Civil War: Disunity and the Road to Recovery

Civil War: Disunity and the Road to Recovery

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Civil War: Disunity and the Road to Recovery
A house divided against itself cannot
stand. These words of Abraham Lincoln forever resonant with the echoes of civil
war rang in the ears of blind Americans during a critical four-and-a-half-year
period in the history of the organized blind movement extending roughly from
mid-1957 to early 1962. For in those years their own house, self-built and self-designed,
was divided against itself and there was serious reason to doubt whether
it could any longer stand.

The reasons for this protracted civil
war among the organized blind were various but not fundamentally complicated.
The troubles within the movement were related in part to the troubles without;
for at least a few active members came to resent and resist the hard line adopted
by the National Federation toward the hostile agencies of the blindness system
in the struggle for the right to organize. (That difference of philosophy and
attitude was to become more evident in later years when the splinter group formed
by dissident ex-Federationists, under the name of the American Council of the
Blind, consistently opposed the NFB in its struggles with industries and agencies
engaged in acts of discrimination against the blind.)

A deeper source of division, however,
sprang from the very success of the Federation its rapid rise in affluence and
influence. Whereas in the lean years of the movement there had been a scarcity
of office-seekers and volunteer workers, during the prosperous fifties aspiring
leaders sprang up on all sides some of whom won national office and responsibility
while others failed in their bids for recognition and accordingly came to feel
neglected and ill-used. Reinforcing this source of friction in the movement
were marked differences of personality and temperament among some of the more
prominent members, which in a few cases became so deep as to become irreconcilable.
Clearly as the bitterness and hysteria of many personal attacks upon Federation
leaders demonstrated there were elements of envy and jealousy, as well as ambition,
involved in the campaign of disruption. Added to these feelings of personal
grievance, furthermore, were the common frustrations and suspicions aroused
in many blind persons by the very real inequities encountered daily and habitually
in a world geared to vision and the
visual.

Although signs of disgruntlement had
surfaced earlier, the first substantial outbreak of civil war occurred in the
summer of 1957 with the firing of A. L. Archibald, the Federation's Washington
representative. Archibald had tried to achieve political power by making alliances
with various members of the Federation's leadership, but these efforts had been
unsuccessful except in the case of Board Member Durward McDaniel of Oklahoma.
Increasingly Archibald refused to accept supervision or follow instructions
from President tenBroek. Finally (in August of 1957) tenBroek fired Archibald,
but the full story of the events leading to the dismissal
was not told until almost two years later.

In the spring of 1959 (at the height
of the Federation's civil war) a special supplement of the Braille Monitor
was issued. It carried, among other things, the details of the Archibald
episode. Written by Kenneth Jernigan, the Archibald article played an important
part in charting the course for the organization during the remainder of the
internal struggle.

THE ARCHIBALD STORY
by Kenneth Jernigan
In August of 1957 A. L. Archibald was
fired from the staff of the National Federation of the Blind. This event ushered
in a new era in Federation affairs. It became the focal point of an internal
conflict, which was already getting underway. It was the beginning of
a civil war.

Throughout all of the strife which has
plagued the Federation ever since, one figure, A. L. Archibald, has been ever
present. In whatever part of the country the conflict has flared, wherever there
have been unrest and dissension, wherever there have been charges made there
has A. L. Archibald been. He has lurked in the background as a principal agitator
and emissary of hate and suspicion.

Unlike McDaniel and Boring [Durward McDaniel
of Oklahoma and Marie Boring of North Carolina], he has not, until recently,
made public statements or circulated letters through the mail. He has kept himself
in the background. Many of the delegates at Boston did not even know that he
was present at the convention. Yet, he was always at Durward McDaniel's side.

The time has now come when A. L. Archibald
must be brought forth from the shadows. His story must be told so that Federationists
everywhere may know the real reasons for his dismissal the facts about his performance
as a Federation staff member.

The McDaniel faction has sought to make
Archibald a hero. In general the story they tell is this: Archibald was a tireless
worker for the Federation. He was brilliant and shrewd, a lobbyist without equal.
He was loyal to the organization that hired him. He worked both day and night
to advance its interests. Because he would not bow to the whims of the dictator who was and is the President of the Federation, he was suddenly fired without
warning or cause. He was not even given an opportunity to resign or told why
he was being dismissed. Emissaries from the dictatorial President simply came
to his hotel room one night and gave him a letter
saying that he was fired.

What are the facts? Is this a true account
of what happened? Was Archibald really a hard worker? Did he win friends for
the Federation? What were his attitudes toward the elected officers of the organization?
Were there specific reasons for his dismissal, or was it simply based on whim?
Let Federationists everywhere read the record and judge for themselves. Let
them read Archibald's own letters. Let him speak for himself. This is the Archibald
story.

When the Federation was established in 1940, there was little money to hire staff or do anything else. The first
thought of paid employees came in 1942 at the Des Moines convention. At that
time the delegates unanimously decided that the President, not the Executive
Committee [the name Executive Committee was later changed to Board of Directors],
should do the hiring. The nominating committee was also serving as a resolutions
committee. The exact wording of the motion establishing the first Federation
staff position was as follows:
Mr. President:
Your nominating committee formally recommends that the Federation authorize its President to appoint a person to act as his
assistant and to be officially designated as Executive Director of the National
Federation of the Blind.

Passed Unanimously.

The first Executive Director of the Federation,
Mr. Raymond Henderson, was selected and appointed by the President. He served
brilliantly and efficiently from 1942 until his death in 1945. The President
then selected and appointed Mr. Leslie Schlingheyde. Mr. Schlingheyde, however,
did not get his work done, and he was dismissed by the President. In 1946 Mr.
Archibald was hired as a part-time
employee. In 1952 he was employed on a full-time basis.

It was hardly a year after his full-time
employment that the trouble started. He began to refuse to carry out assignments
given him by the President of the Federation. He insisted upon his right to
decide whether specific articles or other printed material sent him by Dr. tenBroek
should be distributed in Washington. In one instance he categorically refused
to circulate a particular article concerning public assistance because he thought
the wording was not quite what it should be this despite the fact that he was
a hired staff member and Dr. tenBroek was the elected President of the organization
with responsibility for supervising his work.
From 1952 to 1956 there was a gradual
deterioration in Archibald's performance and attitude. He tried more than once
(unsuccessfully) to form political alliances with individual members of the
Executive Committee, always with complaints against Dr. tenBroek and the fact
that he, Archibald, was under Dr. tenBroek's supervision. He became increasingly
sulky and insubordinate, and there were long periods of time when he did (and
moreover seemed incapable of doing) little if any work at all.

Throughout all this nonperformance and
insubordination, Dr. tenBroek was patient in the extreme. As he later said,
he kept hoping that if he were patient long enough, Archie would come to his
senses. In the meantime Dr. tenBroek was careful to make no statement which
would injure Archibald's relation with the affiliates. He had only words of
kindness and friendliness for him.

It may well be that the 1956 convention
at San Francisco, that meeting which seemed so harmonious and full of promise
for the Federation, was the real turning point in the Archibald story. Archibald's
earlier attempts at forming alliances with members of the Executive Committee
in opposition to the President had been unsuccessful. At the 1956 convention
the name of Durward McDaniel was placed in nomination for the Second Vice Presidency
of the Federation. He was defeated in the nominating committee. It was then
that McDaniel went to Dr. tenBroek's room and angrily talked to him and other
leaders of the Federation about the presidential succession. It was soon after
the San Francisco convention that Archibald's insubordination increased markedly
and that carbons of almost all of his letters began to be sent to McDaniel,
but not to other members of the
Executive Committee.

The extent of Archibald's nonperformance
and insubordination is so great that it should be shown by his own letters.
Otherwise it could hardly be believed.

On August 6, 1956, Dr. tenBroek wrote
to Archibald requesting him to prepare a draft of proposed federal rules and
regulations implementing the new self-care and self-support provisions of the
1956 Social Security Act Amendments. This was simply a routine assignment.

On August 15, 1956, Mr. Archibald replied
in perhaps one of the strangest letters ever written by an employee to an employer.
Among other things, he said that while he appreciated the honor of it all, he
felt forced to decline to carry out the assignment. He was not content merely
to send this letter to the President of the Federation but sent it to others
as well, among them, of course, Durward
McDaniel. The letter says:

Dear Chick: [Dr. tenBroek was called Chick
by some of his close associates.]

My vacation plans and reservations have
all been canceled. I don't know how much good this will do the Federation; for
I can't cancel my secretary's plans. She is scheduled to give birth to a baby
this week. Tomorrow, in fact, is the due date. Having had the forethought to
time the arrival of this infant for some time after the close of the congressional
session, these plans can be changed by no one. She has, in fact, pressed her
luck a bit by staying on as long as she has. But this is her final day with
me. I have thus far had no luck in finding a temporary replacement. Were it
not for her kindness in volunteering to come in for a few hours now and again
until she goes to the hospital, my prospects for getting anything done would
indeed be slight. I have set these facts forth in order that you and others
may understand fully my situation here with respect to the project outlined
in your letter of August 6th.

My first comment with respect to that
project is that you do me entirely too much honor to believe that I can, like
Athena sprang from the head of Zeus, single-handedly come forth with a complete
plan in all its refinements whereby the Social Security Administration will
have to do no work to adopt regulations putting into effect the new self-support
purpose of state public assistance plans. I am sure that there are many ideas
which would never occur to me; nor do I have any long administrative experience
to think of all the details. Therefore, while I appreciate the honor of it all,
I am compelled to decline the full responsibility for developing a set of regulations
to submit to Schottland. [He refers to Charles Schottland, the head of the Social
Security Administration.] I am in consequence calling upon a group of Federation
leaders, including yourself, to concentrate upon this project with virtually
the same attention that I shall be giving to it. Without their help and yours
the project will amount to very little. Having deleted the last paragraph of
your letter from the copies I have made of it (the paragraph is not relevant
to the project), I am accordingly sending copies of your letter and this one
to the people who are listed below in an earnest appeal for ideas from them
and with the full knowledge on my part that if they do not make contributions
we will probably not have very
much to suggest to Schottland.

Cordially,
A. L. Archibald
Executive
Director

On August 20, 1956, Dr. tenBroek replied:

Dear Archie:
This will reply to the tone and substance
of your letter of August 15.

In my letter to you of August 6, I asked
that you set to work immediately preparing a draft of proposed federal rules
and regulations implementing the relevant provisions of the 1956 Social Security
Act Amendments. In so doing, I had no idea that I was conferring an honor upon
you. I was sending you an assignment, which I now repeat.

