Americans with Disabilities Act
Name:
Institution:
Abstract
The Americans with Disabilities Act
is a legal document that seeks to promote equality in the society by offering a
similar opportunity for all citizens regardless of their physical capabilities
and appearance. This text seeks to analyze the various stipulations indicated
in the document. This includes the requirements presented in the documentation
for use by particular sectors of the national and regional administration as
well as other social sectors.
Americans with Disabilities Act
Introduction
The legal provisions in this act aims at discouraging inequality against physically handicapped citizens. It stipulates equality requirements in work places, public automobiles, legislative offices, communication channels, communal accommodation, and other public amenities. The main purpose of this legal document is to protect physically or mentally disabled nationals from unfair treatments in various sub sectors. According to the provisions of this act, public and government institutions should not use physical appearances as the criteria of offering their services.
The government has several formal agencies that offer procedural support and legal enforcement of the bill. One such institution is the Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP) in the administrative labor division. Other institutes such as the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) aid in suppressing discrimination among disabled individuals (Fleischer & Zames, 2001).Through the Americans with Disabilities Act, every citizen has an equal opportunity to improve his or her living standards as well as acquiring basic societal and legal services.
Employment
In terms of employment, the Americans with Disabilities Act contains detailed information that guides employers on how to treat employees with physical or mental impairments. To start with, the bill emphasizes that business proprietors should focus on the credentials of current or potential employees as opposed to basing recruitment decisions on their physical capabilities. However, the document only caters for companies that have more than fifteen personnel. This stipulation is one of the amendments made on the original document of 1990 that catered for corporations with more than twenty-five workers (Fleischer & Zames, 2001).
Additionally, the conditions detailed in this documentation assert that employers have to be rational with reference to the disabilities of their workers. They must formulate and put in place principles and policies, which recognize disability among some of the human resources as a normal occurrence. Unless the duties or conditions at the workplace are too challenging for disabled employees to undertake, executives in a commercial organization should consider the qualifications of physically or mentally impaired applicants. Moreover, discrimination of an employee or interviewee because of his or her relationship with a handicapped human being is illegal.
Nonetheless, there are particular phrases incorporated in the Americans with Disabilities Act that limit the official benefits offered to physically or psychologically handicapped employees. These limitations seek to discourage such bodily challenged individuals from using the provisions in the act for destructive activities. For instance, the document allows employers to fire workers or reject employment applications if recruiting such individuals will jeopardize the wellbeing of other workers in the commercial organization. Furthermore, physical or mental disabilities arising from current drug abuse are not subject to the benefits stipulated in the act. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is responsible for dealing with violation claims with respect to the bill. Employees or candidates may also use law courts to stop this form of discrimination (Longmore, 2003).
Public Housing
The Americans with Disabilities Act also has detailed rudiments that discourage the society from discriminating bodily or psychologically impaired people in public accommodation. These facilities include eating-places, theaters, museums, libraries, drug stores, private educational institutions, or trading centers. However, religious institutions and private associations are not part of the provisions in this segment. The basics in this document are a result of the amendment made on the original copy of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990.
According to this legal documentation, all the public accommodations have to transform their policies, operations, and principles in order to discourage any form of discrimination regarding bodily or mental impairments. The act stipulates that service providers in these facilities have to assist individuals with such disabilities as visual or hearing impairments. This is because all customers who seek services in these amenities should have an equal chance to take part or gain from these intangible or tangible products. However, there is exclusion in situations that involve unjustified trouble.
One of the benefits that disabled individuals should attain is accessibility in these public areas. For instance, buildings with less than three floors do not have to incorporate an elevator. This is an effort to allow disabled customers to access all sectors of the structure. However, these provisions exclude shopping malls, or offices of health experts (Longmore, 2003). In higher constructions with elevators, an alternative pathway should be accessible for the bodily-impaired clientele. Such individuals should be able to access essential areas like bathrooms, handsets, and drinking water facilities. These alterations should not be subject to additional costs.
Furthermore, public accommodations that provide transportation facilities ought to have alternative amenities for customers considered as physically handicapped. Similar to the stipulations in the employment segment of the Americans with Disabilities Act, service providers in these community structures should not categorize their clients based on the physical capabilities and appearances of people with whom they have a connection. Violation of these rules may attract penalties and monetary damages if forwarded to law courts or the office of the Attorney General (Schwartzenberg, 2005).
Public Transportation
The Americans with Disabilities Act demands that all public bus systems should be accessible to physically or mentally challenged commuters. Unless unjustifiable trouble may result from the activities, authorities that govern these systems ought to provide alternative automobiles for the disabled clientele. This also applies to bus stations and public amenities within these areas. The facilities include bathrooms, telephone booths, and drinking water areas. Additionally, the administrations in these systems should not increase charges for the alternatives.
