[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 57 (Tuesday, April 8, 2014)]
[Senate]
[Page S2210]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               150TH ANNIVERSARY OF GALLAUDET UNIVERSITY

  Mr. HARKIN. Madam President, I see the time has come to recess for 
the caucuses, but I just wish to say that today is another important 
day. Today is the 150th anniversary of the date that Abraham Lincoln 
signed the law authorizing the institution we now know as Gallaudet 
University in Washington, DC. That was 150 years ago today. What began 
on April 8, 1864, as a school with just eight students has flourished 
into the world's first and only institution of higher education 
dedicated to deaf and hard-of-hearing students, renowned 
internationally for its outstanding academic programs and also for its 
leading research into the history, language, and culture of deaf 
people.
  I take pride in the fact that it was Senator James W. Grimes of Iowa, 
then-chair of the Committee on the District of Columbia, who initiated 
that legislation allowing the school to confer degrees. Dr. T. Alan 
Hurwitz, who is now the current distinguished president of Gallaudet, 
was born and raised in Sioux City, IA, not too far from the Presiding 
Officer's State of North Dakota. In fact, Dr. Hurwitz's father and my 
brother were classmates at the Iowa School for the Deaf. We are proud 
of the many Iowa students, including a recent intern in my office, 
Joseph Lewis, who are graduates of Gallaudet.
  It is a wonderful school. If you have never been there, you ought to 
go and take a look at it. They do fantastic work at Gallaudet, 
attracting people from all around the globe to go there. In 1894 it was 
named after Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet, and then in 1986 it was conferred 
university status by the Congress. Again, 150 years ago today, on April 
8, 1864, Abraham Lincoln signed it into law.
  In 1864, the school was known as the Columbia Institution for the 
Instruction of the Deaf and Dumb and Blind. It was inspired by the work 
of Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet, who had traveled to Paris to study the 
successful work of French educators who pioneered the use of a manual 
communication method of instructing the deaf--in other words, sign 
language. In 1894, the name of the institution was changed to Gallaudet 
College in honor of Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet. In 1986, by act of 
Congress, the college was granted university status.
  My brother Frank was deaf from an early age. During his childhood, in 
the 1940s and 1950s, most Americans had very backward, ignorant 
attitudes toward deaf people. It pained me to witness the brazen 
discrimination and prejudice that he faced on a daily basis and I 
promised that if I ever got into a position of power, I would change 
things to prevent that kind of discrimination in the future.
  As it turned out, I did rise to a position of power. I was determined 
to make good on my promise to pass legislation to end discrimination 
against people with disabilities, and an unexpected event gave a huge 
impetus to my legislative ambition.
  In 1988, Gallaudet University was hiring a new president. At that 
time, the school had never had a deaf president. There were three 
candidates: one was deaf and two were hearing. The Board of Visitors 
selected a hearing president.
  To the students at Gallaudet, who believed passionately that the time 
had come for a deaf president, this was unacceptable. They rose up in a 
movement that came to be known as Deaf President Now. They organized 
protests. They boycotted classes. Some 2,000 Gallaudet students marched 
from their campus to the U.S. Capitol Building. They demanded a 
president at Gallaudet who could relate to them in a way that no 
hearing person could.
  I had the privilege of speaking to them. I told them, ``You are my 
heroes.'' They are still my heroes because they kept up their protests 
until they won. Gallaudet got its first deaf president, I. King Jordan.
  But that is not all those students won. The protests by the students 
at Gallaudet struck a chord with other people with disabilities all 
across America. Those students were like a spark that ignited a 
brushfire.
  They rose up and said: Enough. No more second-class citizenship. No 
more discrimination. And other people with disabilities took up the 
same rallying cry.
  As the chief Senate sponsor of the Americans with Disabilities Act, 
ADA, there is no question in my mind that the students' successful 
protests at Gallaudet were one of the key reasons why we were able to 
pass the ADA 2 years later.
  Today, Gallaudet University is a diverse, bilingual university 
dedicated to the intellectual and professional advancement of deaf and 
hard-of-hearing individuals through American Sign Language and English. 
I have always been an admirer and supporter of Gallaudet. I respect it 
as a place that opens doors and creates opportunity. At Gallaudet, the 
focus is on ability, not disability, and, as with all schools, 
sometimes it is on extraordinary ability, such as Adham Talaat, the 
academic all-American defensive end who helped to lead the Gallaudet 
football team to a 9 and 1 record this past season or faculty member 
Dr. Laura-Ann Pettito and her Visual Language and Visual Learning 
Center, where she and her graduate students map the brain to better 
understand how we decode auditory and visual language or 2011 graduate 
James Caverly, who starred in the play ``Tribes'' about a hearing 
family with a deaf son.
  Gallaudet aims not only to educate but also to empower, and this is 
an incredibly important gift to give to the men and women who attend 
Gallaudet. I join with my colleagues in the Senate in saluting this 
remarkable institution on its 150th anniversary.
  I yield the floor.

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