Senator Feinstein shocked civil and disability rights advocates with her vote to send Jeffrey Sutton's nomination to the floor, in spite of his history of attacks on the rights of people with disabilities.

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Gather at Feinstein's office at 12 noon this Thursday 20th February and remind her that there's still time to change her vote - and that she should be representing the people. 11111 Santa Monica Blvd, suite 915 - this is on the corner of Santa Monica and Sepulveda, in West LA. Also, call Feinstein's office at 310 914 7300
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Disability rights issues are civil rights issues. They are about enabling people to live with dignity and independence. You may not feel they are relevant to you right now, but remember, you or someone you love could become disabled in an accident at any time. It's a minority group which still faces discrimination and barriers both subtle and obvious, on a wide scale - and a minority which any of us could join, at any time.


Jeffrey Sutton has a record of advocacy hostile to the interests of the disability community. He has not simply taken an unpopular position in the name of zealously representing a client. Instead, he has aggressively pursued a national role as the leading advocate for a group of far-right legal theorists attempting to limit Congress's power to protect individuals' civil rights. He has acknowledged that he is "on the lookout" for cases where he can present this view, and he has devoted his career to advancing the cause of federalism.

Sutton argued that the protections of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) were "not needed" to remedy discrimination by states against people with disabilities. He also argued that Medicaid rights are unenforceable by individual recipients. Sutton's arguments can, and no doubt will, be extended to claim that rights under the Rehabilitation Act and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) are unenforceable as well. Instead of Congress extending protections through federal civil rights laws, Sutton believes that states should be the "principal bulwark in protecting civil liberties" - a statement that has grave implications given the massive record of state-sanctioned discrimination against individuals with disabilities.

Attacks on the ADA

Jeffrey Sutton actively sought involvement in a case that severely limits the rights of persons with disabilities. Sutton argued before the Supreme Court in Board of Trustees of the University of Alabama v. Garrett that Congress had no power to authorize individuals with disabilities to file lawsuits for damages against states for violating the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Sutton argued that Congress had no power to apply the ADA to the states because "[in passing the ADA, Congress did not identify any pattern or practice of unconstitutional State action, or for that matter, even a single instance of such conduct." Despite the massive record of egregious conduct toward individuals with disabilities by states that Congress had compiled -- including instances of forced sterilization of individuals with disabilities, unnecessary institutionalization, denial of education, and systemic prejudices and stereotyping perpetrated by state actors -- Sutton argued that states were actually in the forefront of efforts to protect the rights of individuals with disabilities.

Sutton persuaded the Supreme Court's conservative majority to rule, in a 5-4 decision, that individuals with disabilities who are state employees cannot sue their employers for damages under Title I of the ADA. Garrett not only prevents persons with disabilities from collecting monetary damages from state employers. Significantly, the decision has resulted in fewer attorneys being willing to represent individuals in an ADA cases against state employers.

While Jeffrey Sutton has tried to characterize his argument in the Garrett case as limited to ADA claims for money damages, the implications are much broader. Despite Sutton's assurances to the Supreme Court that he "doubt[ed] anyone would ever bring . . . an across-the-board attack on the law," states have been raising such challenges across the country and some courts have ruled that even ADA claims that do not involve money damages cannot be brought against state actors.

Jeffrey Sutton also filed a brief representing the state of Georgia before the Supreme Court in Olmstead v. L.C. Sutton argued in Olmstead that states had no duty under the ADA to serve individuals with disabilities in integrated settings. Sutton argued that unnecessarily keeping people with disabilities in institutions was not a form of discrimination. Fortunately, the Supreme Court did not accept his arguments in that case.

What would happen if Jeffrey Sutton got his way?

Individuals with disabilities would be segregated in institutions despite professional opinion that they would be better served in the community.

Impoverished children and adults denied the basic medical care guaranteed to them under the Medicaid program would be unable to enforce their rights.

State governments would be free to exclude people with disabilities from their programs and services, including health care, education, roads and streets, public buildings, and welfare benefits, without fear of having to compensate those individuals for the discrimination they suffered.

Sutton has already ensured that state employees with disabilities can no longer seek compensation from their state employers for violating ADA.

Thank you for posting this, an issue too often ignored by liberals and progressives.

If you care about civil rights, stand up for disability rights!

I think it is also worth noting that the #1 leading cause of disability is war.

It is not the Federal Governments place or job to enforce a false equality for the unfortunate. That may sound harsh to some ears but when you put the idiots in any bureaucracy in charge of enforcing some supposed equality you wind up with some of the most bizarre interpretations.

If you feel that strongly about it then set up a private organization to help them. Don't point a gun at someone else's head and enforce your views upon them. The ADA is an abomination and should be repealed.

The problem is better handled at the local level by establishing rational Zoning requirements that make for REASONABLE commonsensical accomodations.

And yet she appears to agree with you on the right about the disposability of people with disabilities, even those gained by fighting your wars!

Diogenes, do you feel the same way about equal rights for black people? Would you repeal laws forbidding racial discrimination by the employers, businesses and governments?

I am not talking about affirmative action. I'm talking about it being illegal to deny someone a job or entrance to a public building (ie. store) because of their race (or disability).

