[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 151 (2005), Part 13]
[Senate]
[Pages 17246-17248]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




      HONORING 15TH ANNIVERSARY OF AMERICANS WITH DISABILITIES ACT

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the hour of 5:15 
having arrived, there will be 15 minutes for debate on the Americans 
with Disabilities resolution. The Senator from Iowa will control 15 
minutes.
  The Senator is recognized.
  Mr. HARKIN. I thank the Chair.
  Mr. President, in remarks on the floor this morning I spoke about the 
remarkable progress that we have made since the Americans with 
Disabilities Act became law 15 years ago tomorrow. Today, the physical 
impact of ADA's quiet revolution is all around us. Sidewalks are 
equipped with curb cuts allowing access for people using wheelchairs. 
New buildings are outfitted in countless ways with ramps, wide doors, 
and large bathroom stalls to accommodate people with disabilities. Many 
banks have talking ATMs to assist individuals who are blind. Service 
animals are welcome in restaurants and shops, and on and on.
  For those of us who are able-bodied, these changes are all but 
invisible. For a person with a disability, they are transforming and 
liberating. So are provisions in the ADA outlawing discrimination 
against qualified individuals with disabilities in the workplace, and 
requiring employers to provide reasonable accommodations.
  The ADA is about designing our policies and also our physical 
environment so that America can benefit from the contributions of all 
of our citizens. The ADA is about rejecting the false dichotomy between 
disabled and abled. It is about recognizing that people with 
disabilities, like all people, have unique abilities, talents, and 
aptitudes and that our country, that our America, is better, fairer and 
richer when we make full use of those gifts.
  Last week, in anticipation of this 15th anniversary, I asked people 
from all across America to send stories about how their lives are 
different today thanks to the Americans with Disabilities Act. I wanted 
to find out what the ADA means to people in their everyday lives.
  I want to recite some of those.
  Before I do, I ask unanimous consent that Senators Cantwell and 
Voinovich be added as original cosponsors of S. Res. 207.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. HARKIN. One young woman whose name is Cheri Blauwet wrote me and 
said:

       I am a paraplegic as the result of a farming accident when 
     I was 15 months old. I am now 25 years old and am currently a 
     medical student at Stanford University in addition to being a 
     wheelchair racer on the United States Paralympic Team. My 
     ultimate goal is to become a physician and to work 
     internationally to provide sport and physical activity 
     opportunities to my peers with disabilities.

  She continued:

       I was 10 years old when the ADA was passed in 1990. 
     Although I didn't know it at that time, my realization of my 
     own talents and capacities would be shaped on this fateful 
     day. As I grew into adulthood, I attended a public university 
     and had an accessible dorm room and classrooms that were 
     wheel chair friendly. I received financial assistance from 
     the state Vocational Rehabilitation program. I was able to 
     apply for jobs, scholarships, and schools and to know I would 
     be viewed without discrimination. My ability to easily take 
     buses, trains, and airplanes led me to domestic and global 
     travel for the purposes of building my sports and medical 
     careers. I knew that something as simple as a set of stairs 
     would not stop me from achieving my life goals.

  A woman from Chicago who uses a wheelchair and works for the Federal 
Reserve wrote the following:

       I am part of the first generation of Americans with 
     disabilities to grow up with the ADA in effect, and as a 
     result, it never crossed my mind that going to college, 
     studying abroad, or working in a big city would be impossible 
     for me. I knew these goals would be challenging--as they 
     would be for anyone. But I also knew they were possible, in 
     part, because of the ADA. The law laid the groundwork to make 
     this country more accessible for everyone, and it gave me the 
     access I need to do the things I'm capable of doing. For 
     example, I need accessible transportation to go to work so I 
     can afford my apartment. My apartment is located near a city 
     bus line, and all of the buses have lifts to accommodate my 
     wheelchair. ADA helped to make these necessities available to 
     me and others with disabilities, giving us more opportunities 
     than ever before to be active members of the community. It's 
     hard for me to imagine what my life would be like without the 
     ADA and without the accessibility I take advantage of every 
     day.

