A Brief History of Disability Rights Legislation in the United States
An excerpt reprinted with permission from the publisher, Adaptive Environments Center ©.
Polly Welch, Associate Professor
University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon, USA
Chris Palames
Independent Living Resources, Amherst, Massachusetts, USA
Note: This document is the second chapter in the book,
Strategies for Teaching Universal
Design (Adaptive Environments Center and MIG Communications, 1995).
It briefly
covers the history of relevant accessibility legislation in the United
States during the 20th
century.
It is difficult to understand the significance of the term universal
design without first examining how people who are physically different
have been treated socially, legally, and politically in the United States
over the course of this century. While designers may not view this history
as having bearing on their creativity or being of their making, their
work has been instrumental in perpetuating the norms that exclude some
people from using buildings, landscapes, and products.
Disability has been made visible in American life primarily as an outcome
of military engagement and, therefore, was managed by the federal government
in the War Department and, later, at the Veterans Administration. Civilians
with disabilities were largely invisible and unaccounted for by the government
until the latter half of the twentieth century when the social and physical
isolation of people with physical and mental disability became the focus
of civil rights legislation. Until that time, society managed to keep
people who were different out of sight by building institutions such as
nursing homes, asylums, and homeless shelters and using statutes such
as ugly laws to prohibit from public places people whose different appearance
might offend the citizenry. *1 John Hockenberry poignantly captures this
social isolation in his description *2 of visiting his elderly uncle who
was institutionalized in childhood:
"As I roll in my wheelchair toward the place where he lives, I understand
that my uncle and I share the experience of being different. Our lives
are lived in the crawl space between our strangeness and other people's
reactions an d fears. The instinctive human fear of those who are different
has defined both of our lives. The forces that put my uncle away would
also place me in a category from which there is no escape. Inside me is
the engine that thrashes about, never stopping, always mindful that someday
those same forces could decide my fate, claim that I am really helpless,
that my life is not worth living, give me a label, and send me away to
a place for all those like me."
Following each of the major wars of this century, the U.S. Congress responded
to the needs of returning veterans with rehabilitation legislation in
the form of the Smith-Fess Vocational Rehabilitation Act. Enacted after
World War I, it was amended in 1943, 1954, and 1965, after World War II,
the Korean War, and the Vietnam War respectively, to reflect changes in
how people with disabilities were perceived and the availability of new
treatment and rehabilitation protocols. In World War I, only about 2 percent
of veterans with spinal-cord injuries survived more than a year, but three
decades later during World War II, the discovery of antibiotics and more
sophisticated medical interventions brought the survival rate up to 85
percent.
Although the purpose of rehabilitation legislation was to compensate veterans,
the Smith-Fess Vocational Rehabilitation Act and each of its amendments
brought additional recognition and benefits for civilians as well. In
1943, people with mental retardation were included in the legislation,
making vocational training available to them for the first time. The polio
epidemics of the early 1950's also brought new attention to the needs
of civilians. In 1954, rehabilitation was moved from the Veterans Administration
into the new federal Department of Health, Education, and Welfare and
funds were allocated for research and demonstration grants. But none of
this legislation included any consideration of building accessibility.
Its entire focus was on the clinical impairments of people with disabil
ities and their management.
The first serious effort to address building design as an issue for people
with disabilities was a 1958 conference sponsored by the President's Commission
on Employment of the Handicapped, the National Easter Seal Society, and
the American National Standards Institute (ANSI), a private standard-setting
body that called for the development of voluntary standards for the design
of accessible buildings. With a grant from the Easter Seal Foundation,
these standards were developed by Timothy Nugent at the Rehabilitation
Center at the University of Illinois with oversight by a committee of
representatives from government, advocacy, health, trade, and professional
associations. Published and distributed in 1961 under the title A117.1
Making Buildings Accessible to and Usable by the Physically Handicapped,
the new standard described "in precise and practical terms, the minimal
features required to remove the major barriers that prevent many persons
from using buildings and facilities" and became the first scientifically
developed design guideline on accessibility in the world. Finally, designers
and building owners had available to them specifications for making building
elements such as parking spaces, elevators, and toilet stalls usable by
people with disabilities. The existence of such information, however,
did not result in substantially more accessible buildings; most building
owners and designers were unaware of the standards or oblivious to the
social benefits of implementing them. These voluntary standards were not
enforceable until adopted by a state or local entity, which started to
happen in the late sixties and early seventies.