The task is not at all formidable. This
is the sort of thing that staff people are doing in welfare departments all
around the country every day and in voluntary agencies and organizations. I
expected that the product would need some refinement and that it would not spring
full-grown from your head, making unnecessary any further work either on our
part or that of Schottland. There is no need to worry about refinement, however,
until a primary draft is in hand.

As I view the picture, it is urgent that
we prepare our proposals as soon as possible. We are under the gun. The federal
people are already hard at work on such rules. Moreover, the people in the state
departments are also getting their ideas together. Our proposals will have their
maximum impact if presented while a relatively fluid condition still exists
in the minds of federal and state directors. Progressively as their ideas jell,
the possibility of getting our ideas accepted diminishes.

Let me say two things about your distribution
of this assignment to other Federation leaders. The first is that if I had wanted
them to work on the matter at this stage, I would have written them myself.
The second is that this is the wrong stage of the matter at which to call on
them for their contribution. They are all extremely busy and overburdened with
Federation work. They should, therefore, be asked to contribute only when they
can do so with maximum advantage and minimum effort. That stage would be to
make their comments and suggestions when the primary draft has been prepared
and the pick and shovel work done. Doing that pick and shovel work and getting
the primary draft ready should be performed by staff.

You should, therefore, understand that
these are instructions to you and that I expect them to be treated as such.
When you have completed your draft,
please send it directly to me.

Cordially yours,
Jacobus
tenBroek
President

Despite continued urging on the part
of Dr. tenBroek, the proposed draft of the federal rules and regulations was
not forthcoming.

On November 21, 1956, Dr. tenBroek wrote
as follows:

Dear Archie:

On October 9 I sent you a copy of a rough
draft of proposed Social Security rules and regulations prepared by Perry Sundquist.
In the covering letter to you and a number of other people, I requested comments
and suggestions preparatory to the working out of a final draft, which I indicated
I would try to do in a couple of weeks from that time when I returned from Ohio.
Subsequent events have prevented my completing the draft. Meanwhile, much valuable
time has gone by and valuable opportunity has been lost to present a set of
well worked out proposals to the state and federal agencies.

I now re-assign this task to you. From
August 6 to October 9 you were supposed to have been working on this job anyway.
During most of that time you had very little else to do. Surely you had ample
chance to do the thinking required. Assuming that you did not do it, however,
you now have before you Perry's rough draft to aid you in the process. A very
few days of concentrated work should produce the finished product. I expect
you to get at it immediately and to complete it quickly. You are to send your
final draft to me for review and distribution.

Cordially,
Jacobus tenBroek
President

Let Federationists everywhere read and
marvel at the reply of November 26, 1956.

Dear Chick:

You expressed an interest in learning
what progress is being made on the proposed revisions of federal public assistance
regulations to carry out the new self-care provisions added to Title X this
year.

I am happy to say that work on these
proposals has been underway for a long time past. I believe that, if there are
no further serious interruptions such as have occurred frequently since the
project was first undertaken, the job will be completed in the fairly near future.

I am happy to say (he refers here to
Dr. tenBroek's appendectomy) that you have come out of your recent surgery in
apparent good shape. We all seem
to be subject to interruptions which
are not of our own choosing.

Cordially,
Archie

One need hardly add that the inevitable
copy was sent to Durward K. McDaniel.

On December 5, 1956, Dr. tenBroek replied
in a letter which most administrators would consider mild indeed under the circumstances:

Dear Archie:

In your letter of November 26 you begin
with the sentence: You have expressed an interest in learning what progress is
being made on the proposed revisions of federal public assistance regulations
to carry out the new self-support and self-care provisions added to Title X this
year. This is a most amazing sentence. Yet, it expresses an attitude which you
persist in clinging to. As the person in the organization responsible for supervising
your work and determining what it will be, I gave you a work assignment. After
numerous dilatory tactics, delays, and procrastinations, you now write me describing
this work assignment as a mere expression of interest on my part just as you would
reply to an outsider who had asked
about this or that.
In the past when you have attempted to
force an issue on this score, I have systematically followed the practice of
deliberately avoiding it, hoping that if I were patient long enough you would
gradually find your proper niche in the Federation and come to your senses.
It is obvious now that my excessive patience has not been helpful. It is time,
therefore, that we straighten this matter out once and for all.

You have simply got to face the fact,
and moreover accept it fully, that your position in the Federation is not that
of an independent constitutional officer. You are not free to decide what work
you will do and what work you will not do and when and how you will do it. You
are not free to select your own duties. Your duties are to be carried out under
the supervision and direction of the President of the Federation. The tasks
you will perform, your overall work load, and how and when you will perform
assigned tasks are to be determined by him unless in the circumstances of particular
cases he tells you that you are free to decide for yourself.

It is absolutely preposterous that at
this late day I should have to say these things to you. You know full well that
this has been the mode of operation in the Federation as long as you have been
in it. The letter of appointment which I sent you when you were raised to your
present salary was very explicit on this point. In addition, you were present
at the Executive Committee meeting at the Omaha convention in 1955 at which
a resolution was formally passed confirming the long-standing mode of operation
on this point, i.e., assigning to the President the authority and responsibility
of determining the duties and supervising the work of
all employees of the Federation. That resolution reads:

WHEREAS, there is now every reason to
believe that the income of the National Federation of the Blind will continue
to increase and that, as a result, our organization will soon be in a position
to make long overdue and desperately needed additions to its
paid staff; and

WHEREAS, it seems desirable that there
is a restatement and clarification of our established policies with respect
to the hiring, supervision, direction, and if necessary, the dismissal of staff
members:

THEREFORE, be it resolved in the future,
as in the past, the President of the National Federation of the Blind shall
have the exclusive authority to negotiate with, hire, supervise, direct, and
when necessary, dismiss any and all members of the staff of this organization.

There are some intimations in your letter
that you have not had time to get this assignment done and that you have been
subject to distractions beyond your control. This assignment was originally
given you some four months ago. Let us assume that you spent a month working
on Dave Cobb's Post Office report, which is an extravagant assumption. [Dave
Cobb was the Federation's Washington attorney.] Let us assume further that other
work claimed your attention, or that you were sick for another month. I have
had no evidence that either of these assumptions is correct. Since August you
have done very little Federation work. Still this would leave approximately
two months in which to do a job that at the very outside would take a week of
concentrated effort.

You are receiving a very substantial
salary. Including full maintenance in a Washington hotel, it totals between
$9,000 and $10,000 a year. [This salary must be seen in the context of the value
of the dollar in 1956.] For that amount of money, the Federation has a right
to expect a substantial amount of work, and beyond that, a substantial amount
of cooperative compliance with those responsible for the executive direction
of the operations of the Federation. There are several people in the Federation
who are more productive than you are despite the fact that they carry on full-time
jobs in addition to their work for the Federation.

This may seem to you like a tough letter.
After so many years of patience and putting up with your refusal or inability
to comply with work assignments and of your maneuvers to carve out a different
position in the Federation from that assigned to you, it is intended to be just
that. It may also seem to you like an angry letter. If so, it is based on an
attitude that I have had for a long
time and will continue to have for a long time.

So far as I am concerned, Archie, you
have only one course open to you and that is at long last to face and to accept
the role assigned to you in the Federation and to carry out with a greater show
of willingness and deliberate effort the tasks you are asked to perform.

Cordially yours,
Jacobus tenBroek
President

It has been said by some that Archibald
was given no intimation of the fact that his attitudes and work performance
were not satisfactory. He was fired in August of 1957. The foregoing letter
from Dr. tenBroek was written December 5, 1956. Let the record
speak for itself.

These are by no means the only instances
of insubordination on the part of Archibald during 1956. During the early part
of the greeting card difficulties with the Post Office, our then Washington
attorney David Cobb, suggested that Dr. tenBroek should secure from him and
other employees of the Federation, including Archibald, an exact accounting
of the way they spent their time working for the Federation. This would permit
the distribution of expenditures in accordance with the various headings in
the Federation's books. On June 13, 1956, Dr. tenBroek wrote to Archibald requesting
that he keep a daily work log. On October 5, 1956, it was necessary to write
again:

Dear Archie:

On June 13 I wrote you a letter asking
you to keep a daily work log indicating the allocation of your time to the various
projects on which you are engaged. I asked you to send me copies of this daily
work log near the end of each month. It is now October 5, and in none of the
intervening months have I received any work logs from you.

I now call your attention to this matter
again. You are herewith instructed to begin keeping such daily work logs starting
with the 1st of October and to send them to me at the end of each month.

Cordially,
Jacobus tenBroek
President

On November 21, 1956, Dr. tenBroek wrote
once again:

Dear Archie:

On June 13 I wrote you asking that you
keep a daily work log. On October 5 I reminded you of my earlier communication,
pointed out that you had not complied with it in any of the intervening months,
and repeated the instruction that you were to send me copies of your daily work
logs near the end of each month. You still have not complied with these instructions.

I reiterate to you once again that you
are to keep a daily work log indicating what time is spent on what projects
and that these daily work logs are to be sent to me near the end of each month.

Cordially,
Jacobus tenBroek
President

Perhaps the only comment needed is this:
Archibald never complied with the request. Was he really a dutiful and hard-working
employee of the Federation, laboring diligently to advance its cause? What does
the record say?

The year 1957 brought many new things,
but it did not bring a new Archibald. He was back at the same old stand. Note
the following letter from Dr. tenBroek
dated April 10, 1957:

Dear Archie:

Last year I had occasion to write you
several times to inform you with such emphasis as I could muster that some of
your attitudes, methods, and procedures were decidedly unsatisfactory to the
Federation. One of the points I discussed explicitly was the procedure by which
you distribute to a number of people a request to submit ideas and judgments
to you. In the case of the Switzer letter [he refers to Mary Switzer, head of
the federal rehabilitation program] you indulged in this same procedure modifying
it, however, to the extent of at least sending out your preliminary evaluation
along with the request. The method is still completely
unsatisfactory.

The procedure implies and your letter
to Bill Taylor makes quite explicit that you will pick and choose among the
comments submitted and decide what policy the Federation will follow. [Bill
Taylor was a Federationist from Pennsylvania who was an attorney.] It is a basic
principle of the Federation, as you well know, from public documents of the
Federation as well as from instructions from me, that staff members of the Federation
shall not decide important issues
of policy.

I do not expect to go over this same
territory with you two or three times every year.

Yours sincerely,
Jacobus tenBroek
President

To those who feel that the Archibald
story reveals a new technique in employee-employer relationships, it can only
be said that more novel experiments
were yet to come.

