ADA Amendments: Another View
The ADA Amendments Act of 2008 (H.R. 3195), which passed the U.S. House of Representatives on June 27, is now being considered by the U.S. Senate. The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions conducted a hearing on the bill on July 15. You can watch the proceedings and read the testimony of the various witnesses here.
Much of the testimony was supportive of the legislation. But Andrew Grossman of the Heritage Foundation expressed concern in his testimony over what he believes is an ill-advised amendment to the definition of "disability" under the Act. Although the bill still defines "disability" as "a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities," the term "substantially limits" has now been defined as "materially restricts" - supposedly a less restrictive definition than the Supreme Court of the United States has given that term in previous court decisions. See, e.g., Sutton v. United Air Lines, Inc., 527 U.S. 471 (1999); Toyota Motor Manufacturing, Kentucky, Inc. v. Williams, 534 U.S. 184 (2002). But Mr. Grossman points out that the term "materially restricts" is itself not defined in the statute and thus is susceptible to varying interpretations. The White House has expressed similar concerns in this June 24 Statement of Administration Policy.
