Bell, Alexander Graham (1847-1922) to Clara Hammond McGuigan

Feb. 12 1897
Dear Mrs. McGuigan
Your note of the 10th inst. received with enclosed note from Mr. Lucus.
Mr. Lucus' note is important [as] coming from the States Attorney for New London Co. I will have my secretary make a copy of it and return the original to you. I think you are perfectly safe from attack.
Don't hesitate to send for me if you want me to come [on] at any time. My own feeling is that it is best for me to stay here until sent for by the Committee. I hope it may not be necessary to go before two Committees. The moment I heard that your bill had been referred to the Committee [on] Appropriations I wrote to Senator [Lornesbury] - telling him that I was not familiar with parliamentary [ways] - and asking his advice as to whether I should apply for a hearing before the Appropriations Committee as well as his own. Have not heard from him yet.
There is considerable confusion in the public mind as to what is meant by "Oral Method". In the volume of statistics just issued by the United State Bureau of Education - Mr. Williams of Hartford returns 127 pupils in 1895 as "taught by the Oral Method"; whereas no pupils so taught are credited to his school in the Annals. We must be prepared therefore for a claim by the Hartford School that they teach some of their pupils by the Oral Method although no oralist would admit it. What shall we do in the face of such a claim - when we know [2]
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that the public do not understand the difference.
If we deny what Williams says is so - then, to the public, it seems a mere question of [?]ity. Even the parents, as you say, do not understand the difference between what Mr. Williams claims as the Oral Method - and what you claim.
It would be difficult to make the public - and therefore the Legislative Committees - understand the importance of the pure oral method as distinct from what Williams will probably claim as the oral method. To outsiders, not specially interested in the subject, it will seem as hairsplitting - of no particular consequence. We must place the difference in such a way that Williams cannot deny it - and that the Committee & the public may recognize its importance.
I am inclined therefore to have all arguments - not upon the use of speech in either school - but upon the use and disuse on the French Sign-Language.
I would claim that you employ the English Language alone as the means of instruction and communication - without any [?] to the French or de l'Epee Sign-language which was introduced into the Hartford School from France in 1817 by the French deaf-mute Laurent Clerc. Whereas in Hartford, although English is taught in school, the French Sign-Language is still used as the common means of communication - by all the pupils; - and it is also used as a means of instruction in the chapel - if not in the school-room. The French Sign-Language becomes the vernacular of the Hartford pupils, the English language the vernacular of yours. I would not insist so much upon the importance of "pure Oral" methods - as of "pure English". I would not say that the difference consists in the use of "Signs" by the one school and not by the other, or in the use of "Sign-Language" - for Williams will claim that you use "Signs" and even "Sign-Language" - too because natural actions and gestures are used in all schools. [3]
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To base the distinction upon "Signs" or "Sign-Language", alone - would reduce the question again to a question of [v]eracity. It all depends upon what you mean by "Signs" & "Sign-Language" - and this is a matter for experts to wrangle over - the public cannot follow us - and only get mixed up - without appreciating the importance of the distinctions we make.
Williams cannot deny that you make no use of the French or de l'Epee Sign-Language; and although he might object to calling it "French" or de l'Epee, he cannot deny that it came from France, brought here by Laurent Clerc & the Mr. Mrs. [Hopkins Gallaudet] in 1817, and that it originated in the school of the Abbie de l'Epee in France in the last century. He cannot deny that the Hartford Method of instruction was called the "French Method" even by the Hartford people themselves - for more than half a century. These are simply historical facts.
What we want to indicate is that the Sign-Language is a foreign language - a distinct language from English - and we will emphasize this fact by giving it the name of the country in which it originated. The fact that it is a foreign language - not natural but [communications] will be specially emphasized - if the Hartford people should employ us at the hearing an Interpreter to translate what goes on to the deaf persons present.
In Hartford this foreign language comes into competition with the National Tongue. In your school English alone is used. In several States the Germans have tried to have German used in the public schools (notably in Illinois where the German population is very large) - but [ex]cepting in schools for the deaf, the public money has only ever been given to schools employing the English language alone - as means of instruction and communication.
Schools employing the French Sign-Language should be supported by private means - and state and be given to those schools alone that employ the English language exclusively. This cannot be insisted upon but the
idea may be suggested. [4]
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The French Sign-language makes foreigners of our deaf children. It makes of them a distinct class in the community. In adult life they associate almost exclusively with one another - just as foreigners do who live in our country - and just as English-speaking persons do who live in a foreign country. In Paris and in all the foreign capitals - the English and American residents form a distinct class by themselves - even marrying largely among themselves.
The former pupils of the Hartford School, in the same way, have become a distinct class in the community - marrying among themselves almost exclusively.
The 1887 report of the Hartford School - shows that no less than 69 of the pupils admitted up to that time were children of former pupils. Other deaf children of former pupils have appeared in other schools in the New England States - and many other have been born but have not appeared in school at all.
How many pupils have been taught in the [Mystic] school since its foundation? I should not be surprised to find that as many deaf children have been produced by the marriage of Hartford pupils - as have been educated in your school altogether.
Large schools make the deaf all acquainted with one another and boarding the pupils away from home prevents them from cultivating acquaintances with hearing persons of their own age. The French Sign-Language gives them a language of their own that is not understood by hearing people - and tends to keep them distinct from hearing people in adult life.
Hence I advocate small schools always - day-schools where possible - small boarding-schools where not (House schools) The total disuse of the French Sign-language - and the exclusive use of the English language in its spoken and written forms. I thought it might clarify my own ideas - and perhaps help you - to put these points down in the form of
a letter. Yours sincerely
Alexander Graham Bell