In April of 1957 Archibald sent to Dr.
tenBroek a bulletin concerning bills affecting the blind which had been introduced
into Congress. He requested that the bulletin be mailed immediately to all of
the membership. Dr. tenBroek felt that the bulletin was not well written, that
it was entirely too long, and that it emphasized rather starkly the poverty
of the Federation's legislative efforts for the past few months. He so informed
Archibald. On May 10, 1957, Archibald wrote:

Dear Chick:

I have your letter of May 7, 1957, commenting
upon my letter of April 29, which responded to your letter of April 25, describing
the bulletin I sent you for release as emphasizing starkly the poverty
of the Federation's legislative program. You re-assert your
description. I again reject it.

I further herewith reiterate my request
that the bulletin as submitted to you except for one paragraph be put on the
mimeograph machine and mailed out
to the general mailing list without delay.

You will receive this Monday, May 13.
Unless I hear from you by letter, wire, or telephone before noon on Wednesday,
May 15, that the bulletin is in the course of publication to be mailed, Ishall
proceed at my personal expense to order it mimeographed here and mailed out
to the limited and incomplete mailing list of this office. It can be decided
later whether the National Federation of the Blind will reimburse me for the
expense. Needless to say, I shall disregard any directive from you ordering
me to refrain from this course of action.

Cordially,
A. L. Archibald
Executive
Director

Again the inevitable carbon. To whom? Durward K. McDaniel.

At this stage surely most administrators
would have felt that Archibald's usefulness to the organization had ended. A paid
staff member announces that a particular piece of material must be mailed out
immediately. If the elected President does not comply with his wish, then he,
the paid staff member, will order the mailing to be done from the Washington office.
Moreover, he will disregard any directive to the contrary.
Apparently McDaniel felt that his friend
had gone too far and had perhaps put himself in an untenable position. Accordingly,
McDaniel, in a telephone conversation with Dr. tenBroek on May 13, 1957, suggested
that he, McDaniel, would negotiate with Archie and get him to back down on his
demand. Dr. tenBroek said that there was no negotiating to be done. In a few
days the Archibald bulletin was mailed out from Washington. It contained no
spectacular material or information, and is probably not remembered by most
Federationists.

Despite the fact that Archibald had said
in his letter of May 10 with regard to the mailing of his bulletin. It can
be decided later whether the National Federation will reimburse me for the expense, he sent a bill to Dr. tenBroek on July 16, 1957, in the amount of $328.50. It
will be noted from Dr. tenBroek's reply dated July 31, 1957, that still other
instances of insubordination had occurred in the meantime. Archibald had asked
whether he could take his secretary to the New Orleans convention. Dr. tenBroek
had told him that he should not do this, that it would be cheaper to hire local
secretarial help than to pay all of the travel expenses involved. Note Dr. tenBroek's
letter concerning the Archibald bulletin and the secretarial incident:

July 31, 1959

Dear Archie:

I have your letter of July 16 containing
a number of suggestions and attaching two bills, one from Ginn's and one from
the City Duplicating Center. The bill from Ginn's has been forwarded to Emil
for payment. [Emil Arndt of Illinois was the Federation's Treasurer.] The bill
from City Duplicating Center (the firm that had printed the Archibald bulletin),
since it is a personal one, is
herewith being returned to you.

I cannot agree with your suggestion that
a Washington bank account be established from which you could make payments
on your own authorization. Such an independent account would facilitate the
development of staff positions into the positions of constitutional officers.

You are authorized to incur Federation
bills prior to approval from Federation headquarters only if the bills are small
and of a routine nature. For all other bills you must secure headquarters approval
in advance. This applies not only to supplies and
equipment, but also to trips for the Federation.

When I was in Washington in June, you
expressly raised the question with me of taking your secretary to the New Orleans
convention. At that time I told you not to do so since arrangements were being
made to procure secretarial help locally. Yet, you did take your secretary and
submitted a bill for her travel expenses to the Federation. That bill was paid
by Emil before he secured my approval. Emil has been alerted not to allow such
a slip to occur again.

Cordially yours,
Jacobus tenBroek
President

P. S. Your bill from Ginn's is not accompanied
by any invoice. You should secure invoices in triplicate along with all bills
so that Emil and I will have a permanent record of what the expenditures were
for and the third invoice can be returned with the paid bill so that the supplier
knows what was covered in the payment.

On August 15, 1957, the real character
of Archibald was clearly revealed if, indeed, there had been any doubt about
the matter before. He announced to Dr. tenBroek that he, Archibald, intended
to incur expenses in the name of the Federation for any item or service that
he considered necessary and reasonable. He said that it was unreasonable of
Dr. tenBroek to ask him to send invoices in triplicate, that Dr. tenBroek had
a photographing machine in his office, and could make his own copies. Finally,
he said that the bill for the mailing of his bulletin must and would be paid
by the Federation. He said that if it were not paid, he would advise the creditors
to sue the Federation, and that he would give testimony in their behalf. This
was the responsible, loyal, and hard-working Archibald! These are his exact
words:

August 15, 1957

Dear Chick:

I have deliberately permitted a considerable
time to elapse before reacting to your letter of July 31. Surely you realize
that I will not agree to accept a Federation expense as a personal bill. I am,
therefore, returning to you herewith for prompt payment the bill from City Duplicating
Center, Inc. in the amount of $328.50. Since you have delayed payment of this
bill into the third month, there
is no difficulty in supplying you with copies in triplicate.

I need not recount here the facts surrounding
the incurring of the bill. They are known in detail to you, to Durward McDaniel,
and to me. When Durward was in Washington during the last week of May, I confirmed
with him my understanding of the agreement reached by telephone between you
and him on May 14, following your receipt of my letter of May 10. I can say
with confidence that both Durward and I understood that I was to mail the legislative
bulletin from here and forward the bill to you in the normal procedure.

My actions were taken in good faith.
I am sure Durward acted in good faith also. I directed City Duplicating Center
to bill the National Federation. They accepted the job in good faith, and billed
the Federation in good faith. They expect to be paid in good faith. In addition
to repeated billings, they have telephoned to inquire why they have not been
paid and reimbursed.

You may rest assured that under the circumstances
I shall not pay from my personal funds any bill made out to the National Federation.
[It might be inserted here that Archibald made the bill in the name of the Federation
utterly without authorization.] Even if the Federation's creditor should find
it necessary to sue for payment, I shall take no action except to give testimony
to the facts as I know them. If I am again contacted by City Duplicating Center
on the subject of this bill, I shall have no alternative but to advise them
regarding their course of action. Before raising any question about the bill,
you permitted two months to pass [this statement is not true, of course, since
the bill was not even sent until July 16, and Dr. tenBroek answered on July
31] during which there was ample time and opportunity to straighten out any
misunderstanding which might have existed, and to take action to avoid embarrassment
for the Federation. I can only be very forthright and honest with the Federation's
creditor if questioned again.

Your request for bills and invoices in
triplicate will seem demanding to business establishments supplying us with
small assortments of items. You have a photographic reproducing machine in your
office. You can easily make as many copies for record as you
desire.

Your recollection of our conversation
on June 13 about taking my secretary to New Orleans is obviously hazy. I regret
the necessity of directly contradicting your statement that you told me not
to take her to the convention. I did not expressly raise with you the question
of taking her along. After some questions about how she was working out as my
secretary, you commented that you were attempting to make some arrangements
in New Orleans for secretarial help. When I had heard nothing more regarding
the subject of secretarial help in New Orleans, I made the decision on Friday
before leaving for the convention to secure reservations for my secretary in
order to assure myself of competent help in the difficult and arduous task of
drafting, re-drafting, and putting in final
form the very large number of resolutions presented.

My practice generally in respect to incurring
expenses for which I ask reimbursement from the Federation has always been to
exercise great care to determine that they were reasonable, under the circumstances.
For me to operate under any other rule would be to make my work impossible of
accomplishment in a variety of situations. There have been occasions which have
required me to reach a decision on my own that a hurried trip was necessary,
and there have been occasions when I have had to hire people to get urgent work
for the Federation done. There have also been other instances which could be
enumerated. The only practicable way for me to function is to continue the exercise
of the rule of reason in making outlays for which I expect to gain reimbursement.

Very truly yours,
A. L. Archibald
Executive Director

Once more the inevitable carbon. To whom?
To all members of the Executive Committee? No! To Durward K. McDaniel.

It was at this stage that Dr. tenBroek
paid the bill for Archibald's bulletin and fired him. He did not further negotiate
with him or plead or persuade.
He simply fired him.

In view of all of the past circumstances,
however, the letter of dismissal and the financial conditions allowed can hardly
be called other than generous. The First Vice President [George Card] personally
delivered Dr. tenBroek's letter to Archibald in Washington.
The letter reads:

August 20, 1957

Dear Archie:

Effective immediately upon receipt of
this notice your services as Executive Director of the Federation are terminated.

You are directed to turn over to George
Card the keys to the Federation's Washington office and all files and other
Federation property in your custody.

Your salary will continue for four months
as separation pay.

Your reasonable travel and removal expenses
to California, if you desire to return there, will be met by the Federation.
Other expenses incurred by you after receipt of this notice will not be paid
by the Federation.

Your maintenance expenses incurred prior
to the receipt of this notice but not yet paid will be processed and paid by
the Federation in the usual way.

Very truly yours,
Jacobus tenBroek
President

In his letter of August 23, 1957, to
the Executive Committee Dr. tenBroek said in part:

Dear Colleague:

On behalf of the Federation I have today
carried out the personally very unpleasant duty of firing Mr. A. L. Archibald
as the Federation's Washington representative. The separation has been made
immediately effective.

Archie has been a full-time employee
of the Federation since 1952. Prior to that, beginning in 1946, he was a part-time
employee. He was originally hired as an Executive Director. However, I soon
discovered Archie was not cut out to be an executive. He was very slow and inefficient
in handling routine matters. He failed to allocate time in accordance with the
importance of items. He went to pieces under pressure. I therefore assigned
him to duties in connection with the Washington work of the Federation. These
increased gradually until in the past two or three years he has spent full time,
practically the year round, in Washington. Despite this reassignment of duties,
the title of Executive Director has not been changed.

At the present time Archie's salary is
$10,000 per year. He received $5,000 in cash plus full maintenance. Full maintenance
during the past 12 months has amounted to $5,235.00. If Archie maintained a
home in California, his living expenses in Washington could not properly be
considered salary. In that event they would be properly treated as costs of
travel. However, Archie does not have to maintain a residence elsewhere and
does not maintain one. Since he is in Washington practically the year round
and that is the almost exclusive location of his work for the Federation, the
payment of the ordinary living expenses such as rent and food must be
regarded as part of his salary.