Spare me the implied racism argument. There is a distinction between requiring enormous burdens on small operations to accomodate an extremely small number of people who have unfortunate disabilities. Reasonable accomodation means accomodation which takes into account the factors involved in making the accomodation. It does not, or at least should not, require a disproportionate effort. It should not require an unreasonable accomodation such as keeping some asshole on the payroll because his being an asshole is considered a disability.
There is a clear difference between trying to make things easier for someone who is crippled and a drunk.

Racial prejudice has nothing to do with your argument and is simply a veiled ad hominem attack. Bite me.

Excuse me.

People with disabilities are not "the unfortunate." The only unfortunate thing about us is that people continue to discriminate against us!

"Don't point a gun at someone else's head and enforce your views upon them. "

You sound just like the people who used to defend slavery!

The ADA is one of the most important civil rights acts in years. It is what gives me the right to be able to get into my place of work, my bank, to be treated as a full and equal citizen not as some inferior being because I happen to use a wheelchair rather than legs for my mobility. The right not to be forced to live in an institution. The right to sue people who discriminate against me, who would keep me helpless and dependent on others, and trapped in my own home (if I was lucky enough not to be poor and forced into an institution).

The ADA was passed because lawmakers on both the left and the right could clearly see the voluminous record of egregious discrimination that people with disabilities have endured for years and years, even with the existing state laws as they were. They recognized that people with disabilities are deserving of the same rights and respect as other people; and that by working to ensure that we can get jobs, reach and enter our places of work, carry on our lives as independently as possible, they were working to make fewer people dependent on the government for welfare money.

We do not need charity. We need rights.
We do not need pity. We need rights.
We do not need ignorance. We need the ADA.

I am not attacking you; I am saying that civil rights are civil rights. Why would you say that people of different races are deserving of protection, but people of different abilities are not?

>There is a distinction between requiring enormous
>burdens on small operations to accomodate an
>extremely small number of people who have
>unfortunate disabilities.

Nothing requires enormous burdens. It requires "reasonable accommodation" (Incidentally, there are approximately 50 million people in the US who have some form of disability, though most people with disabilities do not consider themselves "unfortunate" any more than African Americans do - the misfortune, for most, is in the way they are regarded and treated by others).

> It does not, or at least should not, require a
>disproportionate effort. It should not require an
>unreasonable accomodation such as keeping some
>asshole on the payroll because his being an
>asshole is considered a disability.

And there is nothing in the ADA that does that. You appear to be responding out of a surprising level of ignorance, here.

The ADA says that businesses must make reasonable accomodations to be accessible to people with disabilities - a store with a step to its door must put out a couple of hundred bucks to put in a ramp. If it is a small business up a long flight of stairs which clearly cannot afford to put in an elevator, nothing in the ADA requires it to do so.

>Racial prejudice has nothing to do with your
>argument and is simply a veiled ad hominem attack.
>Bite me.

It is not an attack, veiled or otherwise - unless you do in fact believe that businesses should be allowed to discriminate against people on grounds of race, in which case I would be happy to insult you outright. :-)

It is a comparison. When a prejudice, or refusal to accomodate, is widespread, and local laws have done little to help the matter, federal action is necessary for the simple reasons of human rights and justice.

This is also about things as simple as curb cuts so someone can travel down the street (people in wheelchairs have been killed by being forced out into traffic because the sidewalks have been inaccessible), making public transport accessible, even making court rooms and ballot points accessible so people who use wheelchairs can share and exercise the most basic rights that are supposedly guarranteed to all in our fair nation.

If you are not disabled yourself or close to someone who is, you are unlikely to have any idea of the amounts of obstacles and barriers still faced every day, even with the ADA having been in place for 12 years, because judges like Sutton want to make it impossible for people with disabilities to stand up for their rights. You have no idea how many difficulties are caused *not by the disability* but by the *response of people to the disability,* their attitudes and reactions, and their not giving a fuck about simple things like thinking to put in a ramp instead of steps when they refurbish their hair salon.

and though you may have little idea, you yourself could be hit by a car and require the use of a wheelchair tomorrow, and suddenly find out just how hard it is and how much of what makes it hard is not your physical condition, but OTHER PEOPLE'S IGNORANCE.

Sutton is 'a leading advocate for a group of far-right legal theorists attempting to limit Congress's power to protect individuals' civil rights.'

This is the basic issue. Are we for, or against, civil rights and Congress's power to protect them?

I took care of my Wheelchair bound Mother for the last 5 years of her life. I am well aware of the inconviences faced by someone who has mobility problems. As I mentioned before Reasonable accomodations can be made. Wheelchair Curbs are certainly one. Rampways instead of steps another. These are all Zoning matters that do not require an FBI inspection. The Federal Government should not be involved. Again all of these things can be handled locally.

And there have been some pretty strange rulings arising from the ADA. I know the original intent was to help people but anything taken to an extreme can become ludicrous. And government absurdity is almost a given.

I know of an instance from personal knowledge where a small Church was ordered to install a 10,000 dollar hydraulic lift next to a stairway because someone in a Wheelchair "might" want to go down to the lower level.

I would have to do some research to cite specifics but I have read about some pretty strange rulings based upon the ADA.