The stipulations also consider public railway networks. According to this legal documentation, bodily-impaired travelers should have the opportunity to access such stations. For instance, the original copy of 1990 requires that all railway stations should have at least one vehicle for every train that is accessible to disabled customers (Schwartzenberg, 2005). Proprietors and managers of all types of train stations should follow the official requirements dictated in the Americans with Disabilities Act. Failure to do so may attract legal charges depending on verdicts of the infrastructure division in collaboration with law courts.
Buses owned by individuals should also adhere to the details under the public transportation segment of this civil rights bill. Private automobiles that offer similar services to public transportation amenities should transform their assets in order to benefit all customers regardless of their physical state. Gas stations should also be accessible to these individuals as indicated in the Americans with Disabilities Act. The Attorney General and courthouses have the responsibility to deal with people who violate these provisions through the civic spaces operations.
Governmental Operations
Based on the prerequisites in this legal text, governmental institutions should also be considerate of physically and psychologically handicapped citizens. These institutions include all federal and regional agencies governed by the national administration. As a way of promoting the constitutional liberties of all citizens of the United States, government aims at leading by example. With the national lawmakers being responsible for the formulation of this documentation, the ideology of including government institutes in the stipulations is rational and efficient.
According to the Americans with Disabilities Act, all governmental institutions should restrain from direct or indirect discrimination against bodily or psychologically challenged citizens. To start with, the stipulations in this section discourage the use of physical appearances as the main criteria for recruiting individuals into the government agencies (Smith, 2003). As directed in the segment about employment, applicants or employees should have equal employment opportunities with considerations of their physical challenges. Consequently, declining the application of a citizen or firing a worker in a government institution based on his or her bodily appearance is illegal.
In addition, all fundamental facilities within the administrative structures should be accessible to the handicapped people. This includes bathrooms and telephone booths. Other services rendered to the physically fit members of the general population should consider the disabled citizens. In circumstances where similar facilities and services may attract unjustifiable hitches, the organization should offer appropriate alternatives without monetary extortion or other forms of unfair treatment. Failure to adhere to these requirements may attract legal punishment according to the verdict of a court of law.
Communication Services
This legal section mostly considers the visually impaired or deaf individuals. Based on the provisions in this section of the Americans with Disabilities Act, commercial organizations who offer telecommunication services to the general populace should consider physically handicapped clientele while designing their tangible or intangible products. This sub section of the bill seeks to uphold the constitutional rights of all citizens regardless of their bodily shortcomings. Consequently, it offers an equality platform at the regional and federal levels through detailed stipulations.
For instance, this legal document requires telecommunication corporations to design products and services that cater for the needs of the deaf and blind customers. These apparatus should have similar benefits with those designed to suit people without such forms of physical disabilities. One such gadget that concurs with the requirements in this bill that promotes civil liberties is the category of Telecommunication Devices for the Deaf (TDD) (Smith, 2003). The Americans with disabilities act also stipulates the legal punishments fro companies or individuals who violate the detailed conditions. As dictated, victims of this form of discrimination can file a lawsuit through the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
Conclusion
Based
on the facts documented in the Americans with Disabilities Act, discrimination
against people with physical or mental impairment is an illegal deed that
requires uncompromising mode of punishments. This bill, formulated and enforced
by various governmental institutions, is helpful in maintaining equality in the
community. Moreover, incorporating government- controlled operations in the
stipulations is an efficient way of emphasizing the ideologies of the act. Since
governmental organizations are part of the institutes that should follow these
policies, the general population is bound to adhere to the rules. Consequently,
the act has been a successful venture that promotes civil liberties and
equality in the community. For this reason, it is rational to conclude that the
Americans with disabilities act is a well-formulated documentation that seeks
to provide a similar opportunity for physically and psychologically challenged
citizens with reference to employment opportunities, administrative services,
and social amenities. To illustrate this, the document is in Braille, large
print, electronic file, and audiotape formats for easy accessibility by all
people.
Annotated Bibliography
Fleischer, D. Z., & Zames, F. (2001). The disability rights movement: From charity to confrontation. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
This informative text offers a detailed record about the struggle for the rights of physically disabled citizens in the United States. It provides facts about the legislative aspects of the issue as well as the predicaments of various handicapped individuals with constant reference to the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Longmore, P. K. (2003). Why I burned my book and other essays on disability. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
This book offers concrete information about the civil movements held with the aim of suppressing discrimination against the physically and mentally handicapped people. Moreover, it focuses on personal accounts of citizens who have experienced this form of bigotry.
Schwartzenberg, S. (2005). Becoming citizens: Family life and the politics of disability. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
This book is a personal yet real documentation of families who have individuals living with physical or physiological challenges. The text, which encompasses a photo album, focuses on the experiences of several parents and children who have suffered discrimination or other hardships because of the physical conditions.
Smith, J. D. (2003). In search of better angels: Stories of disability in the human family. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Corwin Press.
In this informative book, David focuses on personal experiences narrated by individuals with bodily or mental disabilities. It offers an insight into the daily lives of these individuals with the intention of enlightening the general population on the harm of promoting discriminative deeds against such people.