Congressman Tony Coelho talks about his life with a disability, his journey of working for the People, and how he introduced the ADA.
Thanks to Gatsby for being a sponsor of the show. Gatsby is a modern website framework that builds performance into every website by leveraging the latest web technologies. Create blazing fast, compelling apps and websites without needing to become a performance expert.
Make sure you have a look at their site: https://www.gatsbyjs.org
Transcript
Nic:
Welcome to the Accessibility Rules podcast. This is episode 92. I’m Nic Steenhout and I talk with people involved in one way or another with web accessibility. If you’re interested in accessibility, hey this show’s for you. To get today’s transcript, head out to the podcast website, https://a11yrules.com. Thanks to Gatsby for sponsoring this episode. Gatsby is a modern website framework that builds performance into every website by leveraging the latest web technologies. Create blazing fast, compelling apps and websites without needing to become a performance expert. This week I’m speaking to Tony Coelho. Hey Tony, thanks for joining me for this conversation around accessibility. How are you?
Tony:
No problem. Look forward to talking.
Nic:
So I like to let guests introduce themselves. Brief intro, who would you say is Tony Coelho?
Tony:
Well, I’m a former member of Congress and for this podcast I was the author of the ADA, Americans with Disabilities Act, when I was in the Congress. Disability is my ministry and my passion.
Nic:
That’s wonderful. So, that’s big actually, the ADA. I’m Canadian, but I moved to the US in the mid nineties and I started working in Disability Rights at the time and everybody was really excited about all the changes. Obviously, I’d like to ask you how did that happen? How did you come to author and sponsor the ADA?
Tony:
I’ll have to give you a little bit of my background in order to do it. But when I was 16, I was on Canal Bank in Central California. My parents’ dairy farm, and the pick up tipped over into the canal, hit my head, came out of it, had a headache, but was safe and went back to milking cows and doing what you do. And a year later, I was in the barn milking, and next thing I knew I was in bed and I had just gone through a major passing out spell as I called it. And the doctor was called in and called my parents and I think what it was that but my parents didn’t tell me, and I didn’t know what the doctor had said.
Tony:
So, I then went to other doctors and basically again, in those days, I’m 77 so, in those days doctors didn’t talk to the patient, they talked to whoever else was in the room, I guess. But they didn’t know what it was. My parents told me that it was a lack of calcium. It was this, it was that, and so forth. So then, after that I then went to witch doctors, and the reason is, is that the doctors were telling my parents that I had epilepsy and in their culture, Portuguese culture, if you have epilepsy, it means that you’re possessed by the devil. And something that was preached by the Catholic church.
Tony:
So, I then started going to witch doctors and after the third one I decided that I wasn’t going there anymore. I told my parents I would not go there anymore. So, I continued having these passing out spells, not knowing that it was epilepsy. And then, when I graduated from high school, I went to college in Los Angeles, Loyola University, now Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. And I continued having my passing out spells and I was active in student government and so forth, and got good grades.
Tony:
And when I decided to … what I was studying for, was to become a lawyer. And I decided in my senior year that I didn’t want to because John Kennedy had just been assassinated and I decided, I was very impressed with him and followed him. And so when that happened, I decided I wanted to do something more public service. And so, I thought about it a lot, decided to become a Catholic priest. And as I always say to the shock of my girlfriend of several years and my fraternity brothers, and so forth, I decided to become a priest. It was announced and so forth.
Tony:
And after I graduated, I went to take my physical, the doctor said, “I have some good news and bad news. The good news is that your 4-F, and that the term in regards to qualifications to serve in the military, and 4-F meant you are not qualified. And the reason is, is because you have epilepsy. And he asked me if I knew what that was and I didn’t, and he told me about it. He said, “The bad news is, that you cannot become a Catholic priest because Canon Law in 400 AD, said that if you have epilepsy, you’re possessed by the devil, you can’t be a priest.
Tony:
So, I was denied entry into the seminary. I didn’t worry about it at that particular time. I was excited that I knew what my problem was. He prescribed a prescription for me to reduce the severity of the seizures and not to cure, obviously, but to reduce the severity of a man and the amount to them. And that made me happy. And when I left, I called my parents to say that I had some good news and I said, doctor determined that I have epilepsy.
Tony:
And my mother said, “No son of ours has epilepsy.” And that sort of ended our relationship there. And I just took it well that’s the way it is. And then, because I was student by president, outstanding senior and so forth, I’d gotten a lot of job offers. And so, I started applying them, going after these offers and I would fill out the application and I never got a call. And I realized that on every job application was the word epilepsy. And I checked the box, I wasn’t going to lie, and I never got an interview.
Tony:
So, I realized then that that was the problem. So I started drinking, I was a drunk by two o’clock in the afternoon most days, and then I became suicidal. And because I thought that everything I’d ever loved in my life turned against me, my parents, my church, God, so forth. And so, I was basically given up. And so, on the day that I used to go out and drink on a mountain in Griffith park, there are no mountains, but if you’re drunk, there are a lot of mountains.