  An individual from Laramie, WY, wrote:

       The ADA has made a tremendous impact in my life. The 
     ability to go into a store to shop, or to travel, and to find 
     a place to stay have been the largest differences I've 
     experienced. Now, when I find a place of business that I 
     can't get into or get around in because of my wheelchair, 
     it's the exception rather than the rule. In 1990, in Wyoming, 
     the number of businesses I couldn't get into, or get around 
     in, far outnumbered the number of businesses that were 
     accessible. That has changed. Many have added ramps, 
     doorbells, or simply rearranged displays to make wider 
     aisles.

  An individual with a spinal cord injury from St. Paul, MN, wrote:

       I'm 32. Growing up, I was never sure whether I would be 
     employed. Thanks to the ADA, I received accommodations to 
     enable me to earn a B.A. and a J.D. I passed the bar in 1998, 
     thanks to accommodations received under the ADA. One of my 
     first jobs was clerking for a district court judge. Under the 
     ADA, the court provided me with assistive technology to 
     enable me to write judicial opinions and orders. The ADA has 
     made a tremendous difference in my life, both personally and 
     professionally. The ADA has enabled me to participate in 
     every facet of daily life, including the mundane things like 
     going to a movie or staying at a hotel. I can't imagine what 
     my life would be like if this law had not passed.

  A woman who has an 11-year-old son with a disability wrote:

       I am thankful for the ADA each time we pull into a 
     handicapped parking space, hit the automatic door to the 
     building, and can move around due to widened doorways. Each 
     time we go into a movie theater and don't have to sit on the 
     very front row. Each time we go to a theme park show where we 
     don't have to sit in the very back row.

  Those are just a few of the many letters. I ask unanimous consent 
that the remainder of the letters I have be printed in the Record at 
this point.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:
       A woman with multiple disabilities wrote: ``Without the 
     ADA, I would either be on welfare or Social Security, unable 
     to support myself. Thanks to the ADA, I am a tax-paying 
     citizen helping to support others, living in my own little 
     home which I bought myself, paying for my own car, bills and 
     medicine. The ADA has helped me to secure meaningful 
     employment. In the 70's and 80's, when I was hard of hearing 
     with hearing aids, I had a very difficult time finding and 
     holding jobs because I was not able to hear on the phone, and 
     most often misunderstood verbal instruction. I could often 
     only find jobs paying the minimum wage. Now,

[[Page 17247]]

