization directs its officers to take all actions necessary, including the forwarding of this resolution to President Richard M. Nixon, L. Quincy Mumford, Librarian of the Library of Congress, Robert S. Bray, Chief of the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress, James Hahn, Assistant Chief for Reader Service, Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress, all members of the United States Senate and House of Representatives, and to any and all others deemed by the President of the National Federation of the Blind to be among those who should be apprised of the conduct and behavior of a Federal public servant to the segment of the public whom he is hired to serve; and be it further
RESOLVED that appropriate officials be asked to reprimand James Hahn and Robert S. Bray for their failure to act with responsibility toward the persons they are engaged to serve and that the members of the National Federation of the Blind fully expect and are entitled to a full explanation and apology for their reprehensible behavior; and be it further
RESOLVED that the President of this organization is directed to take all steps required to assure that employees of the Division for the Blind and Physically Handicapped of the Library of Congress, hired only for the purpose of serving the blind and the physically handicapped, do serve the blind and the physically handicapped, and to do all things necessary and reasonable to see that such employees act in all ways required of them as public servants toward the blind and physically handicapped whom they are engaged and paid to serve.
Adopted unanimously.
Delegates came to this Convention by means of a wide variety of transportation. Chartered buses arrived from California, Idaho, Iowa, Kentucky, Minnesota, South Carolina, and Tennessee. The Jernigans traveled in a highway cruiser. That great group from Utah came by plane. Some of the younger members came part of the way by shanks mare when the thumbing was slow. But come they did.
Wednesday afternoon was reserved for tours, and it was a real red hot Texas sizzler sort of day. But busses left the Shamrock Hilton Hotel all afternoon to visit the NASA Space Center and the Astrodome.
One of the many bright spots of the Convention was the performance of the Utah Melodonic Chorus, conducted by Tessie Jones, a former president of the Utah affiliate. The NFB Endowment Fund benefited from the proceeds of the event.
During each Convention session Manuel Urena of Des Moines, Iowa, the persistent and colorful Master of Prizes, gave away many beautiful gifts donated by the affiliates and the host chapter. These were received with delight by the lucky winners and by disgust by the unlucky fellows who had taken "five" and missed out. As usual, there was the repeated good-natured confrontation between Manuel, urging the drawing of prizes, and the President intent on pursuing the main business of the Convention.
No chapter or affiliate exceeded in number or value, the lovely items donated by the NFB of Tennessee. We wonder if their president's persistence, or good looks, or both, had something to do with this windfall.
Marshall Tucker was the leader of the devotional services held each morning. These non-sectarian services lasted about a half hour. The programs presented were excellent and the many who attended felt that these few minutes gave them a good start on the day's activities.
The exhibits which filled the large hall set aside for this purpose were examined with real interest and were an attraction viewed by most of those attending.
All during the Convention Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts were on hand. They did a wonderful job as guides, elevator operators, writers of letters, makers of phone calls, and their cheerful "Can I help you?" was appreciated by all.
One center of congregation before and after sessions was the Texas-proportioned swimming pool--three times Olympic size. President and Mrs. Jernigan, Treasurer and Mrs. VanVliet were seen enjoying an early morning dip on the Sunday before the Convention opened.
Jim Omvig did a beautiful dive from the 33 foot--10 meter--board which was caught by the T.V. cameras with some unforeseen results. When a legally blind teacher in Houston saw it on a news broadcast he was so impressed that a blind person could perform such a feat that he contacted Jim. As a result he attended the Convention banquet and is on his way to becoming a good Federationist.
Donna Hintch of Iowa figured anything that big should be approached properly so she took her white cane along to "sound out" the depths of the water when she ventured into the pool for the first time.
One young Federationist--his name is better left unmentioned--had an unforgettable experience in the pool. His bathing trunks split wide open while he was cavorting in the water and a large towel had to be sent to the rescue.
Federationists lugging sacks of groceries were a frequent sight at the hotel. This was not only due to the high prices of the available restaurants but also the fact that rooms on the ninth floor and above were equipped with kitchens.
Some conventioners had super-bargains in the way of rooms at our low Convention rates when they found themselves ensconced in lovely suites of four and five rooms at twelve dollars a day.
One of his chickens came home to roost for Kelly Smith of Alaska. The Alaska affiliate had donated a large number of sealskin wallets as door prizes. That's right. Kelly's name was drawn for one of them.
The Wednesday evening dance staged by the host affiliate was a huge success. The hall was jam-packed. The music was provided by the Hi Toppers and had the dancers doing polkas, country western, and some dances that had never been seen before. President and Mrs. Jernigan joined the throng on the dance floor. Tiny Beedle didn't let the fact that she had one leg in walking cast interfere with her dancing.
Evenings in the hospitality room were enjoyed by all who attended the piano playing, guitar accompaniment to singing new songs and old.
Introductions at the first roll call showed that the oldest delegate was ninety years old--Urvin Gee of Provo, Utah--and the youngest four months.
George Hoppenstedt, veteran NFB Convention goer at age eight, threw a party for all the youngsters to celebrate his birthday on July 6. He is proud of the fact that he shares Dr. tenBroek's birth date. This prompted President Jernigan to quote the Bible: "Raise up a child in the ways he should go and he will not depart from them."