Why courts cannot deny ADA protection to plaintiffs who do not use available mitigating measures for their impairments

Congress intended the Americans with Disabilities Act ("ADA") to provide strong standards for addressing and eliminating discrimination against individuals with disabilities. Many commentators have concluded, however, that the federal courts are undermining the goals of the ADA by too narrowly construing membership in the statute's protected class. One example of this trend is courts' hostile treatment of ADA plaintiffs who do not use medications or devices that might alleviate their impairments ("nonmitigating plaintiffs"). Numerous district and appellate decisions have held or suggested that nonmitigating plaintiffs are not protected by the ADA. In addition, some commentators have proposed that courts should evaluate the reasonableness of a plaintiff's decision not to use mitigating measures; they argues that it is unfair to burden an employer with the cost of accommodating a disability that continues to exist only because an employee unreasonably refuses to mitigate it. Contrary to the views of these courts and commentators, however, this Comment will show that nonmitigating plaintiffs are entitled to ADA protection from employment discrimination. It argues that the statute's language, history, and structure, as well as Supreme Court precedent, demonstrate that courts cannot deny ADA protection based on a plaintiff's nonuse of available mitigating measures. It also presents several considerations that weigh against any future congressional enactment that would tie ADA protection to the reasonableness of a plaintiff's decision not to mitigate an impairment.     

Short versus Long Coalitions: Electoral Accountability and the Size of the Public Sector

This article examines the policy consequences of the number of parties in government. We argue that parties externalize costs not borne by their support groups. Larger parties thus internalize more costs than small parties because they represent more groups. This argument implies that the public sector should be larger the more parties there are in the government coalition. We test this prediction using yearly time-series cross-sectional data from 1970 to 1998 in 17 European countries. We find that increasing the number of parties in government increases the fraction of GDP accounted for by government spending by close to half a percentage point, or more than one billion current dollars in the typical year. We find little support for the alternative claim that the number of legislative parties affects the size of the public sector, except via the number of parties in government .     

‘Politics’ and Academic Feminist Theorising: Reflections on Women's Studies in Asia

When invited by the organisers of the Asia-Pacific Non-governmental Organisation (NGO) Beijing+10 Forum to make a brief presentation on the question of academic feminists and the de-politicisation of feminist theorising, I asked myself: What politics? What feminist theorising? Then I remembered how close the links were between the history of feminism in academe—particularly in the form of Women's Studies—and the women's movement.2 Vina Mazumdar, ‘Whose Past, Whose History, Whose Tradition? Indigenising Women's Studies in India’, paper prepared for the International Conference on Women's Studies in Asia, Seoul, 18–21 October 2000 published in Asian Journal of Women's Studies, vol. 7, no. 1, 2001, pp. 133–53; Carol Sobritchea, ‘Imaging the Future of Asian Women's Studies and Feminist Scholarship’, paper prepared for the International Conference on Women's Studies in Asia, Seoul, 18–21 October 2000; and Tita Marlita and E. Kristi Poerwandari, ‘Indonesian Women's Movement throughout History: 1928–1965’, paper prepared for the International Conference on Women's Studies in Asia, Seoul, 18–21 October 2000, are recent narratives of the development of Women's Studies and its ties to the women's movement in India, the Philippines, and Indonesia, respectively. View all notes Ah, that politics!     

Suicide in children and adolescents: a 10-year retrospective review

Suicide is second only to accidents as the most common cause of death for children and adolescents age 10 to 19 in Canada. All of the pediatric cases that were referred to the Hamilton Regional Forensic Pathology Unit from 1993 to 2002 were reviewed. For the purpose of this study, pediatric deaths were defined as deaths in the age group of 1 day up to and including 19 years of age. Specific criteria for suicide were applied to each case, independent of the manner of death issued by the coroner. The criteria were 3-fold. First, homicide had to be ruled out by the police investigation and autopsy findings. Second, the method had to be consistent with self-infliction. Finally, there had to be some evidence of suicidal intent. Questionable cases were discussed among the authors, and if reasonable intent could not be established, then the case was excluded. The autopsy and police reports were examined in detail regarding age, sex, location and method of suicide, presence of suicide notes, and any contributing psychologic factors or stressors. Of the 501 pediatric autopsies performed during the 10-year period, 31 (6%) met the criteria of suicide. The majority of cases (87%) were in older adolescents (age 15 to 19), and the male to female ratio was 2.4:1. Psychologic factors were identified in some of the cases, including depressed mood (77%), suicidal ideation (45%), previous suicide attempts (23%), and drug or alcohol problems (19%). Most of the suicides (61%) occurred in the victim's home, and 12 (39%) cases left a suicide note. In 9 cases (29%), alcohol or street drugs were detected postmortem, though in 8 cases toxicology was not performed. Hanging (48%) was the most common method of suicide, followed by firearms (13%), poisoning (10%), drowning (10%), and blunt force vehicular trauma (10%). Almost 60% of the male suicides were by hanging. No specific trend was identified in the 9 female suicides. These results were compared with similar studies within Canada and other countries. Overall, the method of suicide is dictated by what is convenient and readily available, though the acceptance of various suicide methods can change over time. Suicide prevention efforts should be tailored to address local trends.     

Extra Effort During Memory Retrieval May Be Associated with Increases in Eyewitness Confidence

When testifying in court, witnesses are motivated to try as hard as possible to give an accurate account. This study tested the proposition that extra effort by eyewitnesses during a memory test can lead to higher confidence ratings without any accompanying changes in accuracy. Participant-witnesses answered multiple-choice questions about a classroom visitor who had spoken 5 days earlier. In the high-motivation condition participants could earn prizes based on their memory test performance; in the low-motivation condition there were no special incentives. Although the motivation manipulation did not affect mean witness confidence, the confidence–accuracy and effort–accuracy correlations were substantially smaller in the high-motivation condition than in the low-motivation condition. Furthermore, the confidence ratings for those participants who reported expending high levels of effort in both motivation conditions were significantly higher than the confidence ratings for the low-effort participants, despite the fact that response accuracy did not differ as a function of reported effort. These findings have important implications for understanding how pressures to perform well in the courtroom can affect eyewitness confidence.     

Government Hedging: Motivation, Implementation, and Evaluation

This article examines option hedging strategies that enable politicians to manage budgetary risk. While the theoretical risk management arguments are general, the simulation analysis considers the example of oil revenue risk in Texas, and estimates the costs and benefits of an option hedging program. To evaluate government option hedging strategies, the study develops a hedge quotient measure that compares the future value of realized revenues plus net option proceeds to the future value of expected revenue. The average hedge quotient is found to be lower for the option hedging strategy than for the unhedged position, illustrating the cost of an option hedging program. Nevertheless, option hedging effectively manages extreme downside risk and stops large budget deficits from occurring. Politicians may also like option hedging because it preserves the potential of realizing budget surpluses.