The Ability of Disability

So on we go

His welfare is of my concern

No burden is he to bear

We'll get there

For I know

He would not encumber me

He ain't heavy, he's my brother

~He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother
The Hollies

Disability law is a myriad of  intertwined pieces of legislation. I've talked about the Americans with Disabilities Act, but even before that landmark legislation was signed by President George H.W. Bush in 1990, there was The Rehabilitation Act of 1973.

I downloaded the Rehabilitation Act from the Internet. It was 39 pages, single spaced. I flipped to the very last page, the very last sentence, and there I found what I was looking for. Section 504. It reads:

No otherwise qualified handicapped individual in the United States, as defined in §7(6), shall, solely by reason of his handicap, be excluded from the participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.

The language of Section 504 was the same as a provision of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The only difference was that it covered disabilities instead of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. Although Congress previously had dealt with and dismissed the subject of civil rights for people with disabilities, it was added to this legislation almost as an afterthought, and it garnered little attention when it became law.

As the Rehabilitation Act was signed into law on September 26, 1973, there were many other issues on the radar. The Watergate scandal was heating up. The Vietnam War continued, even though the United States had pulled its troops out of Vietnam and North Vietnam had released U.S. Prisoners of War. There was unrest in the Middle East. The United States was in the midst of the Cold War with the Soviet Union.

With so much happening in the country and in the world, perhaps it's no surprise that President Nixon signed the Act into law without realizing that it wasn't just a funding bill. Even disability activists thought it was a funding bill. No one debated Section 504 before it was enacted, because few people knew it was even there.

Section 504 didn't go unnoticed for long, however. The Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) estimated that compliance with Section 504 could cost billions of dollars. The Ford Administration avoided implementation of the provision. They stalled the issuance of final regulations until it became the Carter Administration's problem. They also claimed that Section 504 was a "policy statement" that did not require implementation.

By the time Jimmy Carter became President, the patience of disability activists was wearing thin. Carter's Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, Joseph Califano, assigned a group of lawyers to rewrite regulations for Section 504. It was a half-hearted effort because, like his predecessor, Califano was not sold on the idea that people with disabilities had civil rights. 

Disability activists were not willing to let Califano off the hook. Demonstrations were held at the HEW office in San Francisco and at the HEW headquarters in Washington, DC. Protesters held a candlelight vigil at Califano's house. The Carter Administration became concerned that if the demonstrations continued, they would face the embarrassment of arresting "the deaf, the blind, and the crippled." Ultimately, to avoid that embarrassment, Califano gave in to the protesters and signed the regulations that had been drafted by the previous administrations.

Finalizing the regulations did not mark the end of the controversy. There was backlash when people discovered that nondiscrimination policies cost money. The Reagan Administration put Vice President Bush in charge of a task force to reduce regulatory burden. (As I mentioned at the beginning of this discussion, it was Bush who later signed the Americans with Disabilities Act into law). Among the regulations identified as burdensome on businesses were the 504 regulations. In response, disability activists remobilized and, although the Administration did manage to water down the regulations, it dropped its attempts to "de-regulate" civil rights for people with disabilities in 1984.

For more on the history of Section 504, albeit from a somewhat biased standpoint, see Signing the Section 504 rules: More to the story.

What Does Section 504 Do?

I've mentioned before that sometimes the U.S. government enacts legislation withholding funding to get states and local governments to do what they want them to do. Examples of this include withholding highway funds from states that didn't set their speed limit at 55 or their drinking age at 21. 

Section 504 essentially says that any program or activity that receives money from the federal government cannot discriminate against a person with a disability. If you're wondering about how the term, "handicapped individual" is defined, wonder no more--in subsection 6 of section 7 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, a "handicapped individual" means any individual who (A) has a physical or mental disability which for such individual constitutes or results in a substantial handicap to employment and (B) can reasonably be expected to benefit in terms of employability from vocational rehabilitation services. Clear as mud, right? Luckily, the Americans with Disability Act more clearly explains what constitutes a disability.

Federal Regulations

More than 40 years after enactment of Section 504, nearly every federal agency has its own set of section 504 regulations that apply to its own programs. Agencies that provide federal financial assistance also have Section 504 regulations that apply to entities receiving financial aid.

The Department of Health, Education and Welfare became the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) after the Department of Education was created. On its website, HHS provides a Fact Sheet outlining its Section 504 regulations. The agency works to make sure that doctor’s offices, clinics and medical equipment are accessible to people with disabilities.

The Department of Education makes sure that student with disabilities get the kinds of educational services they need to succeed in school. Teachers and parents of students with special needs probably are familiar with the term "504 plan." For more information, see Protecting Students With Disabilities.

You can also check out the Department of Labor and the Federal Highway Administration to see their 504 regulations. And, to see just how far Section 504 and the ADA reach, check out Federal ADA and Disability Resources.