Although an informal group of federal officials had developed an advisory
guide for federal agencies on making public buildings accessible during
the late fifties, it was not until the 1965 ame ndment of the Rehabilitation
Act that architectural barriers were formally acknowledged by the federal
government as an issue. The National Commission on Architectural Barriers
was established and three years later issued a report titled "Design
for All Americans" (ed. italics), which captures the remarkable
lack of awareness of American businesses, public officials, and design
and construction professionals to the existence of barriers and the standard
for their removal:
In a survey of almost three thousand architects—of the seven hundred
who replied, only 35 percent were aware of ANSI A117.1 (1961).
None of the four major building codes made any reference to architectural
barriers or their removal.
Building industry manufacturers and suppliers were unaware of the existence
of standards.
Public officials believed that there was not enough public interest to
develop public programs addressing building access.
The report cited a number of deficiencies in the ANSI standard that diminished
its usefulness to designers. The standard did not define the scope of
its application—what facility types, what elements of a building,
and how many of each element. The standard was difficult to implement
because its language was vague and had very few drawings to aid designers
in interpreting the information. Just a few years later in 1971, the 1961
ANSI standard was reaffirmed without revision by ANSI and continued in
use for another decade as the "pivotal document for the forging of
federal and state laws." *3 Confusion persisted for designers because
of multiple standard-setting agencies, conflicting requirements, and negligible
enforcement. The National Commission's report concluded that "the
greatest single obstacle to employment for the handicapped is the physical
design of buildings and facilities they must use." In response to
these findings, Congress drafted and passed new legislation in 1968—the
Architectural Barriers Act. It is interesting to note some of the issues
related to passage of the Act. One of the motivating factors for the legislation
was a perception that public funds expended on rehabilitation were a shortsighted
investment without removal of architectural barriers. Supporters emphasized
the belief that architectural barriers existed because of "simple
thoughtlessness" and their removal would occur with education of
the public and design professionals. In hindsight, the two-decade delay
in achieving full accessibility to both public and private places illustrates
the naivete of this belief. *4 The Act mandated that buildings designed,
constructed, altered, or leased with federal funds would comply with standards
for accessibility. It established three federal agencies that would set
standards—the General Services Administration, the Department of
Housing and Urban Development, and the Department of Defense. The Act
required two majors amendments (1970 and 1976) before it started to have
a significant effect on the accessibility of public buildings.
In spite of significant changes providing people with disabilities greater
independence and opportunities for greater participation in American life—federal
legislation, medical advances, and developments in assistive technology—changes
in public attitudes have followed slowly and primarily in response to
educational efforts that have accompanied new laws. The critical factor
to real change, according to Harlan Hahn, a professor of political science
at the University of Southern California, was that the definition of disability
shifted from medical and economic perspectives, which view disabilities
from the standpoint of functional and vocational limitations, to a socio-political
perspective that focuses rather on the disabling qualities of the environment
that limit the possible interactions of people with disabilities.
In this shift, people with disabilities have emerged as a "minority
group," oppressed not by their disabilities but by circumstances
that can be changed through legislation and political action. A principal
dimension of oppression of a minority group is the assumption of biological
inferiority by the majority. While other minority groups have managed
to disprove this assumption, the visible, physical differences of people
with disabilities evokes fearful reactions that perpetuate the notion
of subordinate status. Citing Stigma, in which Erving Goffman describes
people with disabilities as being viewed by society as not quite human,
Hahn argues that it is this failure to meet the twentieth-century Western
values of physical attractiveness and individual autonomy that permits
society to set disabled people apart. *5 For public-policy changes to
be effective, the attitudes that lead to the marginalization of people
with disabilities must be addressed equally along with functional changes
in the physical environment.
The disability rights movement, both in a formal legal sense and in a
moral sense, has its roots in the civil rights movement of the 1960's.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964, focused in its intent to eliminate racial
discrimination, set the stage for a number of minority groups to broaden
its coverage and use its mandate to demand equality. The disability rights
movement began to be a force and have its agendas recognized in legislation
during the 1970's, starting with the Rehabilitation Act of 1973.
