Building a Diverse Customer Base

Building a Diverse Customer Base
The Americans with Disabilities Act	The Americans with Disabilities Act
Comprehensive Civil Rights Legislation
The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was signed into law
on July 26, 1990, by President George H.W. Bush. While some
businesses may think of the ADA as merely a building code
or an employment law, the ADA is, in fact, one of America’s
most comprehensive pieces of civil rights legislation. The ADA
bases much of its structure and enforcement remedies and
procedures on the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
Nondiscrimination in Public Accommodations
Title III of the ADA extends to people with disabilities the same
protections that Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 extends
to people discriminated against on the basis of race, color,
religion, or national origin. Both laws guarantee the right to
“…full enjoyment of the goods, services, facilities,
privileges, advantages or accommodations of any place of
public accommodation...” The ADA not only covers the same
public accommodations as the Civil Rights Act, such as hotels,
restaurants, theaters, stadiums, and gas stations, but also
an expanded range of others, including retail stores, private
schools, and doctors’ offi ces.
Rights in Everyday Life
In everyday commerce, then, the ADA and the 1964 Civil Rights
Act enable Americans to participate without discrimination in
typical daily activities that include going to the movies, traveling
and staying in hotels, eating out in restaurants, and attending
museums, concerts, and sporting events.
“It took the Civil
Rights Act of 1964
and subsequent
statutes to make
plain this nation’s
opposition to
racism, sexism and
discrimination based
on a person’s age. It
will take the
Americans with
Disabilities Act to set
the record straight as
to where we stand on
discrimination based
on disability.”
Senator Lowell
Weicker, Jr.
Joint Congressional
Hearing on the ADA
September 27, 1988
U.S. Department of Justice
Civil Rights Division
Disability Rights Section
Expanding	Expanding	Expanding
Your Market
The ADA protects the civil rights of people with
disabilities and helps businesses develop a diverse
customer base from a market of more than 50 million
Americans.

The Look of Disability Discrimination
Discrimination against people with disabilities can take many different forms.
Under the ADA, civil rights violations may look like this:
• Restaurant staff refuses to seat a family with a daughter who has cerebral
palsy because they say she will make other diners uncomfortable.
• A taxi driver slows to pick up three riders until he sees that one of them
uses a service animal. The driver swerves and speeds away.
• A trendy new clothes shop is built with steps to its only entrance, the
equivalent of a sign telling people who use wheelchairs that they are not
welcomed.
• A hospital refuses to provide a sign language interpreter when one of its
physicians is ready to explain upcoming surgery to a deaf patient who uses
sign language.
• A museum’s information desk staff tells a father who is blind that he cannot
join a walk-in tour with his two sons. Instead, he must take a separate tour
for blind people, which requires making reservations two weeks in advance.
The ADA’s Benefi ts to Businesses
It is clearly in the interest of businesses to make their facilities and services
accessible to customers with disabilities. According to the U.S. Census
Bureau’s 2002 Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP), there
are 51.2 million Americans with disabilities in the United States. The U.S.
Department of Labor states that people with disabilities have $175 billion
annually in discretionary spending power.
People with disabilities are of all ages, are members of all racial, ethnic,
and cultural groups, and live in communities large and small throughout the
country. According to the SIPP, 19.8% of Black Americans reported that they
have disabilities while 19.0% of Whites, 13.8% of Hispanics/Latinos, and
11.5% of Asian/Pacific Islanders self-identified as having disabilities. The
ADA protects the civil rights of all Americans.
For more information about the ADA and business, visit the Department of Justice
ADA Business Connection at www.ada.gov. 	Or, call the toll-free ADA Informa-
tion Line: 800-514-0301 (voice) • 800-514-0383 (TTY)
June 2006 	Duplication of this document is encouraged.

The Americans with Disabilities Act authorizes the Department of Justice (the Department) to
provide technical assistance to individuals and entities that have rights or responsibilities under the
Act. This document provides informal guidance to assist you in understanding the ADA and the
Department's regulations.
This guidance document is not intended to be a final agency action, has no legally binding effect,
and may be rescinded or modified in the Department’s complete discretion, in accordance with
applicable laws. The Department’s guidance documents, including this guidance, do not establish
legally enforceable responsibilities beyond what is required by the terms of the applicable statutes,
regulations, or binding judicial precedent.