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Impairment As Protected Status: A New Universality For Disability Rights, Michelle A. Travis

Georgia Law Review

This Article analyzes the fundamental change to federal
civil rights law that Congress accomplished through the
ADA Amendments Act of 2008 (the ADAAA). Congress
enacted the ADAAA in response to a series of United States
Supreme Court opinions that had narrowly interpreted the
definition of disability in the Americans with Disabilities
Act of 1990. Although many commentators have
recognized the ADAAA's intent to restore the class of
individuals with disabilities to the breadth that Congress
originally intended, this Article argues that the ADAAA
accomplished something more significant: it extricated
disability from the broader concept of impairment. As a
result, the …