There are two major reasons for Archie's
separation at this time. The first has to do with the level of his performance;
the second with the conception
of his position.

Throughout the remainder of this letter
Archibald's performance and lack of performance are discussed in detail. Since
much of the discussion would be repetitious to those who have read the foregoing
letters, it will be omitted.

However, perhaps the final paragraph
dealing with the relations between hired staff and elected officers should be
quoted. It reads:

The theory and even necessity behind
this policy and practice (that is, that hired staff members all be under the
supervision of elected officers) is of utmost importance to the future of the
Federation. If the policies of the Federation are to be carried out and its
purposes accomplished, the Federation must have a strong executive. Because
of the Federation's democratic and representative make-up, that executive must
be elected. The difficulties I have had with Archie during the past several
years illustrate what can be seen without such illustration: Either the staff
will govern the officers, or the officers will govern the staff. All of the
advantages in the struggle are on the side of the staff. They are permanent;
they are full-time; they are paid; they become knowledgeable. Even without a
deliberate purpose to do so, the whole tendency of the operation is for them
to become the governing forces. In the Federation, the President must have authority
to hire, fire, and supervise the staff. If the President's administration is
not a good one, if he is weak, ineffective, or otherwise incapable of discharging
his duties, then the delegates at the convention should elect another person.
No such safeguards exist in the case of the staff. If the organization is to
remain democratic, then all major policies must be handled by persons who are
responsible to the convention by election. Once the staff is in control, then
the Federation simply becomes another agency. It loses its democratic and representative
character. Elected officers simply become the fronts for the activities of paid
employees.

Cordially yours,
Jacobus tenBroek
President

Even though Archibald's conduct had been
of the character described, Dr. tenBroek permitted him on August 24, 1957, to
submit a letter of resignation for the record. This was done in order to increase
his chances of employment elsewhere. The same consideration (namely, the wish
to do nothing which would damage Archibald's chances of finding employment)
has been largely responsible for the fact that the entire story has never been
fully told before. Such a consideration can no longer be taken into account.

McDaniel's reaction to the Archibald
firing was immediate and violent. With Archibald's firing, McDaniel saw for
a second time the ruin of his hopes and ambitions. The first setback had come
in 1956 when he had failed to get the nomination for Second Vice President.
Now the alternative means of achieving power and influence, an alliance with
the Washington staff representative of the Federation, was also gone. In a bitter
letter to the members of the Federation's Board of Directors dated August 29,
1957, McDaniel railed against the President and demanded an immediate meeting
of the Executive Committee. He said concerning the Archibald firing:

In closing I would like to make a statement
about the President's letter of August 23rd, 1957. I am one of the few members
of the executive committee who has been intimately acquainted with this episode
as it developed. This letter of August 23rd is an inadequate revelation of the
facts. I know A. L. Archibald very well. I know that he has had no desire to
exert an improper influence upon the organization which has employed him. This
superficial and erroneous issue of staff versus elected officials must not confuse
and conceal the real problems confronting us. I can think of many major achievements
to add to Mr. Archibald's credit. I was shocked to receive such a letter about
a loyal Federationist who apparently was not given a chance to resign. I note
in today's mail an effort to mitigate this injustice by accepting a resignation
which was voluntarily submitted.

Sincerely and fraternally,
Durward

As Federationists will remember, the
meeting of the Executive Committee demanded by McDaniel was held in Chicago
early in September of 1957. At that Executive Committee meeting, despite all
of his threats and railings, McDaniel had no case to make and he and Marie Boring
stood alone as a disgruntled twosome. McDaniel went away from that Executive
Committee meeting a bitter and a disappointed man. Ever since that time his
actions have seemed to say, If I cannot rule the Federation, I will ruin it.
The foregoing series of letters and statements
has been called The Archibald Story. But it might also be called The Story
of Frustrated and Twisted Ambition, The Story of Rule or Ruin, The Story of
Distortion and Suspicion, or it might simply be
called: THE MCDANIEL STORY.
At the Federation's Boston convention
in 1958 a small minority (soon to be known as the McDaniel-Boring faction) sought
to gain control of the convention, or failing that, to disrupt it. After a long
and embittered debate, the dissident group was decisively put down by a vote
of the delegates, and order was at least temporarily restored. But it was plain
to most conventioneers that the internal strife had just begun and that it was
threatening to consume the Federation. Thus one veteran observer of NFB conventions Braille Monitor editor George Card of Wisconsin reported despairingly
on the scene at Boston:

There has never been a National Convention
like this one, he wrote, and it is my fervent hope that there will never be
another like it in the future. He went on to declare: For the first time in
our history, there seemed to be real dissension among us. Feelings ran higher
and higher as the time for the showdown approached. When it was all over, there
was little evidence of any real reconciliation. Some degree of tension and grimness
was apparent right through to adjournment on Monday. Whether or not the National
Federation can ever again become the united, consecrated organization that it
always has been is now in the balance.

Those grim sentiments came to be even
more widely shared among Federationists in the months that followed the Boston
convention. In May of 1959 (as has already been said) the NFB published a special
edition of the Braille Monitor devoted expressly to a full account of
the internal warfare which threatens to destroy the National Federation of the
Blind. The special issue featured a report
from the President, Jacobus tenBroek, entitled The Crisis in
the Federation. His narrative
began with these words:
Two years ago I reported to you that
the National Federation was faced with a concerted and serious attack from without
from a number of powerful agencies which had pooled their resources to oppose
our right to organize.

Today I am obligated to report to you that the Federation is faced with an equally concerted and no less serious attack
from a different source: an attack from within.

The assault upon the Federation by the
agencies was principally characterized then as it is still characterized by
defamation of the character of our elected leadership, by ridicule of the achievements
of our movement, and by systematic attempts to disrupt
or dominate our national, state, and local organizations.

The present attack upon the Federation
from within is characterized by the same strategy and tactics: by defamation
of the character of our elected leadership, by ridicule of the achievements
of our movement, and by systematic attempts to disrupt or
dominate our national, state, and local organizations.

Declaring that one thesis above all has
been repeated again and again with mounting clamor and bitterness by a small
group of members the thesis that tenBroek must go the Federation's President
maintained that the effort to oust him from elective leadership did not stand
by itself but was part of a larger scheme to destroy the democratic character
of the Federation if not the Federation itself. He went on:

The drive for the elimination of the
present administration has been accompanied, as thousands of our members and
much of the public are now aware, by such depths of vituperation and divisive
action as to bring the National Federation of the Blind to the brink of ruin.
Whether such total destruction of our movement is within the purpose of the
minority faction may still be a matter of speculation; but that the disruption
of the Federation has been deliberately threatened as the alternative to resignation
of the President is now plainly
part of the record.

The bitter division within the National
Federation, which this special edition of the Monitor documented in comprehensive
detail, raged on unabated into the 1959 convention at Santa Fe, where the issue
was finally formulated in terms on which the entire convention could vote (the
so-called Georgia Compromise). The steps leading up to the decisive action,
and the mood of the delegates during the strife-torn convention, formed the
substance of an illuminating Monitor report by editor George Card. His
article, simply entitled Convention Notes, follows:

CONVENTION NOTES

A Year of Travail: A great many of us
left Boston at the end of our National Convention a year ago rather depressed
and full of forebodings for the future of our beloved organization. The 1958
convention had been a disillusioning experience. From all previous annual meetings
we had gone home inspired and with rekindled enthusiasm for our cause. At Boston,
for the first time, we had found ourselves torn by internal dissension. Old
comrades-in-arms, veterans of many battles with our traditional foes, hurled
bitter recriminations at each other.

The year that followed was surely the
darkest in our history. The internecine bitterness intensified as each month
passed. Our mailboxes were clogged with voluminous documents, full of charges
and countercharges, until many of our members became utterly bewildered. Those
on the outside who hate and fear us looked on with deep satisfaction, confidently
and joyously predicting to each other that the end of the National Federation,
as a united and powerful movement,
was in sight.
But when the hour for adjournment came
at five last Monday afternoon, most of us started for home with a feeling that
perhaps, after all, the good ship NFB had ridden out the storm, had righted
herself and was once more on course. Not that the 1959 convention was a peaceful
one. Not by any means. But the decision of the delegates when it finally came
bespoke such an overwhelming vote of confidence in the tenBroek administration
that no doubt can any longer exist as to the sentiments of the democratic majority.
Since both sides on innumerable occasions had sworn eternal fealty to the democratic
process, there is now at least reasonable ground for hope that the verdict,
freely and democratically arrived at, will this
time be accepted in good faith.

A Day of Decision: The showdown came
late Saturday night, after thirteen and a half hours of debate. Everyone was
given a chance to express his views. Dr. tenBroek, as always, leaned over backward
in an effort to be absolutely fair. There was plenty of applause but no boos
or catcalls, and all speakers were given respectful attention. I have listened
to many debates in state legislatures and in the halls of Congress, but I have
never seen an audience display a more mature attitude throughout. In all candor,
however, I doubt whether a single vote was changed by what the speakers had
to say. Nearly everyone had come to Santa Fe with his mind grimly made up; and
if there were any switches after the convention began, I suspect they were brought
about in smoke-filled rooms.

The Georgia Compromise: Many of us have
been racking our brains all year in a desperate effort to find a face-saving
compromise formula. We had not found one. Yet, the Santa Fe delegates were offered
such a compromise, and it came from a most unexpected quarter. The delegation
from Georgia worked it out and presented it to us. It was just a bit startling
at first, but it was beautifully simple and entirely workable. As it was finally
voted on, after the thirteen and a half hours, it contained three parts: 1.
All officers and members of the Executive Committee were to resign immediately,
the nominating committee (one member nominated by each state) was then to bring
in a complete slate, and those elected by the convention delegates would serve
out all unexpired terms. If one resigned, all were to be considered recalled
providing the motion to adopt the Georgia compromise passed by a two-thirds
vote. 2. All incumbent officers and members of the Executive Committee were
to be eligible for re-election. 3. After this convention, anyone who persists
in reckless and irresponsible charges against any other member, or members,
without substantial evidence, may be given a fair hearing before the Executive
Committee and, if found guilty, deprived of the rights and
privileges of membership in the National Federation.

