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It is doubtful what effect these resolutions would have had upon the development of the Association if they had remained for any length of time the center of attraction, but almost simultaneously with their adoption, a motion to place the existing association upon a national basis and give to it a national rather than a state name, was put and carried. In the minds of many of the members, the work of this convention left everything uncertain and progress impossible and it was felt that the Third annual convention could not do better than to concentrate attention upon the plan of organization, and it was in this third convention that the American Blind People's Higher Education and General Improvement Association came into existence and the plan of voting by mail adopted. The Association now had a national name, a workable constitution, and a voting system by which all members present or absent could be successfully articulated with the movement, and the hour seemed to have struck for some definite action to accomplish the purposes of the organization, but this would have to be the work of a Fourth Annual Convention. Much dissatisfaction was arising as to the slowness of the evolution of the Movement, and it was hinted that nothing practical could be attained or else it would already have been attained.

At about this time Mr. A.M. Shotwell, Braille stereotyper at the Michigan School for the Blind, Lansing, Mich, prepared a number of papers showing the desirability if not necessity of the Association taking immediate action to secure the higher education of the Blind, and suggested certain constitutional amendments, and resolutions by which this could be brought about. The papers were submitted to the Oregon association at its spring convention of '98 and also to the Kansas association in its June convention of the same year. The Kansas Association saw at once that the author of the papers was a clear thinker, shrewd and of benevolent intent. A committee being appointed to formulate a report of the Kansas Branch to be submitted to the Fourth Annual Convention of the American Association, resolutions were drawn up, one urging the American Association to give full consideration to the Shotwell papers, and another, which provided for the establishment of the Commission for immediate action, and named seven commissioners who were to act in case the resolution was adopted by the general membership. Of the seven, only four consented to undertake the work, and they were the Messrs. Shotwell of Michigan, Nolan of Illinois, Ray of Missouri and McGill of Kansas. The resolution which was adopted with almost no opposition, was as follows: --

Be it resolved, That a board of seven commissioners be established to take immediate steps to fit itself for soliciting and administering an education fund. No two commissioners shall be from the same state, and no one shall serve who is not a thoroughly educated blind person of some experience.

The Fourth Annual Convention held in October '98 expressed itself in several resolutions each of lasting importance, but aside from other points of policy, when Miss Luretta V. Bloom, now Mrs. John E. Goens of Kansas City, appointed the seven members of this commission for immediate action, and the general membership of the association confirmed her action, and the action of the convention, by adopting the above resolution, the American Association had taken the essential step that would lead to success. This was a definite policy, and nothing was said about Special College, Scholarship, or Annex, these matters being left to the judgment of the Commission. The general drift of sentiment in the Association from the beginning had been toward the Scholarship idea, and it was merely for the Commission to act with all available wisdom in securing Higher Education. These points were settled. Some influential members have desired the Association to definitely declare in favor of Scholarship as opposed to any other possible method of providing the Higher Education, in the form of a strong resolution, but this has never been done, and may be considered rather unnecessary. The membership of the Association has done clear thinking in these connections, and what was once confusion is now perfect order and security of opinion, and this Harmony and Order was illustrated with equal clearness in both Educational Policy and Organization.

Edward J. Nolan of Chicago is a successful blind attorney, and a man of ability and strength. He proposed a series of resolutions to the other members of the Commission to definitize the policy of the Commission relative to Congress, and after much discussion they became the expressed will of the Commission, and were submitted as part of its report to the Fifth Annual Convention. The Commission found it impracticable to do more than study the conditions of success, until receiving more specific instructions from the General Association, and therefore the Fifth Annual Convention had important work to do. And it did it. The following nine resolutions were suggested in the Report of the Commission, formulated by the Resolution Committee of the Convention, and adopted by the General Association membership almost without opposition, now stand as a clear enunciation of Association policy.