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Abstract:
The key to understanding the ADA Amendments Act of 2008 ("ADAAA") is that it was passed to address two issues. The first issue is that the ADA's definition of disability, as interpreted by the Supreme Court, proved to be under-inclusive. The second issue is the preoccupation in ADA litigation with whether the plaintiff-employee is disabled, to the exclusion of whether the defendant-employer engaged in discriminatory conduct. The two issues are related: ADA plaintiffs rarely have the merits of their cases heard because employers often obtain summary judgment on the issue of whether the employee is disabled. To fix this procedural problem, Congress could have amended the ADA to mirror Title VII by altogether eliminating the threshold requirement of proving disability. Congress did not make this change. Consequently the ADAAA, like the original ADA, faces a procedural problem: in ADA litigation the determination of disability must be made prior to reaching the issue of employer compliance. What is the ADAAA's solution to this procedural problem? It is to enfeeble the ADA's definition of "disability" so that it rarely prevents reaching the merits of disability discrimination claims. After the ADAAA, the requirement that an employee prove existence disability will be nearly straw. The jurisprudential and law practice-related consequences of this solution are the subject of this article.
ADA, ADAAA, ADA Amendments Act, accomodation, civil rights, disability, disabled, discrimination, employment
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