The Executive Committee is made up of
the five constitutional officers and eight directors. All officers are elected
every two years. Four of the directors are elected each two years and normally
serve for four years. The numerical strength of the Executive Committee is,
therefore, under ordinary conditions, thirteen. This time there were only ten.
During the past year I had resigned as First Vice President while John Nagle
and Walter McDonald had resigned as directors. During the course of the debate
all four remaining officers declared their willingness to resign, and Clyde
Ross and Jesse Anderson did the same with respect to their memberships on the
Executive Committee. Three of the four officers Dr. tenBroek, Kenneth Jernigan,
and Alma Murphey spoke in favor of the Georgia compromise. When the vote came,
it was a resounding thirty-four
to twelve in favor of adoption.

When President tenBroek arose and uttered
the terrifying words, I hereby resign as President of the National Federation
of the Blind, the assembly sat stunned. I felt my body temperature drop about
thirty degrees. He was immediately elected temporary chairman of the meeting
by acclamation; and when he took back the gavel, the delegates stood up and
cheered wildly. It was one of the most dramatic and emotion-fraught moments
I have ever lived through. The temporary chairman ruled that the vote on the
Georgia compromise had constituted a recall of all ten members of the Executive
Committee. This ruling was challenged and appealed to the floor. It was upheld
by a vote of forty to five.

Late as it was, the nominating committee
went into immediate session. The Wisconsin delegation had nominated me as its
representative on this committee. The nominating session lasted about three
hours, and on the whole the atmosphere was one of friendliness and cooperation.
George Burke of New Jersey acted as chairman and did a superb job. When he finished,
it was well after three a.m.

The election was held immediately after
the Sunday morning session began so that we would not be without officers. The
nominating committee recommended the following slate: President, Dr. Jacobus
tenBroek; First Vice President, Kenneth Jernigan, Iowa; Second Vice President,
Donald Capps, South Carolina; Secretary, Alma Murphey, Missouri; Treasurer,
Emil Arndt, Illinois; Directors (unexpired three-year terms): Jesse Anderson,
Utah; Clyde Ross, Ohio; David Krause, Virginia; Victor Buttram, Illinois; Directors
(unexpired one-year terms): Eleanor Harrison, Minnesota; Don Cameron, Florida;
William Hogan, Connecticut; Dean Sumner, South Dakota. In some instances other
candidates were nominated from the floor, but the committee's slate was elected
with a single exception. Russell Kletzing of California was nominated against
Dean Sumner, and the vote twice resulted in a tie. Then, Connecticut
switched from Sumner to Kletzing and that did it.

The hopes of the vast majority of Federation
members for an end to the factional plotting and disruption which had led to
the decisive actions of the Georgia Compromise at the 1959 convention were dashed,
however, as the disgruntled losers continued to maneuver for power at the next
National Convention the twentieth anniversary convention to be held in Miami
in 1960. On the other side the Federation's elected officers, led by President
tenBroek and First Vice President Kenneth Jernigan, had become determined both
to settle the internal conflict once and for all and to restore the convention
to its normal agenda of positive programs, undertakings,
and accomplishments.
The first sign of this deepened determination
on the part of the leadership came with startling surprise on the opening day
of the Miami convention. What the President was to term a severe blow to the
National Federation and all its members occurred with the unexpected withdrawal
of Kenneth Jernigan as First Vice President and member of the Board of Directors.
In a dramatic address to the convention, Jernigan announced his refusal to permit
his name to be placed in nomination for any future office. He attributed his
decision to two principal factors: the mounting responsibilities of his job
as director of the Iowa Commission for the Blind, and, of course, of more compelling
importance, the factional warfare within the Federation which had recently
come to concentrate its campaign of character assassination in large part upon
him.

Jernigan provided in his address the
most complete and detailed account yet available to Federationists of the origins
and ambitions of the dissident faction within their midst, as well as an assessment
of the destructive effects of the continuing civil war.

The text of his speech follows:

For the past eight years I have been
a member of the Board of Directors of the National Federation of the Blind.
For the past year and a half I have been First Vice President of the organization.
With this convention my membership on the Board comes to an end. Under present
circumstances I feel that I cannot be a candidate for re-election to the Vice
Presidency or any other Board position. In short, I will be unable to permit
my name to be placed in nomination for any elective office in the Federation
this year.

When I reached this decision several
months ago, I quite naturally discussed the matter at some length with Dr. tenBroek.
It was his opinion and also mine that the reasons involved in my withdrawal
from office were of such a nature that they should be discussed with the convention.
Accordingly, I am now on the platform for that purpose.

To summarize my first reason for withdrawing
from Federation office this year, let me say that the time needed to make the
program of the Iowa Commission for the Blind a complete success makes it difficult
for me to carry the full responsibilities of Federation First Vice President.
It is as important for the Federation as for the blind of Iowa that the program
succeed. The withdrawal from office does not mean that I intend to become in
any way inactive in the movement, and it certainly does not mean that I feel
that there is any conflict of interest involved. I would be a
strange Federationist, indeed, if such were the case.

The second reason for not allowing my
name to be placed in nomination for Federation office this year admittedly in
some ways more compelling than the first has to do with the present internal
situation which faces us. In order to explain I must talk a bit about
history and background.

My first Federation convention was at
Nashville in 1952. That convention is still talked about and remembered by many
as one of the best we have ever had. In more ways than one it was a milestone
and a turning point in my life. I found a united, dedicated, aggressive organization
working toward the achievement of goals which I could believe in wholeheartedly
and support without reservation. Merely to be in the meeting hall and listen
was an inspiration and a challenge. Many of you will remember that I was president
of the Tennessee affiliate in 1952 and that I had charge of arrangements and
planning. I made up my mind at that convention that the Federation was the greatest
and most promising force in existence for the betterment of the blind and that
I would give to it all that I possessed in the way of effort, ability, and talent.
I have never regretted the decision. It was in 1952 that I was elected
to membership on the Board.

Nineteen-fifty-two was a good year for
the Federation, as were '53, '54, and '55. The greeting card program was launched
and made successful. Whereas in 1952 the national office of the Federation had
less than $30,000 to work with, our income was five times as much by 1955. For
the first time in the history of the organization money was also being pumped
into the state affiliates. New members were coming in. New growth was being
achieved. Everywhere there was expansion. And above all there was unity the
kind of unity and devotion to purpose which made the Federation unique. There
was virtually no politics in the Federation and comparatively little striving
for position. Leadership was based not on influence peddling or the holding
of office, but upon the ability to work and the willingness to work. The conventions
at Milwaukee, Louisville, and Omaha were climaxes for successive years of growth.
They were not political battlefields where contending majorities and minorities
monopolized the sessions with charge and countercharge and little else. Instead,
they were meetings of inspiration and substantial program items, of friends
and comrades gathered to exchange ideas, of organizational renewal and preparation
for the year to come. They were not like Boston or Santa
Fe.

By 1956 at San Francisco the progress
was phenomenal. The first state surveys had been made. Nine new affiliates had
come into the Federation in a single
year. The Monitor was a going concern
with a regular staff and a monthly publication.
As important as any of these things,
our enemies had taken alarm and were desperately trying to crush us a sure token
of growing prestige. It seemed that the achievement of our goals was near at
hand.

But such was not to be the case. By the
1957 convention at New Orleans still a tremendous success a subtle change was
beginning to come over the organization. A small group of people from within
our own midst began, for reasons best known to themselves, to sow dissension
and to foment civil war. They began to write letters and to go from state to
state systematically destroying the unity and feeling of oneness which had always
been the principal asset and distinguishing feature of the Federation. They
began to say that the Federation, where any blind person had always been able
to make his voice heard, was not truly democratic that we had simply believed
that it was that in reality it was controlled by a sinister dictator and his
small clique of followers who had somehow hoodwinked the gullible, unsuspecting
members into thinking the Federation was representative and democratic. In short,
the blind were told that there had been a colossal fix and that they had, for
eighteen years, been too stupid to see it a fix which this enlightened minority
had just discovered and was bent upon exposing. There were half-truths, innuendoes,
twisted facts, and outright falsifications.

By the time of the Boston convention
the Federation that we all had known and loved, the old Federation of unity
and oneness, of constructive achievement, and substantive, inspiring conventions
was dead killed by the very people who had said they had come to save it. In
the year between New Orleans and Boston the Federation was transformed from
a dedicated crusade to a bickering, political movement.

During that year many things changed.
Perhaps the most important of these changes occurred in the activities and direction
of effort which took place. My own personal role was altered substantially.
Before New Orleans virtually none of my time or attention was given to internal
political matters. Between 1952 and 1957 I traveled more than 530,000 miles
organizing and building chapters in state affiliates; wrote What Is The National Federation of the Blind and Who
Are the Blind Who Lead the Blind, and Local Organizations of the Blind
How to Build and Strengthen Them; conducted a study for the Federation concerning the employment of the blind in the teaching profession; and took part in three state surveys of programs
affecting the blind. These were happy years. The work was challenging and rewarding.
Even the hostility and opposition of the agency administrators in Arkansas and
the bitter accusations of having ruined the lives of some of the rehabilitation
officials dismissed in Colorado and Nevada did not diminish the keen pleasure.
The brotherhood and mutual support which characterized our movement were at
the heart of the joy of accomplishment. It was a time of unparalleled growth
and progress.

After New Orleans all of this changed.
For the first time in Federation history a group from within our own ranks organized
itself and pounded away at the very foundations of our movement with sledge-hammer
blows. It coordinated its efforts and embarked upon a systematic campaign of
vindictive destruction and sabotage of the elected officers and leaders. If
the majority was to survive, if indeed the very structure of the organization
was to be preserved, speedy action and counter-measures had to be taken.

The situation can, perhaps, best be summarized
in the words of Edmund Burke, the English political philosopher, who championed
the fight of the American colonies for independence. Burke said, When bad men
combine, the good must associate. If the good do not associate, then they fall
one by one, useless sacrifices in a contemptible struggle. To paraphrase these
words, we might say, When a minority of disgruntled dissenters combine to achieve
destruction and to subvert the will of the majority, then the members of that
majority must associate and bestir themselves to militant action. If the majority
does not so associate and bestir itself, then its members will fall one by one,
useless sacrifices in a contemptible struggle not to mention which the minority
dominates and controls the society.

This sort of thing was new to us. We
had long been accustomed to fighting our external enemies, but never before
had we been forced to repel slander and false charges from those who had been
our comrades-in-arms and still proclaim themselves to be Federationists. With
sorrow and reluctance and, perhaps, too slowly and with too much kindness the
great overwhelming majority of Federation members, officers, and leaders organized
for battle and took up the challenge
of the civil war.

