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PROPOSED RESOLUTION
HONORING THE 25th ANNIVERSARY OF THE SIGNING OF THE AMERICANS WITH DISABILITIES ACT (ADA)
WHEREAS, on July 26, 1990, our nation committed itself to the elimination of discrimination against people with disabilities through the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA); and
WHEREAS, in 1986, the National Council on Disability (NCD) recommended enactment of an Americans with Disabilities Act ( ADA), and drafted the first version of the bill which was introduced in the House and Senate in 1988; and
WHEREAS, after the spectacular Senate vote of 76 to 8 on September 7,1989, the Bill went to the House where it was considered by an unprecedented four Committees and later approved and signed as a law; and
WHEREAS, the ADA began with the establishment of the independent living movement, which challenged the notion that people with disabilities needed to be institutionalized, and which fought for and provided services for people with disabilities to live in the community; and
WHEREAS, the hard work and the coalescing of lawyers and advocates, top level negotiators and policy analysts, disability organizations, lobbyers, protesters, witnesses, and many more groups from all areas of the country formed the disability rights movement to help the passage of the ADA; and
WHEREAS, people with disabilities went to Washington D.C. to talk to members of Congress, to advocate for the Bill, and to explain why each provision was necessary while others wrote letters, attended town meetings, and made endless phone calls; and
WHEREAS, for the first time, the exclusion and segregation of people with disabilities was viewed as discrimination; and
WHEREAS, before the ADA, no federal law prohibited private sector discrimination against people with disabilities, outside a federal grant or contract; and
WHEREAS, the ADA is a wide-ranging civil rights law that prohibits discrimination based on a disability and offers similar protections against discrimination ...
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