Justices Limit Scope of Disabilities Act

More of this Feature • 1: Justice Limit ADA    Join the Discussion "We need to contact our representatives and other people of influence -- like President George Bush, whose father was instrumental in putting the ADA on the books -- and urge them to support (and preserve!) the rights guaranteed by the ADA." AB_DISBLTY "Is the ADA in danger?" AB-DISBLTY     Related Resources • Police Can Enter Suspects Home • New Freedom Initiative • Job Hunting Help for the Disabled • Supreme Court Tests the ADA • Disabled Access to Voting • Sources of Govt. Aid    From Other Guides • Court Rejects Garrett • Federal Resources for the Disabled • Disability Issues News • ADA Regional Contacts • ADA in non-legalese • Help the Justices Decide    Elsewhere on the Web • Justice Department - ADA Home Page • Text of ADA • Supreme Court • Complete Decision (PDF)

Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist, in writing the court's majority opinion states, "We decide here whether employees of the state of Alabama may recover money damages by reason of the state's failure to comply with the (employment discrimination) provisions of Title 1 of the Americans With Disabilities Act. We hold that such suits are barred by the 11th Amendment."

Rhenquist was joined in the majority by Justices Sandra Day O'Connor, Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy and Clarence Thomas. 

Dissenting were Justices John Paul Stevens, David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen G. Breyer.

"The court ... improperly invades a power that the Constitution assigns to Congress," wrote Justice Breyer in the dissent.

Breyer's dissent also stated that some 300 cases of workplace discrimination by state governments had been identified by Congress. "Congress expressly found substantial unjustified discrimination against persons with disabilities," he wrote.

This decision comes only days after President Bush issued his New Freedom Initiative asking Congress to make sweeping changes to the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) designed to improve educational, employment and social opportunities for over 54 million disabled Americans.

• Read the court's decision
  Complete text of this decision from the Supreme Court Web site. (In pdf format. You'll need the free Adobe pdf file reader. Get it here.)