Tony:
And so, I would drink on top of this hill and I decided to do the dirty deed that day. And as I was about to, I had heard a voice and instead, you’re going to be just like those little kids, in the bottom of the hill, there was a merry-go-around. And you’re going to be just like those little kids, and you’re not going to let anybody or anything stop you from doing what you want to do. And that jolted me and I have never gotten depressed again.
Tony:
I drink, but I didn’t get drunk. I believe that there was something there. A week later, I had an opportunity to live with Bob Hope and his family for a year and I did so. And he basically talked to me about my future and so forth. And one day he said, “Look kid, you think that a ministry is only practiced in a church. A true ministry is practiced in sports, in entertainment, in business, in government. Where you want, is in politics and that’s what you ought to pursue.
Tony:
So I thought about that and decided that was an interesting concept. And I wrote a letter to a Congressman who I didn’t know and he happened to be looking for somebody young that had an agricultural background, and that was not a strong left or strong right politically, and I interviewed, got the job, moved back to Washington and worked for my Congressman for 13 years, became his chief of staff. And when he decided to retire, he asked me to take his place and I ran and won.
Nic:
Wonderful.
Tony:
And during the campaign when I ran, one of my opponent towards the end of the campaign said to a group at dinner that, “I don’t know if you know it or not, but Tony’s a very sick man. He has epilepsy. What would you think if he went to The White House and had a seizure?” Some reporters heard about that. Several people at the dinner called me, Porter called and said, “I understand your opponent said X last night. What’s your reaction?” My first reaction was, “Well, in the 13 years that I was in Washington, I knew a lot of people who went to the White House and had fits.” At least, I’d have an excuse and that ended it.
Tony:
Nobody’s ever took my epilepsy against me again. I wrote a letter, got the job, I then got elected to Congress. And when I got elected, I decided that I wanted to be involved in disability issues. And so I had my boss, he had helped me connect with a lot of different people. And so, when I started offering these amendments, I realized that it didn’t do me any good to offer them, because we didn’t have our basic civil rights, that if you were sight-impaired and you went to a restaurant and asked someone to tell you what was on the menu, they could kick you out because you were nuisance.
Tony:
If you went to a movie theater, wanted to go to a movie theater, they could kick you out if you were in a chair because you were a fire hazard. If you went to get a job, the employer could ask you if you had a disability and say to you, “Because of your disability, you’re not qualified.” So, all those things were going on. And I realized that our basic civil rights is what I needed to be pursuing. So that’s why I had worked on, and developed a bill.
Tony:
Now, grassroots community in the United States had been working on legislation and President Reagan, his administration, had a group that they were working on a legislation. And so, I put in legislation and it was interesting when I put it in, I sent a dear colleague letter to all my colleagues, Democrats and Republicans, and told them I was putting in this bill and why, and asked for people to co-sponsor it. And people would come up to me, they were Democrats, Republicans, Liberals, Conservatives, men, women.
Tony:
They would say, “I don’t like the way my brother, my sister, my aunt, my uncle, my father, my wife, whatever, is being treated because of their disability, and I want to be on your bill. And I got a lot of people on my bill because of that. And then we moved forward from there. But that’s the reason I got engaged. And so, I sort of believe that, that was one of my destinies to be able to get elected-
Nic:
That’s a wonderful story Tony. Thank you for sharing that. Obviously, my podcast is generally more focused on web accessibility, but I think I’ll put for the purpose of this discussion, I want to expand it a little bit more to accessibility in general because it’s such an important topic and obviously it’s where you got started. Now, everybody I speak to has a different definition of accessibility. How would you define what accessibility is?
Tony:
Well, we’ve adopted a definition in the United States, and that’s something where it’s something that impairs your ability to function. And so it can be mental, it can be physical, it can be whatever. And the language in the legislation that was adopted, when it got signed into law, Supreme Court after some challenges to it looked at the ADA, and said that they felt it was only meant for people with physical disabilities.
Tony:
And so they kicked out the rest of us, and I helped write it. And so, I felt that they were telling me I didn’t know what I was doing, because I excluded people with epilepsy and other disabilities. And so, what we did then is that we put in a bill, I was out of Congress, but I got a bill introduced to dealing with the other disabilities and it’s called the ADA Amendments Act.
Tony:
And so, that was introduced. And so, it was basically to reverse the Supreme Court decision. And so, we got it introduced, passed it very quickly and by big support in both the house and Senate, Democrats and Republicans, and we got it through. And now, the ADA has amended, covers all disabilities.
Nic:
One of the things that has been making a lot of noise in the last year or so is all these lawsuits against websites that are not accessible. And you probably have heard of the Domino case that went to the Supreme court recently. And it seems like all these businesses are saying, well we don’t have to be delivering accessible website because the ADA does not specifically mention the web. So, of course you know when you folks wrote that the internet was really not something that was really a thing yet, but now it’s everywhere. As the author of the ADA had the situation been different had the internet been around? Would you have included that in the text of the ADA?
Tony:
Of course. But we also felt and the Supreme court basically agreed that the intent of the legislation was to include all accessibility so that you know, I take the view that the internet is the major highway for communications. Right? And so that if you develop a new highway or a new system, that would be covered because the ADA originally said access period. And so the lower courts ruled in favor of the ADA and the Supreme court did not accept Domino’s requests for them to review it.