The majority was at a disadvantage, however,
in defending itself because it could not devote its full time to the struggle.
It had the responsibility of carrying on the constructive work and programs
of the Federation, of repelling our external enemies, and of keeping the organization
afloat, while the minority, on the other hand, could and did divorce itself
completely from such responsibility, spending virtually all of its time and
energy in subversive attack and destruction. The minority would be hard put
to point to a single legislative or other constructive proposition which it
has advanced or been responsible for since the New Orleans convention. In the
interest of promoting the basic objectives of our movement the external work
of the Federation could not be allowed
to come to a standstill.

Therefore, between New Orleans and Boston
the effort of the officers and leaders had to be divided and redoubled. Legislative
and other program work had to be continued and at the same time the affiliates
had to be alerted to what was happening internally. This had to be done in such
a way as not to give our external enemies aid and comfort or knowledge of our
growing problems. State and local leaders all over the country had to be shown
the documentary evidence of what was occurring and warned of what was to come
at Boston. They needed indisputable and provable facts as ammunition against
the propaganda of half-truths being spread.

With the same energy which I had always
tried to give to promoting the welfare of the Federation, I along with other
leaders and members of the movement entered into this grim, new task. As I went
from state to state late in 1957 and early 1958 collecting evidence and writing
testimony for the right to organize bill, I also talked to the members about
what was happening to us internally. For the first time in my life I found myself
working for the Federation without pleasure or zest. I knew beforehand that
I would earn the hatred and bitter attack of the dissenters in exact proportion
to the effectiveness of my work. Dr. tenBroek and the
other leaders were, of course, in the same situation.

In this connection the minority showed
how badly it had misassessed matters when at the Santa Fe convention last year
several of its members said from the platform (as if they thought it was an
accusation, and one which I would feel called upon to deny) that I had gone
from state to state organizing the majority and showing the documentary evidence
of what the dissenters were doing. They should have known than I have never
yet apologized for or been ashamed of any work that I have ever done in behalf
of the Federation. They should also have known that I would not have denied
but rather would have insisted that I had done all that I could to expose their
tactics and subversion.

At the Boston convention in 1958 the
Federation became acquainted for the first time with political hauling and maneuvering.
The minority came organized as a bloc, and the majority found itself forced
to close ranks and counter-organize in self-defense. Votes were taken not on
the merit of issues but along party lines. Slates of candidates were selected,
and the spirit of crusade and dedication
died a painful death.

After Boston a new vocabulary came into being in the Federation. The minority taught us that when they attacked any
of the rest of us or made charges, it was democracy in action or the right of free speech. When these attacks were answered, however, it was character
assassination or defamation and slander. If they won an issue (a rare occurrence) it was the will of the people or democracy. When they lost on an issue, it was dictatorship and tyranny. When they combined to try to elect candidates or to defeat or pass motions, it was freedom of association and the democratic process. When the majority combined for the same purposes, it was dirty politics and tyrannical dictatorship.

Despite the fact that the will of the
convention was made clear at Boston, the civil war continued. By the time of
Santa Fe the days of unity and dedication were only a memory, and even the memory
was beginning to fade. Again, the convention made clear its will
and by a majority even larger than the one at Boston.

By Santa Fe, however, the real beginnings
of chaos were commencing to set in. The political alliances and arrangements
which had been made during the preceding two years were bearing their inevitable
fruit. It had become accepted practice that the way to achieve recognition was
not by the difficult method of doing hard work for the Federation and forwarding
programs. There was a quicker and an easier way. Form alliances. Circulate resolutions,
make personal attacks, rise in defense of a popular leader, and, above all yes,
above all! come up with suggestions for change any change,
so long as it would bring notoriety and publicity.

Another year has now gone by, and we
are at Miami. The civil war has continued and, if possible, has even further
degenerated. There is now scarcely a person in our movement who is not under
attack by someone or disliked by this or that group. Our legislative and other
programs have largely become secondary to internal politics. Witness, for example,
last year at Santa Fe when even the right-to-organize bills were publicly attacked
on the floor of the convention
by the minority faction.

Or consider the fact that letters which
I now have in my possession were written into Iowa by the dissenters attempting
to destroy the expanding work of rehabilitation and job placement being put
into effect by the Commission for the Blind. In order to hurt me personally
as administrator of the Commission, certain members of the dissenting faction
were willing to destroy the program of rehabilitation and job placement for
the entire blind population of the state. The same thing occurred in California
when Dr. tenBroek came up for reappointment to another term on the Social Welfare
Board. Regardless of the effect on the blind of the state, letters of vindictive,
personal attack were sent to the Governor. As you know, Dr. tenBroek was reappointed
anyway and made chairman of the board into the bargain. Again the dissenters
were defeated in their efforts at destruction, but the next Federationist anywhere
in the country who comes up for appointment to an advisory or policy-making
board and who has not capitulated to the minority may expect to be treated to
the same type of vicious and unprincipled attack.

Also consider the letters opposing Federation
legislation recently sent by the dissenters to Congressman Baring and others.
Is this the so-called constructive activity to which the dissenters point with
pride? Is this their positive new program? Is this the brave
new democracy they would bring us?

Our fund-raising programs have been endangered,
and the very existence of the Federation as a continuing organizational entity
is now threatened. Yet, there are those who at this present convention and even
at this late date in our civil war will tell us that the past three years of
destruction and strife have been a wonderful thing for the Federation, that
we are now stronger than ever. I doubt that many of us will be taken in by that
line. Certainly our external enemies are not taken in by it. If what we have
had for the past three years has been success and progress, I would to God we
had been less successful and less progressive.

The attacks on me personally have increased
steadily since the New Orleans convention. For the reasons I have already given
it was inevitable that this would be so. I knew what the cost would be when
the civil war began and accepted it as an unpleasant but necessary by-product
of the work which had to be done. During the past three years, especially since
Santa Fe, I have been accused of every possible vice of being unscrupulous and
ruthless, without principle, morally dishonest, and above all of being desperately
and wildly ambitious. These charges have been made not only by the recognized
members of the minority faction, but also by some whose principal claim to recognition
is the fact that they have previously held themselves out to the general membership
as friends and supporters of the administration.

Again I say that such charges and attacks
were inevitable in the climate of continuing civil war and political maneuvering.
Such a climate encourages petty politicians and office seekers to attempt to
bargain for position and to seek notoriety by slick maneuver and slanderous
attack. Always as civil war continues, it degenerates into chaos and anarchy.
Factions splinter and beget new factions, which in turn divide and further splinter.
As dissolution and ruin approach, stability becomes harder and harder to maintain.

Leadership in the Federation does not
depend upon the holding of office. It has never so depended. To the extent that
the organization is worthwhile, leadership as always will continue to depend
upon willingness to work and ability to work.

Very soon after the Santa Fe convention
I told Dr. tenBroek that I felt I could serve the Federation and the administration
better if I did not allow my name to be placed in nomination for office at Miami.
Such a decision would certainly set the record straight with respect to the
whispered charges of reckless ambition and desire for presidential succession.
It would also rob the enemies of the administration of one of their principal
issues an issue in fact upon which they have based more and more of their campaign
in recent months. It would utterly destroy one of the main arguments upon which
the case of the dissenters has been built and by which they have sought to justify
their actions. Then, too, it must be admitted frankly that the continuing torrent
of personal abuse and vilification made the prospect of Federation office seem
somewhat less than attractive.

The decision was made, but not announced.
Why? The answer is surely obvious. What now of the charges of reckless ambition
and desire for office which the opponents of the administration have so laboriously
put together? During the remainder of this convention the delegates will undoubtedly
be subjected (from the platform, but principally in the corridors and bedrooms)
to hurried and desperate verbal gymnastics in an attempt to explain away the
utter deflation of what has been charged. It will be interesting, indeed, to
see how the dissenters attempt to explain away their calumny and misrepresentation.
In leaving Federation office to become
a rank-and-file member I would like to make these final remarks. By ceasing
to be an Executive Committeeman I do not cease to be an active Federationist.
Nor do I cease to be a part of the administration. I
shall continue to defend and support it actively.

Moreover, I shall continue to give whatever
organizational help I can to any local or state affiliate in the nation. When
I am invited to do so (and as time permits), I shall attend state conventions,
write articles and testimony for the Federation, attend
meetings, or do anything else which I may be asked to do.

I have already said that the Federation
has very nearly been destroyed by the past three years of political bickering
and civil war. It may already be too late to reverse the trend and forestall
the final descent into chaos and utter destruction. However, I believe that
this is not necessarily the case. It is not on a note of despair but of hope
that I should like to conclude. It is no game we play this business of organization.
It is as serious and important as the lives and destinies of us all. The formula
for solving our problems and saving our organization is simple. It is also painful
and hard to face. It is this. One way or another, once and for all, now and
forever, we absolutely must put a stop to the disgraceful internal strife and
warfare which is destroying the Federation. It is as simple as that. We must
make it unmistakably clear to all concerned that this organization will no longer
tolerate the continued wrecking and destruction of its goals and purposes whether
the wrecking and destruction be in the name of free speech, democratic procedures,
rights of the minority, freedom of association, will of the people, or any other
high-sounding and respectable phraseology used to cloak real purposes. We must
refuse to be intimidated or bamboozled by pious words. We must have the courage
to put down the demagogue, even if he makes his appeal in the name of the very
virtues in our organization which he would destroy. If it requires taking stern
action, then stern action must be taken. If it requires losing some of the dissenters,
then they must be lost. Whatever the cost, it is cheaper than the alternative
of absolute ruin which faces us. We cannot delay, and we cannot equivocate.
By not choosing one course of action, we automatically take
the other.

Perhaps the old Federation was too idealistic.
If so, I can only say that I believe most of its members wanted it that way,
and loved and respected it for what it was. The traditional goals and objectives
of the Federation are still the most compelling reason for our existence as
an organization. To open new fields of opportunity to the blind, to secure the
passage of needed legislation, to exchange ideas and give encouragement to each
other, to labor in a common cause against discrimination and denial of acceptance
as normal people, to establish the right of the blind to compete for regular
jobs in public or private employment these are the things for which the Federation
was created. These are the things which continue to make it worthwhile. Surely
the National Federation of the Blind means enough in the lives of the blind
people of this nation that a way will be found to save it from destruction and,
even more important, to save it from becoming merely a hollow shell and an empty
mockery of the great crusade of former days.