The power of that Rehabilitation Act comes from the fact that its language,
especially Section 504, echoes Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
Section 504 was the first statutory definition of discrimination towards
people with disabilities. Although it did not have the scope of the Civil
Rights Act of 1964 and only outlawed discrimination by those entities
that received federal funds, it was a crucial factor in shifting disability
issues from the realm of social services and therapeutic practice to a
political and civil rights context. The Act survived two presidential
vetoes, suggesting that Congress finally understood the social significance
of the issues. The Act laid important groundwork for change but did not
address implementation; it took four more years for the regulations enforcing
Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act to be issued in 1978.
Three important new concepts emerged during the 1970's—program accessibility,
mainstreaming, and independent living. While none of them directly addressed
the technical issues of accessibility, each had implications for the accommodation
of people with disabilities by organizations that own and operate buildings.
Section 504 introduced the concept of program accessibility, which allowed
programs to achieve accessibility by being "viewed in their entirety."
This permitted some f lexibility for compliance. For example, a community
program could relocate activities to a physically accessible space in
lieu of costly renovations to an existing location. In 1975, Congress
passed the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, mandating free,
appropriate public education for children with disabilities. This legislation
introduced the concept of mainstreaming, ensuring children with disabilities
an education in the least restrictive environment—when possible,
the same environment as children without disabilities. Public schools
throughout the country struggled with barrier removal, in spite of the
fact that existing standards did not address accessibility for children.
In 1978, federal funding for independent-living services became available
for the first time. The independent-living concept, first talked about
in rehabilitation circles in the 1950's and 1960's as a full menu of services
provided by expert professionals to people with disabilities, was redefined
by the disability movement as a self-help empowerment movement to liberate
people with disabilities from the traditional concept of dependency, especially
in their choice of living environments.
While national disability policy was being rewritten, a social and political
movement was emerging among people with disabilities in local communities
through local action. The disability movement was reputedly born in Berkeley,
California, where the first center for independent living was established
in the early 1970's and people with disabilities had their first dramatic
confrontations with the federal bureaucracy, in this case the occupation
of the Health, Education, and Welfare offices in San Francisco in 1977
and 1978 to force the issuance of the 504 regulations. What occurred in
such dramatic terms in Berkeley resonated throughout the country among
people with disabilities who had experienced social oppression and the
devaluation of personal identity and were looking for a political model
for change. The proliferation across the country of independent-living
centers, other kinds of disability advocacy organizations, a movement
into government by people with disabilities, and the formation of state
and municipal offices on disability demonstrated the power of local action
and proved to be very valuable in sustaining a political presence during
a period of restricted national resources.
Government at the state and local levels moved more quickly than the
federal government. While Washington was slow to implement the Architectural
Barriers Act, many states adopted the ANSI standard and required compliance
for state-funded facilities. By 1966, at least thirty states had access
legislation and by 1973, every state except Kentucky had done so. Ten
states had expanded jurisdiction to privately funded buildings designed
for public use *6 Enforcement, however, continued to be problematic at
every level.
The 1980's were a frightening period for people with disabilities because
the prevailing notion that the best government was no government threatened
to undo hardwon rights. But the disability movement was sufficiently strong
at this point to preserve the basic legal structures of disability rights,
unlike other progressive efforts such as the environmental movement, which
experienced major revisions in policy. In spite of the Commission on Regulatory
Relief, the disability movement was successful in opposing attempts to
deregulate Section 504 and the Architectural Barriers Act, achieving some
bipartisan support and making apparent its potential political power.
The groundswell of response from parents had a profound effect on George
Bush, who chaired the Commission on Regulatory Relief.
In spite of the no-government rhetoric in Washington, federal administrative
wheels kept churning and more standards and legislation were passed. In
1981, the Architectural and Transportation Barriers Compliance Board (ATBCB)
first issued its "Minimum Guidelines and Requirements for Accessible
Design," but the new Reagan appointees on the ATBCB proposed recission.
