handicap

Handicap

A disability. The term is sometimes considered derogatory. In the United States, the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 used the word "handicap" to refer to a disability, while the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 used the word "disability" on the assumption that it had the same definition as "handicap." Courts interpreted this differently and applied a higher standard to the definition of "disability." Congress changed this with the passage of the ADA Amendments Act of 2008, which declared the two words to have the same meaning.

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handicap

The Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination on the basis of a handicap.A handicap has been defined as having the same meaning as disability. Persons with disabilities are persons with mental or physical impairments that substantially limit one or more major life activities. The term mental or physical impairment may include conditions such as blindness, hearing impairment, mobility impairment, HIV infection, mental retardation, alcoholism, drug addiction, chronic fatigue, learning disability, head injury, and mental illness.The term major life activity may include seeing, hearing, walking, breathing, performing manual tasks, caring for one's self, learning, speaking, or working.The Fair Housing Act also protects persons who have a record of such an impairment or are regarded as having such an impairment.

The Complete Real Estate Encyclopedia by Denise L. Evans, JD & O. William Evans, JD. Copyright © 2007 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.