With those solemn words, Kenneth Jernigan
left the convention rostrum and gave up his elective office. But he continued,
side by side with President tenBroek, to lead the fight on the convention floor
in defense of the National Federation and its democracy. During the next four
days, decisions of major consequence were taken on several fronts. The Constitution
of the NFB was substantially amended; six state affiliates were suspended for
activities destructive of the Federation; all national officers and Board Members
found themselves facing election; and important commitments were made in various
program areas. When the Miami convention was finally adjourned the National
Federation of the Blind, while still a house divided, was not merely standing
but was more firmly grounded than before the convention. The amendments to its
Constitution, all adopted overwhelmingly, spelled out rights and responsibilities
in terms not readily twisted or evaded. And the convention's decisive action
in suspending from membership the six state affiliates (those of Georgia, Louisiana,
Maryland, North Carolina, Oklahoma, and South Dakota) that had been at the heart
of the insurrection proved to be the most effective step yet adopted toward
a solution of the protracted civil war.

It should be noted that the action taken
against these state groups was not that of expulsion they were not permanently
thrown out of the Federation but only suspended as affiliates until such time
as they might furnish evidence in good faith of a willingness to abide by the
responsibilities as well as the rights of membership. In a post-convention Monitor
article reviewing the suspensions, President tenBroek repeated the main points
of the motion he submitted to the convention:

Through calculated activities on various
fronts, these states have critically endangered our vital source of fundraising;
they have opposed our basic legislative programs, and thus have jeopardized
our warmest relationships with Congress; they have obstructed and fought against
our organizational efforts within the states themselves; they have plotted assiduously
to impugn the reputations of our elected officers and to block their appointments
to positions in public service; and they have cast suspicion upon our integrity
and fundamental purposes as an organization of the blind. They have done these
things deliberately, actively, and vigorously. Moreover, they have formed the
spearhead of a permanent hostile organization within the National Federation
the so-called Free Press Association, openly dedicated to a policy of rule
or ruin. All six states have contributed through specific actions and concerted
agitation to the condition of alarming instability which has come to characterize
our organization in the eyes of growing numbers of friends, foes, and the public
alike. The harm which has already been done to the Federation and its cause
is incalculable. The harm which would be done in the future if this condition
were permitted to continue is, however, not incalculable. It would, quite simply,
be fatal.

The eventual consequence of the Federation's
action in suspending the six state affiliates was to lead to the permanent separation
of these factional groups, the closing of the Federation ranks around its leadership,
and the formation of a splinter organization known as the American Council of
the Blind as a haven for the disgruntled and a willing ally of anti-Federation
forces in the blindness system. But in the short run the civil strife continued
unabated within the National Federation during the period leading up to the
1961 convention in Kansas City.

At the time of the firing of A. L. Archibald
in the summer of 1957 the Federation was a united movement with harmony among
its leaders and members and a clear-cut purpose to achieve its goals. But as
the civil war got underway and continued month after month and year after year,
the unity and viability of the movement began to disintegrate. The strains were
such that friend began to attack friend,
and total chaos seemed likely.

No better example of the destructive
disintegration can be given than the conduct of George Card of Wisconsin. At
the beginning of the civil war in 1957 he was First Vice President of the organization,
as well as the Editor of the Braille Monitor. During 1958 and 1959 the
minority faction (calling itself the Free Press Association) made prolonged
and vicious attacks upon Card, impugning his morals and motives and accusing
him of a variety of derelictions. In 1959 he resigned as First Vice President
but continued as a paid staff member, serving as Editor of the Braille Monitor.

By 1960 the internal strife had become
so bitter that war weariness was almost universal. The unity of purpose which
had once characterized the movement was gone, and almost every day someone else
came forward with a different scheme to end the fighting. Even George Card (Monitor
Editor and long-time stalwart) was apparently not immune. Shortly after
the conclusion of the 1960 Miami convention, he openly joined the minority faction
and began a nationwide campaign, going from state to state to attack President
tenBroek. Apparently his level of dissatisfaction had been rising for months,
but he now openly changed sides and fought with the same vigor against the administration
which he had formerly shown in
its behalf.

In September of 1960 he was replaced as Monitor Editor by Kenneth Jernigan. This was four months before the
Monitor suspended publication December 1960, being the last edition for
the next four years. The October 1960, Braille Monitor carried an article
about Card's defection to the minority. The text of that article
follows:
GEORGE CARD RESIGNS FROM NFB STAFF

The resignation of George Card from his
position as a staff member of the National Federation of the Blind became effective
in mid-September as the result of a letter to the President reaffirming his
defection from the administration and his adherence to
the McDaniel Free Press faction.

Card's defection, although long in the
making, was first openly announced two weeks earlier in a letter to Dr. tenBroek
setting forth his plans for the immediate future plans which were indicated
to be permanent and unalterable, and which included joining the McDaniel faction
in its Nashville meeting and embarking upon a countrywide tour of agitation
against the national administration and the policy of the National Convention.
At that time Card stated: I am going to campaign to the best of my abilities
in an effort to persuade the states which voted against the suspensions to stand
their ground next year and to persuade at least twelve other states to join
with them and to vote for reinstatement at Kansas City. I shall write many letters
(always on my personal stationery), and I shall make as many personal contacts
as I can. I am going to Nashville the latter part of this week.

Card's defection and resignation constitute
the latest links in a chain of events set in motion over a year ago when he
inaugurated a series of attacks upon the President, the First Vice President,
other staff members, and close associates of the Federation. As the evidence
and destructive consequences of Card's activities became unmistakable, the President
ordered him as a staff employee to cease carrying them on. Instead of complying
with this elementary condition of staff employment, Card broadened his attacks
and redoubled his political activities. During recent months, and most conspicuously
following the Miami convention, the scope of his campaign has been still further
extended.

On August 20 the President informed George
Card that due to the deterioration of his health and effectiveness, as well
as of his personal relationships, he was to be relieved of several of his staff
duties (notably the editorship of the Monitor and the supervision of
greeting card mail) and placed on semi-retirement at reduced salary. Card's
reply was to challenge the President's authority to carry out the transfer of
staff functions, to level an attack upon him personally and upon the convention
for its action in suspending six affiliates, and to disclose his plan to tour
the country as the agent of the McDaniel faction's purposes. As detailed elsewhere
in this issue (see article entitled Round-Up of Free Press Agitation), Card
has since begun his tour and has visited numerous states with the now openly
avowed objective of eliminating the President of the Federation and overthrowing
the policy democratically adopted by the National Convention.

On September 10 President tenBroek wrote
to George Card answering various of his charges and clarifying his status as
a staff member of the Federation. In view of Card's subsequent resignation and
political itinerary, the President's letter is herewith reprinted in full:

Dear George:

Let me try to make a few things crystal
clear. I made a similar effort last spring which apparently failed. In personal
terms you cannot afford to misunderstand
now.

You tell me in your letter of August
29 that I may wish to withdraw my offer to you of a changed job in the light
of your avowed intention to carry on a campaign against the administration for
the unconditional reinstatement of the suspended affiliates. I made no offer.
I shall not withdraw any offer. In my function as President, I altered your
status as an employee of the Federation. You were placed on semi-retirement;
your duties were adjusted. If because of this change of status and assignment
of tasks or because of any other reason you wish to resign, that is entirely
up to you. You are free to remain as a staff member only if you comply with
the established policies of the organization regarding the staff. You may not
carry on a political campaign regarding the duties assigned to you as a staff
member; you may not carry on a political campaign regarding the policies of
the organization; you may not carry on a political campaign affecting the officers
or members of the Executive Committee. All three of these things you are quite
patently carrying on at present. Only one of them is frankly avowed in your
letter to me of August 29. You must cease all such activity and cease it immediately.
If you do not, you will have automatically resigned your position as a staff
member.

I still adhere to what I said in Omaha
in 1955. Federation members who have genuine moral scruples on any point should
not be subject to moral pressure. There is quite a difference, however, between
a moral scruple and political shenanigans, and between a staff employee and
a member or officer. I see no moral or other scruple in what you are now doing;
you are simply joining a political campaign which, if it is successful, will
eventually destroy the Federation.

The renewal of your campaign against
the administration includes an outright fabrication. I did not, in our June
30 meeting in Miami, request you to make a statement in my support. You volunteered
to make it. Moreover, you did so in the presence of a third person, so that
you knew that you could not get by with your present misrepresentation. Or is
this, after all, as I am convinced it is, another lapse of memory accompanying
your deterioration of health? These lapses have occurred frequently in the past
couple of years, and at times have
been virtually complete.

You seem, indeed, to be strangely ambivalent
on the subject of your own health. When the purpose is to show that you can
carry on all your staff functions, you claim that your health is not a factor.
At other times, you are willing to portray it in the direst terms. At Miami
you asked your wife to leave the room in order to inform Bernie Gerchen and
me that you felt the end to be very near, that you were in incessant pain, and
that the symptoms were occurring which the doctors had warned you to watch for.
Whatever you may now wish to say about it, the objective evidences concerning
the state of your health cannot be disregarded.

Your defection to the McDaniel camp is
reflected not only in your personal attacks but in your faithful echo of the
McDaniel doctrine concerning the suspensions. That argument holds that it is
only the minority which has rights, and that those rights are unlimited, whatever
the degree of internal or external wreckage they may cause. When, after years
of this bickering warfare, the majority at last rose at Miami to assert its
own rights and protect the Federation from further destruction, its democratic
decision is held out by you to be a mockery of fair play and a monstrous miscarriage of justice. There is nothing unjust or unfair in requiring members
to fulfill the minimum responsibilities of their membership, and holding them
to account for flagrant refusal to do so. There is no need to repeat (to you
of all people) what the grounds of suspension were; they were not only recited
at length in my presentation of the motions at Miami, but they have been thoroughly
and painfully thrashed out for three years at our conventions and meetings,
in the Monitor and Free Press, in public bulletins, open correspondence,
and continuous discussion throughout the country. Most Federationists now know
them by heart.

Furthermore, as you well know, the suspension
decision was not a punitive action or courtroom prosecution, to be regarded
in legal terms of crime and punishment. It was simply an effort on the part
of the majority to save the Federation from future destruction. It was preventive
and protective rather than punitive and retributory. It was not expulsion which
was voted, but only suspension. The proper judicial analogy is that of a restraining
order or preliminary injunction from which the defendants are released if they
can show that they are complying with proper standards. Any or all of the suspended
members may be swiftly and readily readmitted to full standing whenever they
are willing to abide by the indispensable conditions of membership in any democratic
society. If they cannot bring themselves to do so, they are free to disaffiliate.
The choice is clear, and it is theirs to make.

