ADA Policy Brief Series #2: A Carefully Constructed Law

October 30, 2002

SCOPE AND PURPOSE:

This paper is part of a series of policy briefs analyzing and responding to certain problematic aspects of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) decisions of the U.S. Supreme Court. An underlying element of such decisions has been the Court’s treatment of the ADA as if Congress did not draft the Act carefully and with precision. In fact, the supposed uncertainties and ambiguities that the Court has perceived in the ADA are primarily the product of an abrupt change in the Court’s approach to such legislation, and not to any inexactness in the statute.