Tony:
So, basically the Supreme court is supporting my view that the ADA did cover the internet. And so that’s where we are now. And so the compliance then is that everybody with a website needs to make sure that it’s accessible, if they are dealing with the general public. If they’re dealing privately, they don’t have to of course. But if they deal with commerce in any way, it has to be accessible.
Nic:
I think that, that was great that the Supreme court came and said, “Hey, no it does apply and go back to be real and work on accessibility.”
Tony:
Nic, in fairness, I’m sure that somebody else will come up and try to say something different, and they’ll go through the court system end up in Supreme court. But I hope that basically as a result of this decision it will discourage people to do so. And the lower courts will refer to this Supreme court decision and reject the application, I think.
Nic:
That’s my hope as well because it’s … as both an accessibility consultant and a person with disability myself, I’m tired of having to do that fight. And you know, hearing you talk about all the discrimination you faced in employment and everywhere else, it just gets tiring. So hopefully this decision will have a really positive impact, at least in the next few years.
Tony:
Yeah, and I think, Nick, the issue is that those of us, you and I, and others in the disability community, all we want is the same thing that everybody else has. We don’t want anything more. We don’t want anything less. We want to be able to access the internet just like anybody else. And the great thing is that … like, I’m on the board of AudioEye that provides access for any disability in any language and so forth.
Tony:
And that’s what it’s all about. It’s that these businesses have no excuse not to provide accessibility because of folks like AudioEye that provide that ability to connect. And so, there’s no excuse anymore. And so from our point of view in the disability community is that we feel very strongly that businesses need to use AudioEye to provide access for those of us in our community.
Nic:
Yeah. So Tony, you’ve been obviously working in accessibility and fighting discrimination for a number of years. Has your view of what is accessible and what isn’t accessible changed over the last, say 10, 15, 20 years?
Tony:
Well, I think it’s an evolution. I think it keeps changing. Every year it gets better and better. And that’s true Nic, with most laws, is that it takes enforcement and with the ADA itself, it took time for enforcement to go in place and like you said originally that people have filed suits in regards to accessibility to an office place and so forth. And so those suits have been filed. They’ve been … most of them kicked out. They’re trying to get legislation to amend the ADA. That has failed and I expect that as the author of the ADA, it’s not something that people are going to accept totally.
Tony:
But eventually it’s getting there. More and more people are accepting. If you go to curb cuts, you can go to all kinds of different things where you see that not only those of us with disabilities but the individuals without disabilities are using the accommodations that are provided for us. Curb cuts, volume controls, go on and on. And so the [inaudible 00:20:54] of it is, it’s going more and more.
Tony:
I just want to say one thing real quickly and that is that in case people wonder about it, I am a devout Catholic and when I was whipping the United States Congress, I got to take a trip to the Vatican and with a delegation and met with the Pope and my comments were pre-approved by the state department, done by the Vatican.
Tony:
But when I got up to speak to the Pope, I gave my very boring speech and then at the end of it I said, your holiness, I cannot live with myself if I didn’t say something personal. When I was a young man, I decided to become a Catholic priest and I was denied entry because I have epilepsy. Canon law in 400 AD said that if you have epilepsy, you’re possessed by the devil. You can’t be a priest. I think that’s very un-Christian of our church. And I wish you’d look into it.
Tony:
And you know his minions around the room are going to dah, dah, dah. My delegation was looking at me as if I was crazy, but I did it because I felt strongly about it. And when we got through, he held my wife’s hand going to the door and turned around blessed her and turned to me did not bless me. So as a Catholic you think you’re going straight to hell. He doesn’t bless you.
Tony:
But he then, and he said to me, “Young man, I heard your comments,” and walked away. So I didn’t know what that meant. And so two years later, Canon law was changed to permit people with epilepsy to become priests.
Nic:
Wow.
Tony:
Now I’ll quickly say, I don’t know if it was my comments that did it. I don’t know what did it because nobody ever told me. But I know I did it. I’ve evidence that I did it at the delegation that was there that heard me. Plus I have pictures of it. But anyway, it was changed so I think, I believe strongly that those of us with disabilities when we have the podium and opportunity to speak up and speak out, that we need to in order to address things that are wrong.
Nic:
Yes, I think that’s absolutely spot on. We have rights but we also have responsibilities and we can’t just sit passively and wait for things to fall into our lap. Tony, I think that’s a wonderful spot to top our conversation for this week. Thank you so much for being a guest, and I look forward to a chat with you some more next week.
Tony:
Thank you Nic. I appreciate.
Nic:
That’s it. Thanks for listening and a quick reminder, the transcript for this and all other shows are available on the show’s website at a11yrules.com. Big shout out to my patrons and my sponsors. Without your support, I could not continue to do the show. Do visit patreon.com/steenhout. That’s P-A-T-R-E-O-N dot C-O-M/S-T-E-E-N-H-O-U-T, if you want to support the Accessibility Rules podcast.