FROM MOUNTAIN MEDIA
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE DATED SEPT. 13, 1999
THE LIBERTARIAN, By Vin Suprynowicz
Is drunkenness a protected disability?
They actually toured the country a decade ago, visiting the editorial boards of major newspapers, lobbying for the Americans with Disabilities Act.
"This is a modest, sensible law," was the repeated message of these sympathetic delegates from the sundry lobbying groups for disabled Americans -- some of them visiting in wheelchairs, or displaying other physical impairments.
The proposed new law would require only "reasonable accommodation, such as building a wheelchair ramp to help handicapped customers get into your store," the proponents insisted. Those who complained the law might impose burdensome costs on small businesses -- or that its vague definition of "disability" might require employers to "accommodate" drunks or drug abusers, who could subsequently file suit under the statute's broad wording to keep their jobs -- were dismissed as ridiculous.
So, in 1990, with few objections, Congress duly enacted the ADA.
Today, The Associated Press reports, "A decade after its passage ... the scope of the federal law is still being deciphered."
For instance: Last Spring, Rickey Higgins, age 17 and a 5-foot-11 guard, helped lead his suburban Warren Township High School basketball team to second place in the Illinois state high school basketball tourney.
But then young Master Higgins was arrested on two alcohol-related charges, including driving into a tree while drunk, and was told his high school sports career was over.
Now, young Higgins is suing his school in federal court for $100,000 in damages and reinstatement to the team, arguing he is a recovering alcoholic, that alcoholism is a disability, and that dropping him from the team thus constitutes discrimination against a disabled American, as prohibited by the ADA.
Young Higgins, who led the team in scoring in its semifinal victory, has always dreamed of playing college basketball, and had counted on his senior year as an opportunity to showcase his talents to college scouts, he says.
Higgins -- whose father and grandfather are also alcoholics -- reported the drinking incidents to the school and took steps to correct the problem, says his lawyer, Steven Glink. Higgins' alcoholism was diagnosed by a doctor, a psychologist, and a social worker, Glink says. "This kid could not control his use of alcohol. Because he could not control it, it's a disability and he should not be punished for it."
Bennett Rodick, attorney for the high school, says the school will contest the suit. "The ADA cannot be used as a shield against the consequences of illegal conduct," attorney Rodick argues. "I think the school has a right to expect of its athletes or anyone involved in extracurricular activities that they don't engage in illegal conduct."
For the resolution of this case, we will have to stay tuned. Few would be so hard-hearted as to begrudge the lad a chance to ever play basketball again -- providing he's really dealing with his problem -- though the more sober-minded may rightly worry about the message sent to even younger kids, should the school's power to discipline such misbehavior (and even lawbreaking) be easily tossed aside.
But three things are for sure:
1) The Warren Township school district will spend thousands upn thousands of taxpayer dollars fighting this suit; 2) The school's authority to maintain discipline and sobriety among its young charges is already held up to doubt and ridicule; and 3) Those who warned that the definition of "disability" contained in this piece of feel-good legislation was irresponsibly broad, predicting that years and years and millions of dollars would be required before anyone could figure out what the darned thing actually meant -- while its eventual enforcement costs might prove astronomical -- were not "just being ridiculous."
Vin Suprynowicz is the assistant editorial page editor of the Las Vegas Review-Journal. His new book, "Send in the Waco Killers: Essays on the Freedom Movement, 1993-1998," is available at $21.95 plus $3 shipping ($6 UPS; $2 shipping each additional copy) through Mountain Media, P.O. Box 271122, Las Vegas, Nev. 89127. The 500-page trade paperback may also be ordered via web site http://www.thespiritof76.com/wacokillers.html, or at 1-800-244-2224. Credit cards accepted; volume discounts available.
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Vin Suprynowicz, vin@lvrj.com
"The evils of tyranny are rarely seen but by him who resists it." -- John Hay, 1872
"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed -- and thus clamorous to be led to safety -- by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary." -- H.L. Mencken
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