Obama Signs U.N. Convention On Rights Of Disabled Proclamation

Washington, D.C. (AHN) - President Barack Obama signed the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities Proclamation in a ceremony in the East Room of the White House late Friday afternoon, during which he delivered a speech on the importance of the proclamation.

Obama began by recognizing several people who were key to getting the original Americans with Disabilities Act legislation passed.

Then he mentioned his late father-in-law, Fraser Robinson, who had multiple sclerosis, putting the importance of the legislation into perspective. In those days, long before the ADA legislation, Robinson struggled to go to work every day to support his family, eventually needing two canes to walk, the man never asked for any special treatment, Obama said.

Saying that he thought about Robinson "all the time when I think about these issues," Obama continued. It's a reminder of the very promise of the ADA."

"Nineteen years ago this weekend, Democrats and Republicans, advocates and ordinary Americans, came together here at the White House to watch President George H.W. Bush sign the ADA into law. Folks traveled from all across America to witness a milestone in the long march to achieve equal opportunity for all," Obama said.

"But like all great movements, this one did not begin or end in Washington, D.C. It began in small towns and big cities across this country. It began with people like Fraser Robinson showing that they can be full contributors to society regardless of the lack of awareness of others. It began when people refused to accept a second-class status in America. It began when they not only refused to accept the way the world saw them, but also the way they had seen themselves," Obama said.

"And when quiet acts of persistence and perseverance were coupled with vocal acts of advocacy, a movement grew, and people marched and organized and testified. And parents of children with disabilities asked why their children, who had the same hopes and dreams as children everywhere else, were left out and left behind. And wounded veterans came home from war only to find that, despite their sacrifice for America, they now felt excluded from America's promise."

Obama spelled out how many people are impacted by living with a disability.

"Today, 650 million people -- 10 percent of the world's population -- live with a disability. In developing countries, 90 percent of children with disabilities don't attend school. Women and girls with disabilities are too often subject to deep discrimination," he said.

To applause, Obama said, "Disability rights aren't just civil rights to be enforced here at home; they're universal rights to be recognized and promoted around the world. And that's why I'm proud to announce that next week, the United States of America will join 140 other nations in signing the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities the first new human rights convention of the 21st century."

He added that the "treaty calls on all nations to guarantee rights like those afforded under the ADA."

Obama said he has asked U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice to sign the Convention at the U.N. next week and he will urge Congress to speedily consider and approve the Convention when he submits it to them for their "advice and consent."