     though, thanks to the ADA, I am happily employed with an 
     employer who recognizes me for my abilities, not my limits.''
       A German woman with a disability wrote the following: 
     ``Although I am not an American with a disability but a 
     German with a disability, the ADA had an impact on my life. 
     The United States is one of my favorite countries for 
     traveling. Why? I am a wheelchair user and I enjoy having no 
     problems finding an accessible hotel. I don't have any 
     trouble finding accessible restrooms, and I never have any 
     problems visiting museums, parks, attractions and public 
     buildings. There are many more parking spaces for the 
     disabled than in Europe. And if I book my flight at an 
     American airline, there will be no stupid questions--I am 
     just a passenger who uses a wheelchair. No big deal! I try to 
     travel to US at least once a year, because of the ADA. It 
     means seamless travel to me.''
       And one final story. A man from Minnesota with a spinal 
     cord injury wrote the following: ``Six years ago, my spine 
     was severed in a car accident. In that one afternoon I went 
     from being a positive and productive husband, father, and 
     worker in the U.S. to spending months at the Mayo Hospitals. 
     Before that time I didn't know or think much about the ADA. 
     Since my accident I have remained a positive husband not just 
     the right to be independent and have a job, but the 
     wherewithal to be independent and hold a job.
  Mr. HARKIN. Mr. President, shortly we are going to have a vote on a 
resolution commending the 15th anniversary of the Americans with 
Disabilities Act and all it has achieved for our society. It truly has 
opened the doors and torn down the walls of segregation and 
discrimination and the denial of equal opportunity for people with 
disabilities.
  As I said this morning, after the Civil Rights Act of 1964 passed, we 
thought we had done a great thing, and indeed we had. But for a large 
group of Americans with disabilities, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 left 
them out because they still faced segregation on a daily basis. They 
faced discrimination on a daily basis; they faced inequality of 
opportunity on a daily basis. So the Americans with Disabilities Act, 
signed into law on July 26, 1990, finally accorded to Americans with 
disabilities every right that every American ought to have. That is the 
right to live independently, the right to have equality of opportunity, 
the right to have economic self-sufficiency, and the right to be 
accorded full participation in our society. Those are the four goals of 
the Americans with Disabilities Act, and now we see the evidence all 
around us.
  On July 26, 1990, when he signed the Americans with Disabilities Act 
into law, President George Herbert Walker Bush spoke with great 
eloquence, and I will never forget his final words before taking up his 
pen.
  He said, ``Let the shameful wall of exclusion finally come tumbling 
down.''
  Today, that wall has indeed fallen. We must continue this progress. 
We must go forward and not backward.
  As I said this morning, we have come a long way in making sure people 
with disabilities are able to participate in American society. We see 
people in restaurants, traveling, in theaters and sports arenas, people 
with jobs, people going to school, people becoming lawyers and doctors 
and everything else, regardless of their disability, and it is a 
wonderful thing for our country. It has made us a better, richer, and 
fairer country.
  We only have one other thing that we have to do. We have to make sure 
people with disabilities have personal attendant services so they can 
go to work. Right now, 15 years after the Americans with Disabilities 
Act, over 60 percent of people with disabilities are unemployed, no 
job. Many of them can have a job if they just have some personal 
attendant services to help them get going in the morning or help them 
at night, maybe help them on their job. As taxpayers we know this will 
cost us less money than institutionalizing people, and it will make 
their lives and our lives better.
  One final thought. As chairman of the Disability Policy Subcommittee, 
I brought the Americans with Disabilities Act to the floor in 1990. 
Right after it was passed, I spoke in sign language from this desk down 
here about what this would mean for people like my brother Frank who 
was deaf. So I will close my remarks today by using another sign. I 
will not speak at all in sign language, but I would like to close by 
saying that there is a wonderful sign--see, sign language is very 
expressive. There is a wonderful sign in sign language for ``America.'' 
I am going to teach it right now to Senators who are watching. The sign 
for ``America'' in sign language is where one puts all of their fingers 
together like this, intertwined, and makes a circle. That is the sign 
for America, all of the fingers intertwined, one family in a closed 
circle. It is a beautiful sign. It really expresses volumes about 
America.
  Fifteen years ago, not all of those fingers were there. People with 
disabilities were not part of that family. Now they are. So our family 
in America is more complete, the circle is more complete because of the 
Americans with Disabilities Act. For centuries they were excluded. 
People were excluded from our family. Now they are a part of our 
family, and it has made us a better, fairer, and richer country.
  So I hope all Senators will give a strong vote of approval to this 
resolution; one, to recognize the advances that we have made; second, 
to recommit ourselves to make sure that we will not go backward but 
that we will continue forward to even break down more barriers, to 
become even more inclusive, to make sure that every single person with 
a disability is a member of that American family.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
proceed to a vote on S. Res. 207. The question is on agreeing to the 
resolution.
  Mr. LEVIN. I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There is a sufficient second.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant Journal clerk called the roll.
  Mr. McCONNELL. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the 
Senator from Utah (Mr. Bennett), the Senator from Georgia (Mr. 
Chambliss), the Senator from Mississippi (Mr. Cochran), the Senator 
from Idaho (Mr. Craig), the Senator from Tennessee (Mr. Frist), the 
Senator from Arizona (Mr. Kyl), the Senator from Florida (Mr. 
Martinez), and the Senator from Pennsylvania (Mr. Santorum).
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from Indiana (Mr. Bayh), the 
Senator from Delaware (Mr. Biden), the Senator from New Jersey (Mr. 
Corzine), the Senator from Massachusetts (Mr. Kennedy), and the Senator 
from West Virginia (Mr. Rockefeller), are necessarily absent.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Cornyn). Is there any Senator in the 
Chamber desiring to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 87, nays 0, as follows:

                      [Rollcall Vote No. 201 Leg.]

