This post was written by Thomas DeShong, processing archivist at the BCPM
President George H. W. Bush signs the ADA into law in 1990; pictured at right is Justin Dart.
Disabilities Pride Month is celebrated each July to commemorate the signing of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA). This law prohibits discrimination based on disability.
Marvin Leath, who represented Waco in 1990, was a key proponent of the ADA. He received constituent correspondence for and against the bill. In one letter, Justin Dart, Chair of the Task Force on the Rights and Empowerment of Americans with Disabilities, warned Leath that “the eyes of Jefferson, Lincoln, and Martin Luther King are upon us” and likened the ADA to the Declaration of Independence. Dart contracted polio in 1948 and was given days to live. He is pictured to the right of President Bush on the day the ADA was signed into law, 42 years later.
In another letter posted after the passage of the ADA, the Consortium for Citizens with Disabilties thanked Rep. Leath for his leadership. “The ADA truly is the 20th century equivalent of the Emancipation Proclamation, for it will set free the full talents, ability, daring, creativity and humanity of an estimated 43 million Americans who have some type of disability.” Both letters underscored the ADA’s significance in US history, securing the rights of people with disabilities.
[Correspondence and pamphlet from Marvin Leath papers, Box 380, Folders 7-8]
[Photo courtesy of http://www.whitehousehistory.org/whha_pictures/presidentshouse_bush-06.html, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=16667503