by Charles H. Crawford
It has been nearly 13 years since I and other people with disabilities filled the White House lawn as the first President Bush signed the Americans with Disabilities Act. The weather was good that day, spirits were high. We all felt that a significant battle had been joined and won, and we all celebrated a new sense of inclusion and hope. As we walked away from the White House lawn, we talked about all the ways our lives would change for the better.
Indeed, positive changes have happened for many of us with disabilities since the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Spurred by both the spirit and letter of the law, we have seen advances in many areas such as transportation, availability of accessible documents and more. The world has become more friendly to folks who use wheelchairs, and to people with other kinds of disabilities as well. Yet almost 13 years later we find ourselves confronted by numerous attacks against our hard-won rights. These attacks are often defended as mere differences in philosophy — for example, protecting the rights of the various states against unfair or unwarranted federal encroachment, or assuring prudent governmental spending. Most venomous of all is an all too prevalent attitude that people with disabilities don’t really deserve an equal place in society. According to this attitude, which downplays any civil rights implications of the ADA, all we really need are a few modest accommodations, which society can dole out to us out of the goodness of its charitable heart.
Some in the disability rights movement believe this is a time for caution; we should lie low and do everything in our power to prevent people who would deny us our rights from having the opportunity to do so. Others believe we must confront discrimination at every turn and be ready to march and engage in protests as often as required. Still others remain silent, presumably in the hope that things will settle down and the attacks against our civil rights will gradually disappear. Still these questions loom before us: How can a community of 54 million at last count be ignored? And do we need to be concerned, as a community, about the erosion of our rights? The answers to these questions form the foundation of our collective power and the reason we have not used it to our benefit.
The miracle of the disability rights movement was that we came together in a common belief in ourselves and a recognition that only through united action could we move the mountains that stood between us and our rightful place in society. When we passed the ADA, we believed we had reached the summit of those mountains, and we believed all the green fields of the plains below would soon be ours to share. But a law does not break the chains of attitudes within us and around us that reach as far back as recorded history. There were those in the promised land who did not want our community residences in their backyards, or our children educated in truly inclusive ways, or changes to the environment, which many still argue, benefit so few people. Least welcomed was our expectation of equality for people who were, after all, “special.”
Is it any wonder therefore that ACB’s struggle for pedestrian safety, accessible computing, comprehensive education for our kids, real transportation options, job opportunities, accessible appliances, video description, documents in alternative formats, and the many other issues we confront has been so difficult? Wheelchair users still face barriers, deaf folks do not have full access to important spoken information, people with mental illness still receive insufficient health care while they try to manage in a world that would rather ignore them than help.
The power of our disability community has not been lost; it is we who have given it away. Coming together once again as a community is the only way that we can reclaim ourselves and our power. The promised land is not beyond us, it is within us. Once we lay claim to it in ourselves as a community of people with disabilities, then we can take our rightful place in society.
The White House lawn still stands. Will we?