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Chapter Four Groundbreaking Disability Rights Legislation: Section 504 ON OCTOBER 26, 1972, and again on March 27, 1973, President Nixon vetoed early versions of what ultimately became the Rehabilitation Act of 1973-induding Sections 50l-504-both times asserting that the legislation was too expensive. He also argued that the act "diverted the program from its vocational objective into medical and social welfare policies" and "added a variety of new categorical programs."! Throughout the country, disability activists protested these Nixon vetoes. In New York City, Judith E. Heumann and eighty allies organized a sit-in on Madison Avenue in October 1972, bringing traffic to a halt.2 At the annual meeting of the President's Committee on Employment of the Handicapped in May 1973, disability activists marched to-and rallied at-the Capitol demanding passage of the act.3 Following this demonstration, the participants took part in an all-night vigil in the rain at the Lincoln Memorial. A compromise between both houses of Congress and President Nixon resulted in a watered-down version of the proposed legislation, the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, that was signed into law on September 26,1973. While funding and programs in this enacted rehabilitation act were reduced from the original proposal, neither the disability activists, the legislators, nor the president, at the time ofthe act's passage, realized what had been wrought. Although disability rights actiVIsts strongly supported the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, they did not playa role in adding the inserted provisions, Sections 50l-504, that significantlyexpanded disabilityrights. Sections 501 and 503 bar employment discrimination because of disability and mandate the use of affirmative action programs to hire qualified people with disabilities . Section 50l applies to federal agencies while Section 503 applies to recipients of federal contracts. Section 502 created the Architectural and Transportation Barriers Compliance Board, now known as the Access Board, to enforce the Architectural Barriers Act of 1968, disseminate information concerning barriers, and provide technical assistance regarding their removal. Section 504, the provision with the most far-reaching repercussions, provided civil rights for people with disabilities in programs receiving federal financial assistance. 50 CHAPTER FOUR The Cherry lawsuit for the Section 504 Regulations As significant as this legislation was, however , its effectiveness would have been severely limited without implementing regulations . James 1. Cherry, plaintiff in the lawsuit that ultimately led to the issuing of regulations for Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of I973, asserted that without these regulations "disability rights would still be in the dark ages, and there would be no Americans with Disabilities Act."4 Steeped in the civil rights milieu ofHoward University Law School in I968, Cherry, a white student with a severe disability, recognized the connection between social accommodation denied because of race and physical accommodation denied because of disability. Although Cherry appreciated the reasons for the unswerving focus on the civil rights issues of African Americans by the Howard students, faculty, and administrators , he was disappointed that his access issues were not addressed by representatives of the university. For example, Cherry'S request for a parking space near the building where his classes were held and a key to the elevator was rejected by the law school administrators. When the Ninety-second Congress failed in I972 to add a disability provision to the I964 Civil Rights Act-despite the efforts ofSenators Hubert Humphrey and Charles Percy and Representative Charles VanikCherry was frustrated that he had no legal remedy for the discrimination he encountered . Some legislators and members of their staffs, however, conjectured that laws protecting the civil rights of people with disabilities could be tacked onto another federal law. Indeed, in From Goodwill to Civil Rights) Richard K. Scotch revealed that staff members of the Senate Committee on Labor and Public Welfare, in putting together the final draft of the Rehabilitation Act of I973, "adapted and inserted" the language ofTitle VI ofthe Civil Rights Act ofI964 at the very end of the bill.s When the bill was enacted, this provision became Section 504, the first federal civil rights law for people with disabilities. Almost immediately after passage of the Rehabilitation Act ofI973, Cherry began to write letters to the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) requesting the issuance of Section 504 regulations. Meeting with no success, he sought legal support, as well as the assistance ofdisability organizations and sympathetic legislators . When Representative Vanik also utged HEW to issue regulations for Section 504, the congressman, like Cherry, received "an unresponsive response"; in fact...

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