The MGRAD were subsequently reissued in 1982 as a result of overwhelming
public comment. These established the basic underpinnings for the Uniform
Federal Accessibility Standards (UFAS) issued by four federal agencies:
General Services Administration, Department of Defense, Department of
Housing and Urban Development, and the U.S. Postal Service. In 1986, the
Air Carriers Act was passed indicating that Congress was returning to
the business of expanding the rights of people with disabilities to participate
in all dimensions of society, in this case, the right to air travel.
Two years later in 1988, four things happened in one year. The first,
HUD finally issuing its 504 regulations, only eleven years after the model
regulation had been issued, w as another step in the slow effort to develop
standards that would change the physical environment. But the other three
events were on the civil rights front, an arena that was critical to a
major shift in perspective for people with disabilities.
The Civil Rights Restoration Act was written to repair the damage that
had been done to the structure of civil rights enforcement, both by administrative
and judicial decisions in the 1980's. The Civil Rights Restoration Act,
which was stimulated by a gender-discrimination case, required federal-funding
recipients to comply throughout institutions, not just within the funded
unit. Important to disability rights, it was the first time that the disability
community was accepted as a full partner in the legislative and the lobbying
process for civil rights.
The Fair Housing Amendments Act, the prelude to the Americans with Disabilities
Act, expanded the protections of the Civil Righ ts Act of 1968 to include
both people with disabilities and families with children. It expanded
the scope of accessible housing from that which received public funds
to all new multifamily housing with four or more units, both public and
private. For the first time, a person with a disability could reasonably
expect to be able to seek accessible housing in the open market.
And finally, the first version of the Americans with Disabilities Act
went before Congress, crafted not by radicals in the disability movement,
but by Reagan appointees to the National Council on Disability. At this
time the disability movement, from the conservative to the radical wing
of the movement, was unified in the view that what was needed was not
a new and better brand of social welfare system, but a fundamental examination
and redefinition of the democratic tradition of equal opportunity and
equal rights.
In just two years, Congress passed this ambitious legislation and in
1990, President George Bush held the largest signing ceremony in history
on the south lawn of the White House, an historic moment for all people
with disabilities. The passage of the ADA was to some degree effected
by members of Congress realizing their obligation to ensure civil rights
to all Americans. The benefits of the ADA extend to a broad range of people
by cutting across all sectors of society; virtually every voter will experience
positive benefits from the law or know someone who does. Policy makers
saw important implications for the next century in terms of managing costs
of potentially dependent populations. Demographers project a dramatic
increase in the number of people who will live into their nineties. The
extent to which their needs can be accommodated through responsively designed
environments and assistive technology may save billions of dollars in
institutional care, largely underwritten by federal programs. As many
as two-thirds of people with disabilities are unemployed, largely due
to attitudinal and physical barriers that prevent their access to available
jobs. With the national sentiment opposed to long-term welfare reliance
and a labor-deficit economy, employment of people with disabilities is
essential.
The Americans with Disabilities Act is not only historic nationally but
globally as well. There is no other mandate of this scope in the world.
Though other nations provide greater levels of support services and assistive
technology, the United States ensures equal rights within a constitutional
tradition. The ADA has a unique appeal for all Americans because, unlike
other civil rights categories such as race and gender, an individual may
become a member of the protected class at any moment in his or her life.
Notes
1. p14 l5 Lifchez, Raymond (1987). Rethinking Architecture: Design Students
and Physically Disabled People. Berkeley, Calif.: University of California
Press, 2 n.
2. p14 l7 Hockenberry, Joh n (1995). Moving Violations: War Zones, Wheelchairs,
and Declarations of Independence. New York: Hyperion.
3. p18 l24 Lusher, Ruth Hall (1989). "Handicapped Access Laws and
Codes." In Encyclopedia of Architecture: Design Engineering and Construction,
vol. 3, edited by Wilkes and Packard, Pp.647. New York: John Wiley and
Sons.
4. p19 l20 Hull, Kent (1979). The Rights of Physically Handicapped People.
New York: Avon Books, Pp.67.
5. p21 l13 Hahn, Harlan. "The Politics of Physical Differences:
Disability and Discrimination." Journal of Social Issues Pp.44, no.
1 (1988).
6. p25 l10 Ref. 3, Pp.648.
