Money is blind: An editorial in the Wall Street Journal criticizes a federal appeals court ruling that could dramatically change the design of the American money. The ruling, by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia circuit, held that the United States discriminates against people with limited or no vision because the denominations of its paper money can only be distinguished by sight. Such characteristics as size, embossing and perforation are widely used in the currencies of other countries.

An excerpt:

The Rehabilitation Act makes an exception if accommodating the disabled would pose an “undue burden.” And as Judge A. Raymond Randolph noted in dissent, none of the proposed remedies have been proved “reasonable, effective and feasible.”

… All of which leads us to wonder why the courts are involved in this matter at all. The case raised no constitutional issue. Congress enacted the Rehabilitation Act, and Congress has the responsibility to enact legislation governing the design of currency. Surely Congress can sort out how best to accommodate the needs of the blind.

Costly change in sight. From the Boston Herald:

Local operators of vending machines, jukeboxes, pinball games and ATMs could be forced to spend millions of dollars due to an appeals court ruling yesterday that said U.S. paper money is discriminatory against blind people.

… “If they change the size of the bills, it would be a disaster,” said Ken Foley, vice president of Norwood’s Foley Food Service, which operates about 600 food, snack and soda machines across the area

Blind win court ruling on U.S. currency. From the New York Times:

What happens next is not certain. The government could appeal to the full 13-member appeals court (one of whose judges, David S. Tatel, is blind), or it could seek quick review by the Supreme Court, a step it has 90 days to take.

… The decision upheld a 2006 ruling by Judge James Robertson of the Federal District Court in Washington, to which the case will be returned for consideration of remedies unless the government succeeds on further appeal.

“Of the more than 180 countries that issue paper currency,” Judge Robertson wrote in his decision a year and a half ago, “only the United States prints bills that are identical in size and color in all their denominations.”

Judge Robertson rejected the government’s arguments that making bills identifiable by touch would create an undue financial burden: an estimated $178 million for new printing presses, for instance, and up to $50 million for new plates. Those costs are not significant, he said, given that the government spent more than $4 billion producing currency in the decade before his ruling.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 21st, 2008 at 4:49 am and is filed under blindness/visual impairments, commentary, law, NOT2BEMISSED. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.