 Through the overwhelming insistence of the blind pupils , Braille 's system was finally adopted by the Institute in 1854 , two years after his death . The system spread throughout the French @-@ speaking world , but was slower to expand in other places . However , by the time of the first all @-@ European conference of teachers of the blind in 1873 , the cause of braille was championed by Dr. Thomas Rhodes Armitage and thereafter its international use increased rapidly . By 1882 , Dr. Armitage was able to report that " There is now probably no institution in the civilized world where braille is not used except in some of those in North America . " Eventually even these holdouts relented : braille was officially adopted by schools for the blind in the United States in 1916 , and a universal braille code for English was formalized in 1932 . 
