ABSTRACT
There are two quotes very familiar to almost every American, which should remind us of our right to freedom. They are: (1) “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”1 and (2) “Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men [and women] were created equal . . .”2*
Even though the famous words included in the Declaration of Independence of 1776, and those used by Abraham Lincoln at Gettysburg in September of 1862, may appear sexist to us today, they were meant to guarantee equality to all (white) men in the United States and its territories. Women and blacks were later given those same rights. However, today, more than 200 years after the Declaration of Independence and more than l00 years after the Gettysburg Address, some people are still fighting for the equality that is supposed to be guaranteed to them by the Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, and the Gettysburg Address. Although opportunities for segments of blacks†, Hispanics, and Native Americans have im-
proved, there are still barriers for them, as well as for people from many other ethnic groups. There is another sector that is gaining strength and trying to be heard-one that crosses all national, cultural, religious, socioeconomic, and sexual barriers-people with disAbling conditions. In this country alone in 1988 approximately 20 percent of the population had a disAbling condition, and 60 percent of all disAbled adults were unemployed and even more were living well below the nationally established poverty level. According to the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS), in 2003 there were more than 34 million people with disAbling conditions who lived at home, and of this number, more than 7 million used professional home health care. An additional 1.5 million people lived in nursing homes. These figures do not include the people who live with mental illnesses, either in the community or in an institution. For those who were under 64 years of age, 29 million people-almost 12 percent of the population-were covered by Medicaid and another 14 percent by Medicare.
