ace,[254] but in some there are special arrangements. In
Virginia there is one school for the white deaf and blind, and another
for the colored. In North Carolina there is a school for the white deaf,
and another for the blind with a department for the colored deaf and
blind. In Alabama, Maryland, Oklahoma, and Texas each there is a school
for the white deaf and another for the colored deaf and blind.[255]

In nearly all the states these schools are strictly public institutions,
owned by the state and supported wholly by taxation, and are under the
direct control and supervision of the legislature. In a few of the
Eastern states the institutions are in private hands and operated under
their immediate direction, and in some cases supported in part by
endowment funds, but at the same time receiving appropriations from the
state, and subject to its authority and general oversight. They are thus
"semi-public" or "quasi-public" institutions, and will need a brief
separate treatment, as will also the "dual schools," where the deaf and
blind are educated together.

SEMI-PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS

The semi-public institutions are seventeen in number, and are found in
six states: Connecticut, Maryland,[256] Massachusetts, New York,
Pennsylvania,[257] and Vermont. Institutions in these states have
remained private corporations from the time they were established, some
of them being, as we have seen, the first schools that were created for
the deaf. A certain number were especially favored by private
munificence at their beginning, and continued to be supported by private
funds till the state came to their aid and undertook to assist by
regular appropriations. Other schools have been similarly organized, but
have always depended largely on the appropriations from the state. All
of them are in the hands of societies,[258] organized and chartered as
corporations under the laws of the state. In some cases membership is
open to those interested on the payment of the regular dues or
fees.[259]

These institutions, while corporate bodies, are under the authority and
supervision of the state. Their relation to the state and the conditions
under which they exist may be understood from their position in New
York. Here the institutions were chartered by the state as benevolent
societies, the buildings and grounds being presented, or the money for
them collected, by the trustees, and the property reverting to the state
if alienated to anothe