American with Disabilities Act of 1988 - Research Paper Example

Introduction The rights of the disabled has been given due importance in America right from mid Nineteenth century. Equal rights and opportunities for disabled people were demanded nationally right from this period. This later brought forth a movement called ‘disability rights movement’ which debated largely for the rights of the disabled. Its specific demands included disabled friendly architecture and physical environment, equal opportunity in all spheres of life and safety and access to transportation (Fleischer, Doris & Frieda, 1998).It also raised questions over neglect, violations and discriminations against the disabled. These kind of movements put pressure on the governments to formulate and amend rules and regulations so as to protect the interests of the disabled. In the intake process and in the wages, the disabled were discriminated against by the employees. The first two laws that were brought in check discrimination in the job environments were Equal Pay Act of 1963 and an amendment in the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Daron & Joshua, 2001). However, the interests of the disabled did not come under the purview of these Acts as these were made specifically to curb discrimination on the basis of race and sex. Legislations specifically focused on the rights and opportunities of the disabled were formulated later in 1988 which included Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Civil Rights Act-1991 (Daron & Joshua, 2001). The Civil Rights Act of 1991 was an amendment to the Act which existed, resultantly extending the purview of it to the disabled as well. American Disabilities Act which was initially drafted and proposed in 1988 could be considered as the first legal assurance for the rights and opportunities of people with disabilities. This was later passed as a Law in 1991. Americans with Disabilities Act can be considered as a milestone in the welfare of disabled citizens as far as America is concerned. Americans with Disabilities Act-An Overview The discussed Act was proposed in the light of the finding that in the American society there was a continuous prevalence of discrimination and prejudice against the disabled people which was stated to be ”unfair” and “unnecessary” (Christina, 2006). The Act observed that this attitude denied people with disabilities, the equal opportunity to compete and pursue the opportunities that the free society of America offered. This finding by the Act clearly suggests that a social issue which prevailed in America for a long time was identified to be of legal relevance. Thus the Act proves to be high significance in the welfare of the disabled in America. This must be read together with the fact that the law protects a good number of citizens as according to the census of 2000, more than 49.7 million people in the United States were suffering from at least one of the several long lasting condition of disability (USCB, 2003) As towards curbing the discriminative practices against the handicapped, the Americans with Disabilities Act aimed at three objectives which included “1) providing a clear and comprehensive national mandate for the elimination of discrimination against individuals with disabilities; (2) providing clear, strong, consistent, enforceable standards addressing discrimination against individuals with disabilities; [and] (3) ensuring that the Federal Government plays a central role in enforcing the standards established [by the ADA] on behalf of individuals” (Christina, 2006). The act deals with four broad areas which are employment, state and local governments, public accommodation and telecommunications and common carriers (Henry, 2003) The Scope of the Act On enforcement of the Act it was envisaged that the work conditions of the disabled would improve considerably. It was hoped that a resultant of the legislation would be that there would a leveled platform in the labor market which would in turn improve the productivity of the handicapped. (Daron & Joshua,2001). A leveled platform was intended to be created by eliminating discrimination against the disabled. However, opinions against the Act stating that the cost of adaptation of the handicapped would affect the profitability of a work environment were also prevalent. It was also argued that ADA would create negative employment effects (Daron & Joshua, 2001). It was expected that the legislation would bring forth massive changes in terms of opportunities for the disabled in the state and local governments. Another major impact that the law was to bring in was increased access and safety for the handicapped in public transport system and also in public accommodation. Post Implementation Scenario Henry (2003) has observed that Americans with Disabilities Act is one of the most important legislation with reference to labor and employment. One major influence of the act is that it changed the legal definition of disability .The inclusion criteria or in other words the definition of disability was broadened so that the legislation benefited a larger number. There had been a number of studies on the impact of ADA. With reference to the objectives of the Act, the post implementation of the Act should have directly increased the employment rate of the disabled. However, researchers suggest ironical result in the employment rate while comparing with the pre ADA period. It has been observed that in the cases of large and medium sized employees, there was a sharp decline in the employment of disabled workers (Daron & Joshua,2001). However, in the case of small enterprises, this trend was not observed. Further analysis of this observation leads to the fact that employees employing less than 25 people have been exempted from ADA. Thus it can be generally concluded that implementation of ADA has reduced the employment of disabled workers. Epstein (1992) & Olson (1997) also have made similar observations. In terms of protection from discrimination, it can be concluded that Americans with Disabilities Act has largely empowered the handicapped people against discrimination. It has been reported that 93 percent of all the ADA employment discrimination cases files have been judged in favor of the defendant(Ruth,2001) This suggests the effectiveness of ADA in curbing discrimination against the disabled. Christina (2006) has argued that even after 15 years of implementation of ADA, the American government has failed in addressing the issue of discrimination against the disabled in the voting arena. This argument has been supported by the statistics of the General Accounting Office in 2001 that 84 percent of the polling booths had some barrier for the handicapped against comfortable voting (Christina, 2006) Conclusion Americans with Disabilities Act is a very strong legislation which prevents the discrimination against the disabled. The scope of the legislation is large as it covers a larger spectrum of issues. The beneficiary range is also large as it has redefined the definition of the disabled. This has been widely used by the beneficiaries to have legal justice in cases of discrimination in work environments. However, data comparing the post and pre ADA suggests lacunas in the implementation of this legislation. The perception of the stakeholders on the act also has to be reassessed. References Christina J. W (2006), Why The Help America Vote Act Fails To Help Disabled Americans Vote, Legislation And Public Policy Vol. 8 p. 421-456 Daron A & Joshua D. A (2001), Consequences of Employment Protection? The Case of the Americans with Disabilities Act, Journal of Political Economy, 2001, Vol. 109, No. 5 Epstein, Richard A (1992) Forbidden Grounds: The Case against Employment Discrimination Laws. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ. Press Fleischer, Doris Z. & Frieda Zame (1998). “Disability Rights.” Social Policy Vol. 28, No 3,p. 52-55 Henry H P (2003), Americans With Disabilities Act Handbook, (4th ed.)New York; Aspen Publishers Olson, Walter K (1997) The Excuse Factory: How Employment Law Is Paralyzing the American Workplace. New York: Free Press USCB (2003), Disability Status: 2000 ,U.S. CENSUS BUREAU, (Mar. 2003),Retrieved on October,6,2011, from < http://www.cen sus.gov/prod/2003pubs/c2kbr-17.pdf> Ruth C (2001) Winning and Losing under the Americans with Disabilities Act, Ohio State Law Journal, Vol. 62 Read More