What choice they are making is also quite
clear from their post-convention conduct. The Georgia convention refused to
budge an inch from the activities which had led to their suspension. Moreover,
they then and there voted a $300 contribution to the Free Press Association
and authorized delegates to attend its forthcoming meeting with power to join.
Oklahoma voted a $500 contribution to the Free Press. The Louisiana executive
committee voted to surrender the national charter. The first vice president
of the Georgia Federation dispatched a letter to Congressman Baring doing everything
possible to alienate him from the Federation. A Free Press meeting was called
for Nashville on the Labor Day weekend. The six suspended states and one or
two others were present. They voted not to comply with any conditions of readmission
that may be laid down by the Federation. They made a pact that no one of them
would seek or accept readmission unless all were readmitted. They voted to establish
another national organization. George Card traveled to Nashville to attend the
Free Press meeting and has since projected a long tour of states in league with
the Free Press and to achieve their objectives.

It would be instructive to know how you
explain and justify these latest factional maneuvers. Are these maneuvers fair
play or are they such unmistakably vicious blows at the very existence of the
Federation that suspension (if it were not already in effect)
must seem only the gentlest of possible sanctions?

We both know that the actions and attitudes
which you now see fit to disclose have long been in the making. For many months
prior to the convention you were engaged in attacking the Federation's fund
raiser, in attacking its then First Vice President as a ruthless and unscrupulous
schemer, and in attacking me as the accomplice or dupe of both of them. These
charges which you knew to be altogether false when you spread them, were merely
the weapons of a personal political campaign designed to destroy the First Vice
President, to bolster your own position as finance director, and to foster an
image of the President as an impractical and idealistic professor utterly dependent
upon the practical common sense of the finance director.

Early in 1960 I was forced to call you
to task for this agitation, and to direct you as a staff employee to bring it
to a halt. Instead of complying, you offered to resign from the paying part
of your position. Out of consideration for your years of service, as well as
for your failing health, I declined the offer. You then promptly took up the
affair with a member of the Executive Committee and formed your league with
Dave Krause, with the result that problems of staff were made the principal
issue of the March meeting of the Executive Committee. Since then you have not
only refused to discontinue your political activity but have vastly increased
it and broadened the scope of your attacks.

You state in your letter that I should
not have informed the convention of my decision not to remain either as President
or as a member if the Federation was unable to defend itself against these attacks.
That decision was a fact. Obviously it should be considered among other facts.
If it is not a fact of importance to you, it is not unimportant in the minds
of others. To have kept the members in the dark about it would have been the
height of deception. It had the same relevance to the discussion as the other
factual consequences of this destructive campaign bearing upon our relations
with Congress, our fundraising, and our effectiveness as an organization.

In another phase of your attack on me,
you speak of a myth of my indispensability. I have never contributed to such
a myth or believed anything of the kind; on the contrary, I shall be most happy
to be relieved of the Presidency whenever the majority believes that it has
found a better man for the job. But in the meantime I assure you that I shall
not be driven from that office by the harassment of a minority, even though
you have now seen fit to join its cause.

But if I have done nothing to encourage
the myth you mention, I confess that I have done much to build another one:
the myth of George Card. Unlike you I do not now regret that action. There was
then a great deal of justification for it. I would not now seek to rewrite history
as it then stood. That you have ceased to be the George Card you once were makes
of the earlier portrayal a myth of today or of any time since Boston.

I have, despite everything, been willing
to retain you as a member of the Federation staff with the adjusted responsibilities
indicated in my letter. Let me repeat, however, unequivocally that if you continue
to flout the constitutional policy governing staff employment, and to carry
on the further agitation you have outlined and already initiated, you will forthwith
have resigned from your position.

Jacobus tenBroek, President

As 1960 drew to a close, the level of discord seemed (if this were possible)
to increase. The minority (calling itself the Free Press) met in Nashville,
Tennessee, over the Labor Day weekend and followed the meeting with a series
of blasts at the Federation and its leaders. The Braille Monitor no
longer attempted to stand above the battle but openly came into the fray to
defend the democratic character of the Federation and the right of the majority
to set policy. Editor Kenneth Jernigan set the tone in an open letter to the
members in the November, 1960, issue of the magazine, saying that he believed
the Federation to be democratic and worthwhile and that he would defend it from
the destructive elements that were trying to tear it down.
Jernigan was as good as his word, for
in that same November 1960, issue of the Braille Monitor he published
a satirical commentary on the lack of democracy in the Free Press Association.
Here, in part, is what he said:

Everyone knows that the Free Press Association
[later the American Council of the Blind] is made up of dedicated reformers.
The Free Press would never have been established if its members could have received
fair play and just treatment in the Federation. Despite slander and vilification
by the tenBroek administration and others, the Free Press and its adherents
practice democracy in its purest form. Let those who doubt the truth of this
statement consider the following comparisons between the National Federation
of the Blind (which everybody knows to be a notorious dictatorship) and the
Free Press group.

The National Federation conventions are
open meetings. Anyone may attend. Anyone may make tape recordings. Anyone may
take notes. Anyone may speak on any issue, subject only to time limitations
voted by the majority after discussion and debate. At the Miami convention of
the Federation and at the Santa Fe convention in 1959 members of the Free Press
group made tapes of the entire proceedings.

Compare with this the meetings of the
Free Press Association. At Nashville this year during the Labor Day weekend
the Free Press leaders stopped people at the door and demanded to know what
their sentiments were before they could enter the room. Now, wait! I know what
you're thinking! Don't jump to conclusions. You can't call this undemocratic.
You see, this was not a meeting. It was simply a session of the Free Press
held as a committee of the whole. Yes, I know that meetings of the resolutions
committee and other committees of the Federation are open to all who wish to
attend, but you just don't understand. A new organization has to protect itself
against spies and tyrannical majorities. As I was saying, at the Free Press
meeting in Nashville people were questioned at the door as to their loyalties
and sentiments before they could enter. Permission was denied for anyone to
make tape recordings. The President of the Federation requested the right to
attend, either personally or by
representative, but permission was denied.

During the Free Press meeting one person
was caught taking notes. Mr. McDaniel immediately explained that no one could
take notes except the official note takers. Of course, these official note takers had not been elected by the group. One person who managed to get into
the meeting and who said, when asked about her loyalties, that she hadn't made
up her mind but had come to observe, was asked to leave the meeting. She did
leave. In other words, the Free Press proved that it certainly practices what
it preaches.
Perhaps the greatest testimonial to
the Federation's basic soundness and deep significance to the blind of the nation
was the fact that through all of this pulling and hauling the overwhelming majority
of the state and local leaders and the rank-and-file members remained unwavering
in their support of the tenBroek administration and their wish to leave the
civil war behind them. The 1961 convention in Kansas City was to see the climax
of the hostilities and the beginning
of the end of the strife.

The Kansas City convention represented
a watershed in the history of the movement; for it was then that a symbolic
thunderclap struck the Federation and its members an occurrence which none anticipated
and few were prepared to accept. Here is how that event was described in a subsequent
convention report by John Taylor:

After 21 years as founder and as the
continuously elected President of the National Federation, Dr. Jacobus tenBroek
surprised and dismayed the convention by announcing his resignation from office
on the first morning of the sessions. Dr. tenBroek's resignation, which came
in the middle of his current two-year term in office, was prompted solely by
the bitter factional strife which has gripped its activities during the past
12 months. As the new President of the organization, I cannot fully describe
my own feelings. Dr. tenBroek brought this organization into being and has nurtured
it through a score of years. We have lost in Dr. tenBroek the greatest leader
the organized blind movement has ever had or will ever have. His announcement
struck dismay into the hearts of hundreds in the audience; at its conclusion
there were few among us with eyes entirely dry. As founder of the Federation,
as its only President for 21 years, as its leader and leading spirit, he built
the Federation (against persistent external opposition during the whole life
of the Federation and internal disruption in recent years) into an organization
that is democratic, representative, and national. In a unique way, and to a
striking degree, its philosophy is his philosophy; its character is his character;
its accomplishments are his. In the hearts and gratitude of his fellows, he
stands as the blind man of the century.

The stunning announcement by Jacobus
tenBroek of his resignation from the presidency, catastrophic as it appeared
to most of the delegates, served to inspirit the convention to the task of putting
its house in order. The key decision was a vote against readmitting unconditionally
the four state affiliates still under suspension (two had been re-accepted).
The result of this vote was that the suspended affiliates, while they did not
formally withdraw from the NFB, walked out of the convention and met in a neighboring
hotel, where they formed themselves into the opposition American Council of
the Blind taking with them a handful of other disgruntled Federationists, and
by so doing effectively bringing to an end the organized insurrection within
the NFB.

The American Council of the Blind, being
composed as it was of people who had not succeeded in the mainstream of the
organized blind movement, grew slowly and sporadically through the years. After
a full generation it remained comparatively small. During the first twenty years
of its existence the Council spent much of its time reliving the Federation's
civil war and attacking the Federation and its leaders. The 1980s saw some mellowing
of this attitude, but at the end of the decade bitterness against the Federation
still constituted a significant element of the Council's rationale. As it developed,
the organization moved closer to the more reactionary agencies in the field
and was often used by them as a counter to the Federation's advocacy role. It
is fair to say that the American Council of the Blind has never played a major
part in the affairs of the blind.

The struggle within the Federation, the
events surrounding the 1961 convention, and the establishment of the American
Council of the Blind were assessed by Jacobus tenBroek in 1962, when the organized
blind movement was recovering from its self-inflicted wounds.
His speech said in part:

The last of the threats to the welfare
of the blind is by no means the least. In many ways it is the gravest of all.
It is the self-challenge of our own division and dissension the interna peril
of palsy and paralysis. Movements, too, have their diseases. And the worst of
these, the one most often fatal, is the virus of creeping anarchy the blight
of disunity and discord which gnaws at the vitals of a stricken movement until
its will is sapped, its strength drained away, and its moral fiber shattered.
The movement of the organized blind we all know to our sorrow has been so afflicted.
If our movement is to rise again, there must be among us a massive recovery
of the will to live: a revival of the sense of purpose and mission, indeed of
manifest destiny, which once infused this Federation and fired its forward advance.
If we fail in that, more than a movement
dies. The Federation has been, above all things, a repository of faith the
faith of tens of thousands without sight and otherwise without a voice. It
has become a symbol, a living proof, of the collective rationality and responsibility
of blind men and women of their capacity to think and move and speak for themselves,
to be self-activated, self-disciplined, and self-governing: In a word, to
be normal. Our failure is the death of that idea. Our success is the vindication
of that faith.
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