Citizen Activists and Organizations
“On May 9, 1989 Senators Harkin and Durrenberger and Representatives Coelho and Fish jointly introduced the new ADA in the 101st Congress. From that moment, the disability community mobilized, organizing a multi-layered strategy for passage. A huge coalition was assembled by the Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities (CCD), which included disability organizations, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (LCCR), and an array of religious, labor and civic organizations.”
Arlene Mayerson, "The History of the Americans with Disabilities Act"
Citizen Activists
People with disabilities and other activists for disability rights played a vital role in the drafting and passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Activists worked with organizations to educate the public on the circumstances facing people with disabilities, carry out large protests and demonstrations, voice specific concerns to legislators and legal advisors, and lobby for the bill.
Lex Frieden
"It was generally accepted that the Washington-based national advocacy groups would support the bill, but what about ordinary people?"
Lex Frieden, What We have Done, page 436
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Lex Frieden was paralyzed in a car crash and experienced discrimination while attending educational institutions. He testified before Congress multiple times, served as a leader in the National Council on the Handicapped, and organized demonstrations to expose the inaccessibility of public infrastructure.
Click to read a student-conducted interview with Lex Frieden.
Lex Frieden, What We have Done, page 436
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Lex Frieden was paralyzed in a car crash and experienced discrimination while attending educational institutions. He testified before Congress multiple times, served as a leader in the National Council on the Handicapped, and organized demonstrations to expose the inaccessibility of public infrastructure.
Click to read a student-conducted interview with Lex Frieden.
Arlene Mayerson
"My role was to draft and review language to promote the central theme of the ADA- equal opportunity for people with disabilities to participate in society based on the 1964 Civil Rights Act for minorities and woman, using concepts of equality developed in the regulations implementing Section 504 of the 1973 Rehabilitation Act. I was able to apply those legal concepts with the grounding of experience working for DREDF, an organization of and by disabled people."
Arlene Mayerson, Student-Conducted Interview
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Arlene Mayerson served as a legal advisor to both Congress and the disability rights community throughout the drafting of the ADA. Her leadership provided a liaison between disability rights activists and legislators.
Click to read a student-conducted interview with Arlene Mayerson.
Arlene Mayerson, Student-Conducted Interview
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Arlene Mayerson served as a legal advisor to both Congress and the disability rights community throughout the drafting of the ADA. Her leadership provided a liaison between disability rights activists and legislators.
Click to read a student-conducted interview with Arlene Mayerson.
Organizations
Comprehensive civil rights and disability rights organizations provided leadership for the education of people with disabilities about their rights and participation in social movements for the legislation, legal advocacy, and the writing of the ADA.
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"State and local advocacy coalitions and the independent living centers were capable of generating considerable public pressure on Congress and elsewhere. The older disability-specific membership organizations and voluntary associations had aligned themselves with the disability rights movement and reinvigorated their memberships." |
Examples of the Organizations Involved
Activism Through Organizations
"Witnesses with a wide variety of disabilities, such as blindness, deafness, Down’s Syndrome and HIV infection, as well as parents of disabled children testified about architectural and communication barriers and the pervasiveness of stereotyping and prejudice." |
"The disability community began to educate people with disabilities about the ADA and to gather evidence to support the need for broad anti-discrimination protections." |