Persons with Disabilities

The American Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) is a law that extended the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to all individuals, including the mentally and physically handicapped, HIV/AIDS infected persons, and former abusers of drugs and/or alcohol. At the time, there were an estimated 40 million people in the United States who fell into the categories listed above. Under the ADA, they were offered equal rights to transportation, accommodation, employment, and telephone services.

Legal Issues

The ADA includes five titles. The first pertains to employment, and states that no employer may choose not to hire a qualified individual because he or she has a disability. Title II applies to public organizations and states that handicapped persons should have equal access to local and state services, including transportation, facilities, and resources. The third title relates to public accommodations, including hotels, inns, recreational facilities, transportation, dining, stores, museums, and care providers, among others. When the ADA was enacted in 1990, Title III was applied to both new and existing structures and facilities. The fourth title applies to telecommunications – all companies operating in the United States were required to make their services available to those with hearing disabilities or other handicaps. Finally Title V included a set of miscellaneous provisions that individuals with disabilities who assert their rights are protected from retaliation.

Affected Groups

According to the United States Census Bureau, Americans with disabilities make up one of the largest minority groups in the country. In a report conducted in 2010, the Census indicated that approximately 18.7% of Americans have some kind of physical or mental disability, totaling 56.7 million people of those who were over the age of five. Of course, the number of persons affected varies according to the applied definition of disability. Severe disabilities, including but not limited to deafness, blindness, requiring use of a wheelchair, and developmental delays, are more rare, affecting approximately 12.3 million people in the United States. The risk of having a disability increases with age, as age-related disorders and diseases, including dementia and Alzheimer’s, are included in most standard definitions of disabilities. Accounting for America’s aging population, the rate of disabilities is 18.1 percent.

Challenges

One of the challenges that the ADA presented was the allocation of a disproportionate amount of resources that would only affect a small percentage of the population. For instance, a student in a wheelchair may force the school to undertake costly renovations to their facility or keep a nurse on staff full-time. Critics of the law point the fact that those who drafted it never identified an exclusive definition of “disabled.” Many were not certain what the law was supposed to achieve or how realistic and/or financially feasible it was that institutions, businesses, and organizations adopt the measures outlined in the law. However, because disabled individuals evoked pity from the general public, the law was never questioned. Instead, the Supreme Court narrowed who the law was directed at in 2002, by ruling that it only applies to individuals whose impairments affect their day-to-day life.