The American with Disabilities Act is the world’s first comprehensive civil rights law for people with disabilities. The purpose of the law is to ensure that people with disabilities have the same rights and opportunities as everyone else.
At the signing ceremony, President Bush said, “Our success with this act proves that we are keeping faith with the spirit of our courageous forefathers who wrote in the Declaration of Independence: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.’ These words have been our guide for more than two centuries as we’ve labored to form our more perfect union. . . . But the stark fact remained that people with disabilities were still victims of segregation and discrimination, and this was intolerable. Today’s legislation brings us closer to that day when no Americans will ever again be deprived of their basic guarantee of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
The Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 is a part of America’s 100 Docs, an initiative of the National Archives Foundation in partnership with More Perfect that invites the American public to vote on 100 notable documents from the holdings of the National Archives. Visit 100docs.vote today.
