A federal judge has ordered the US government to redesign US currency notes so that blind people will be able to easily identify differently denominated bills. (AFP/Getty Images)Posted on 11/29/2006 11:45:58 PM PST by xtinct
The vending machine industry would have to spend hundreds of millions of dollars so its machines could handle new currency that blind people could use if a new ruling on U.S. bills is enforced. U.S. District Judge James Robertson ruled Tuesday that the current bills discriminate against blind people. He ordered the Treasury Department to find a solution. "If the government is mandated to change U.S. currency, there would be a tremendous financial impact across a number of industries, including the automated vending industry," said Jim Brinton, a director of the National Automatic Merchandising Association (NAMA), a trade association of the food and refreshment vending industry. There are 7 million food and beverage machines in the United States, and 1.5 million of them accept both $1 and $5 bills, according to NAMA. The vending machine industry would have to spend an estimated $200 to $300 to retrofit each machine, Mr. Brinton said.
A federal judge has ordered the US government to redesign US currency notes so that blind people will be able to easily identify differently denominated bills. (AFP/Getty Images)
(Excerpt) Read more at washtimes.com ...
>>Judge Robertson was appointed United States District Judge in December 1994.<<
>>From 1969 to 1972, Judge Robertson served with the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, as chief counsel of the Committee’s litigation offices in Jackson, Mississippi, and as director in Washington, D.C. Judge Robertson then returned to private practice with Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering, where he practiced until his appointment to the federal bench. While in private practice, he served as president of the District of Columbia Bar, co-chair of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, and president of Southern Africa Legal Services and Legal Education Project, Inc.
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Regime change in the courts. Impeach activist judges!
However, that could be more easy to counterfeit, but could they embed RFID chips into the coins (at least the higher denominations) to give them some authenticity?
Why do I get the creepy feeling that the most "fair" way to proceed would be to stop letting the vendors accept cash? After all, it's easer to track and tax EFTs than bills... just sayin.
"Show me just what Mohammed brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached." -Manuel II
It would be cheaper to give all blind people hand-held devices to identify different bill denominations.
Excellent idea! You must promote it, sir.
They already exist.
So now that a blind person can put money in a vending machine, how can he tell what candy bar is in what slot? Do we need to install tape recorders on candy bars so that they will tell you what they are?
Truly this is a case of blind justice...
...Dr. Marc Maurer, President of the National Federation of the Blind, said: “The blind need jobs and real opportunities to earn money, not feel-good gimmicks that misinform the public about our capabilities. Blind people transact business with paper money every day. This ruling puts a roadblock in the way of solving the real problem, which is the seventy percent unemployment rate among working-age blind Americans that severely limits our access to cash. The ruling will do nothing to alleviate that situation; in fact, it seriously endangers the ability of the blind to get jobs and participate fully in society. It argues that the blind cannot handle currency or documents in the workplace and that virtually everything must be modified for the use of the blind. An employer who believes that every piece of printed material in the workplace must be specially designed so that the blind can read it will have a strong incentive not to hire a blind person.”
I haven't seen this dissenting view mentioned on the news.
Who knows where this will lead. Maybe, the courts will declare the fact that TOILET PAPER violates blind people's civil rights because they can't see whether they actually finished the job. You know the old saying "the job is not done until the paperwork is done."
"NAFTA currency anyone?"
Exactly! The Overlords work in mysterious ways.
The easiest way to make different denominations of paper bills obvious to the blind, is to cut the corners differently. On one end of the bill only, one notch is a one, two is a five, three is a ten, four is a twenty. And the other end of the bill could be inserted into the machines w/o problems.
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