RE: Container Gardening

[Guest guest]

From Cheryl

in CA

Subject:

HELP GET THE U.S.

TO BACK DISABILITY RIGHTS FOR PEOPLE

ACTION ALERT!! Help

Get U.S.

to Support U.N. Convention

From Dolan of the World

Committee on Disability

HELP GET THE U.S. TO BACK

DISABILITY RIGHTS FOR PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES AROUND THE WORLD

Thank you for your continued

leadership on the UN Convention on the Rights of People with

Disabilities. We are stepping up the campaign to get House Majority

Leader Tom Delay to schedule for a floor vote House Concurrent Resolution 169

(attached for information) which calls for the US to support of the Convention

and to send a delegation of people with disabilities to represent the US at the

next UN Convention Ad Hoc Committee meeting from May

24 - June 4, 2004.

Also attached is an action alert that I ask you to circulate to your

constituency. It is important that we flood the phone lines to certain

congressional offices this month as we want to change the Administration's

position in time for the next Ad Hoc Committee meetings.

An identical bill has been

introduced in the Senate, however, it has been referred to the Senate Foreign

Relations Committee and no action has been taken on it. We need to get

letters from disability organizations to Senators Lugar and Biden - Chairman,

and ranking Democrat respectively on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee -

asking them to take up Senate Concurrent Resolution 52 in the Foreign Relations

Committee as soon as possible, and to sign on as sponsors of the

legislation. A sample letter is attached.

Summary of actions

requested:

1. Circulate the action

alert to your constituencies and encourage them to phone Rep. Delay this month.

2. If your organization has

not already sent a letter to Rep. Delay, please do so now. A sample

letter is attached to the Grassroots Action Alert.

3. If your organization has

sent a letter to Rep. Delay please call and ask for a

response. We need leadership and grassroots to call in.

4. Please send a letter from

your organization to Senators

Lugar and Biden as soon as possible.

A sample letter is

attached to this memo.

===========================

SAMPLE LETTER TO SENATORS

LUGAR AND BIDEN

INSERT DATE

FAX #

Senator Lugar

Dirksen Senate Office

Building

Washington DC 20510

FAX #

Senator ph Biden

Dirksen Senate Office

Building

Washington DC 20510

Dear Senator:

I write to request that you

take up for consideration in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee S Con Res

52 expressing the Sense of Congress that the U.S. should support a U.N.

convention on disability rights, and calling for the U.S. to send a delegation

of people with disabilities to the Convention Ad Hoc Committee. I also

ask for you to join on as a co-sponsor of this bill.

There is some urgency with this bill. The next meeting of the UN Ad Hoc

Committee starts on May 24th. It is critical that we send the appropriate

delegation to those meetings, and that the position of the U.S. turn to

one of active support.

The United States

is a leader on disability around the world. We must continue to show our

leadership through U.S.

support and involvement in the proposed U.N.

Convention on the Rights of

People with Disabilities, so that the rights of people with disabilities

throughout the world will be enforced and protected.

Sincerely,

================================

GRASSROOTS ACTION ALERT

DISABILITY ADVOCATES -

URGENT ACTION NEEDED

HELP GET THE U.S. TO BACK

INTERNATIONAL LEGAL PROTECTION FOR PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES AROUND THE WORLD

To: Disability Advocates

Date: April 13, 2004

House Concurrent Resolution

169

Pressure must be put on

House Majority Leader Tom Delay (R-

TX) to schedule and support

House Concurrent Resolution 169, calling for U.S. support of a United Nations

human rights convention (legally binding international treaty) on

the rights of people with

disabilities. The bill is co-

sponsored by the Chairman of

the U.S. House of Representatives International Relations Committee Rep.

Henry Hyde (R-IL), and the

ranking Democrat Rep. Tom Lantos (D-CA), and has the unanimous support of the

House International Relations Committee.

