Interpreting rights and obligations under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act

This dissertation analyzes the iterative dialogue that has unfolded between Congress and the Supreme Court with respect to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) and discusses the implications of this dialogue for school districts. The dialogue began in 1975 with the enactment of the statute, which provided students with disabilities the right to a "free appropriate public education" (FAPE). The second phase--the responses of the Court to Congress--is reflected in the ten cases in which the Court interpreted rights under the statute. The third phase--the responses of Congress to the Court--is seen in subsequent enactments of the statute. Overall, this dialogue has helped to bring about major improvements in the education of students with disabilities. To analyze the dialogue, this dissertation utilizes Martha Minow's framework for the legal treatment of difference. As an alternative to the traditional rights-analysis and abnormal-persons approaches, Minow proposed the social-relations approach, which views difference as a function of the relationships between individuals labeled "different" and those in positions of power who do the labeling. The analysis of the dialogue discusses each of these approaches, elaborating on the significance of the social-relations approach for IDEA. This dissertation is comprised of three articles. The first examines the dialogue from the perspective of one case, Schaffer v. Weast (2005). This article demonstrates that the Court in Schaffer took a rights-analysis approach, ignoring important relationships at the heart of IDEA, and recommends that Congress respond using a social-relations approach. The second article examines the ten Supreme Court cases pertaining to IDEA, the second phase of the dialogue. It is argued that the Court's use of a rights-analysis approach focused on the negative dimension of FAPE, emphasizing that rights trump other concerns, but indicated reluctance to interpret the positive dimension of FAPE. The third article analyzes the third phase of the dialogue, arguing that as Congress has come back to define and clarify positive rights under the statute, Congress has increasingly embraced a social-relations approach. All three articles provide recommendations for school districts, encouraging them to adopt a social-relations approach in their own practices.