                                YEAS--87

     Akaka
     Alexander
     Allard
     Allen
     Baucus
     Bingaman
     Bond
     Boxer
     Brownback
     Bunning
     Burns
     Burr
     Byrd
     Cantwell
     Carper
     Chafee
     Clinton
     Coburn
     Coleman
     Collins
     Conrad
     Cornyn
     Crapo
     Dayton
     DeMint
     DeWine
     Dodd
     Dole
     Domenici
     Dorgan
     Durbin
     Ensign
     Enzi
     Feingold
     Feinstein
     Graham
     Grassley
     Gregg
     Hagel
     Harkin
     Hatch
     Hutchison
     Inhofe
     Inouye
     Isakson
     Jeffords
     Johnson
     Kerry
     Kohl
     Landrieu
     Lautenberg
     Leahy
     Levin
     Lieberman
     Lincoln
     Lott
     Lugar
     McCain
     McConnell
     Mikulski
     Murkowski
     Murray
     Nelson (FL)
     Nelson (NE)
     Obama
     Pryor
     Reed
     Reid
     Roberts
     Salazar
     Sarbanes
     Schumer
     Sessions
     Shelby
     Smith
     Snowe
     Specter
     Stabenow
     Stevens
     Sununu
     Talent
     Thomas
     Thune
     Vitter
     Voinovich
     Warner
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--13

     Bayh
     Bennett
     Biden
     Chambliss
     Cochran
     Corzine
     Craig
     Frist
     Kennedy
     Kyl
     Martinez
     Rockefeller
     Santorum
  The resolution (S. Res. 207) was agreed to.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the preamble is 
agreed to and the motion to reconsider is laid upon the table.
  The resolution, with its preamble, reads as follows:

[[Page 17248]]



                              S. Res. 207

       Whereas July 26, 2005, marks the 15th anniversary of the 
     enactment of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990;
       Whereas prior to the passage of the Americans with 
     Disabilities Act, it was commonplace for individuals with 
     disabilities to experience discrimination in all aspects of 
     their everyday lives--in employment, housing, public 
     accommodations, education, transportation, communication, 
     recreation, voting, and access to public services;
       Whereas prior to the passage of the Americans with 
     Disabilities Act, individuals with disabilities often were 
     the subject of stereotypes and prejudices that did not 
     reflect their abilities, talents, and eagerness to fully 
     contribute to our society and economy;
       Whereas the dedicated efforts of disability rights 
     advocates, such as Justin Dart, Jr. and others too numerous 
     to mention, served to awaken Congress and the American people 
     to the discrimination and prejudice faced by individuals with 
     disabilities;
       Whereas Congress worked in a bipartisan manner to craft 
     legislation making such discrimination illegal and opening 
     doors of opportunity to individuals with disabilities;
       Whereas Congress passed the Americans with Disabilities Act 
     and President George Herbert Walker Bush signed the Act into 
     law on July 26, 1990;
       Whereas the Americans with Disabilities Act pledged to 
     fulfill the Nation's goals of equality of opportunity, 
     economic self-sufficiency, full participation, and 
     independent living for individuals with disabilities;
       Whereas the Americans with Disabilities Act prohibited 
     employers from discriminating against qualified individuals 
     with disabilities, required that State and local governmental 
     entities accommodate qualified individuals with disabilities, 
     encouraged places of public accommodation to take reasonable 
     steps to make their goods and services accessible to 
     individuals with disabilities, and required that new trains 
     and buses be accessible;
       Whereas since 1990, the Americans with Disabilities Act has 
     played an historic role in allowing some 54,000,000 Americans 
     with disabilities to participate more fully in our national 
     life by removing barriers in employment, transportation, 
     public services, telecommunications, and public 
     accommodations;
       Whereas accommodations such as curb cuts, ramps, accessible 
     trains and buses, accessible stadiums, accessible 
     telecommunications, and accessible Web sites have become 
     commonplace since passage of the Americans with Disabilities 
     Act, benefitting not only individuals with disabilities but 
     all Americans; and
       Whereas the Americans with Disabilities Act is our Nation's 
     landmark civil rights legislation for people with 
     disabilities: Now, therefore, be it
       Resolved, That the Senate--
       (1) recognizes and honors the 15th anniversary of the 
     enactment of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990;
       (2) salutes all people whose efforts contributed to the 
     enactment of such Act; and
       (3) encourages all Americans to celebrate the advance of 
     freedom and the opening of opportunity made possible by the 
     enactment of such Act.

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Virginia.

                          ____________________