This message is from Ellen Pinnes and The Disability Coalition.
Last week marked the 27th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in the Olmstead case, which held that the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act require that individuals with disabilities be served in the community and not hidden away in institutions, whenever their needs can be met in the community and that is their choice. The White House celebrated the anniversary by requesting – and getting – a memorandum from the Department of Justice (DOJ) that argues that the Olmstead decision was wrong and that there is no such legal right.
The memo, from DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC), claims that people with disabilities don’t have a right to live integrated lives in their communities and that they can therefore be separated from the community and forced into institutional settings. Olmstead recognized – and courts across the country have continued to rule – that segregation of people with disabilities is discrimination. The OLC memo is contrary to this long-established rule.
The OLC memo is a dangerous development in the ongoing battle to ensure that people with disabilities have the choice to live independently and participate equally in community life. But it’s important to recognize what the memo does NOT do.
- It doesn’t overrule the Supreme Court’s Olmstead decision or those of the many other courts that have recognized the right of people with disabilities to live in the most integrated setting possible.
- It doesn’t change or repeal the ADA or Section 504.
- It doesn’t change the legal rule that unjustified institutionalization of individuals with disabilities is discrimination.
However, that doesn’t mean the OLC memo can just be dismissed or ignored. It sends a strong and very disturbing signal that the federal government now wants to undermine – and even do away with – the requirement to serve people with disabilities in integrated settings. Going forward, that could show up in a number of dangerous ways, including possibly:
- Withdrawing regulations under the ADA and Section 504 that implement the integration mandate. (The memo actually encourages the White House to do this.)
- Refusing to enforce the laws, which would permit states to force people with disabilities into institutional care.
- Supporting a legal challenge to the integration mandate that was brought by a group of state attorneys general and is currently pending in federal court.
- Trying to get the Supreme Court to overturn its Olmstead decision and return the country to old, discredited practices of isolating people with disabilities away from their communities.
Although the OLC memo has no legal force, it could be used to justify segregation and exclusion of people with disabilities. That could apply in the realms of education and employment as well as residential settings – and to the civil rights of persons with disabilities across the board. It could be used to encourage states to view disability services through a lens of “what’s the least we can get away with?” instead of “how can we promote integrated and independent lives for people with disabilities?”
If you’re concerned about this, you can contact your elected representatives and tell them you’re worried and you want them to make sure the OLC memo isn’t used to undermine the rights of people with disabilities. Here’s contact information for New Mexico’s senators and representatives in Congress as well as our own New Mexico Legislature:
Senator Martin Heinrich
https://www.heinrich.senate.gov
Senator Ben Ray Lujan
Congresswoman Melanie Stansbury
Representative Gabe Vasquez
Representative Teresa Leger Fernandez
Each congressional website gives addresses and phone numbers for the senator’s or representative’s Washington, D.C. office and district offices in New Mexico. You can also send them a message through their website.
To find contact information for your senator and representative in the New Mexico Legislature, go to the legislative website at nmlegis.gov and click on “Legislators” at the top of the page, then on “House” or “Senate” in the drop-down menu. If you don’t know who your senator and representative are, click on “Find My Legislator” in that menu.
You can also contact New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham (her website is www.governor.nm.state.us) and Attorney General Raúl Torrez (www.nmdoj.gov) and let them know you want New Mexico to stand strong in support of the rights of people with disabilities to live independent lives in their communities.
The OLC memo is quite long, but if you’d like to read it, you can find it on the DOJ website here: https://www.justice.gov/olc/opinion/application-rehabilitation-act-and-americans-disabilities-act-state.
Thanks for making the voice of the disability community heard!
* * * * * * *
The Disability Coalition is funded in part by the New Mexico Developmental Disabilities Council through Federal Program funding.
Additional funding is provided by The Arc of New Mexico, Disability Rights New Mexico, the Independent Living Resource Center,
and New Vistas.
Recent Comments