The legislation:

(1) calls for the United States

to play a leading role in the drafting of a United Nations convention and to

work toward its adoption. The Convention should affirm the human rights

and dignity of persons with disabilities, and should be, among other things,

consistent with the spirit of the American with Disabilities Act of 1990, the

United States Constitution, and other rights enjoyed by U.S.

citizens with disabilities;

and

(2) urges the President to

instruct the Secretary of State to send to the UN Ad Hoc Committee meetings a U.S.

delegation that includes

individuals with disabilities who are recognized leaders in the U.S. disability

rights movement. (So far, no one with a disability has represented the U.S. in

meetings on the Convention!!)

Status of the International

Convention on Disability within the Administration

For over two years, member

nations of the U.N. have been working to draft a convention. The U.N.

human rights system has traditionally not considered disability as within its

scope, so this represents an important turning point for people with

disabilities worldwide. The U.S.

government has taken a

backseat in this process, stating that it will not sign such a treaty because

it has a

comprehensive domestic

law. This undermines the U.S. as a

leader on disability

internationally and also the importance of the convention itself.

ACTIONS NEEDED

House Majority Leader Rep.

Tom Delay (R-TX) is in charge of scheduling all bills. We are asking

disability advocates around the country to call the office of Rep. Delay

throughout this month of April and ask him to immediately schedule House

Concurrent Resolution 169 and to support it.

If we don't pressure

Rep. Delay to schedule this bill, we have little chance that the U.S. will

support this convention, which seeks to preserve and enforce disability rights

around the world.

We are in particular need of

people from Texas

to contact

Rep. Delay, but we need

everyone to contact him.

Here is what we ask you to

do:

1. Call Rep. Delay at his

Majority Leader Office at 202- 225-4000.

2. Introduce yourself and

tell the person who answers the phone that you are calling to ask Congressman

Delay to schedule immediately for a vote on the House floor House Concurrent

Resolution 169 having to do with the UN Convention on Disability. Also,

ask for Rep. Delay's support of the bill.

3. Remind them that the bill

was voted out of the U.S.

House of Representatives

International Relations Committee with unanimous support.

4. Tell them you will call

again in a week to find out when the bill is scheduled for a vote and you

expect to receive a date certain then.

ONGOING EFFORTS

An identical bill is

beginning to make headway in the Senate. It is being sponsored by Senator

Harkin and has been referred to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

We will let you know when

the time is right for similar grassroots action on the Senate legislation.

An international convention

has the potential to provide legally binding standards on disability rights for

all UN member nations that sign and ratify it. For millions of people

with disabilities worldwide who have no domestic protections at all to protect

and promote their rights, this is the most important international development

in

history.

Americans with disabilities will also benefit

greatly from this convention

as it will, among other things, raise the profile of disability as a subject of

human rights. Disability must no longer be marginalized in the human

rights framework but dealt with on the same level and with the same commitment

as other human rights issues.

For more information on the

proposed convention visit:

http://www.un.org/esa/socdev/enable/rights/

=================================

SAMPLE LETTER TO HOUSE

MAJORITY LEADER

FAX NUMBER

INSERT DATE

The Honorable Tom Delay

House Majority Leader

H 107, The Capitol

Washington, DC 20515

Dear Congressman Delay:

I write to ask you to

schedule for a vote on the House floor as soon as possible House Concurrent

Resolution

169 expressing the Sense of

Congress that the U.S. should support a U.N. convention on disability rights,

and calling for the U.S. to send a delegation of people with disabilities to

the Convention Ad Hoc Committee. I also ask for your support of this

bill, which has bipartisan support from the House International Relations

Committee.

There is some urgency with this bill. The next meeting of the UN Ad Hoc

Committee starts on May 24th. It is critical that we send the appropriate

delegation to those meetings, and that the position of the U.S. turn to

one of active support.

The United States

is a leader on disability around the world. We must continue to show our

leadership through U.S.

support and involvement in the proposed U.N.

Convention on the Rights of

People with Disabilities, so that the rights of people with disabilities

throughout the world will be enforced and protected.

Sincerely,

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