Casey wins case against PGA Tour

WASHINGTON, MAY 30. Handicapped pro-golfer Casey Martin has won a U.S. Supreme Court case against the PGA Tour, allowing him to use an electric cart to ride around golf courses during pro tournaments.

The court, in a 7-2 decision on Tuesday, upheld an appeals court ruling that said the Professional Golf Association cannot discriminate against handicapped persons.

Martin, 28, has a degenerative circulatory disorder on the right leg that makes walking a golf course nearly impossible. He had claimed the PGA violated the Americans with disabilities act by not letting him ride in a cart.

Justice John Paul Stevens wrote for the court that the PGA, ``as a public accommodation ... may not discriminate against either spectators or competitors on the basis of disability.''

He also wrote that allowing Martin, ``a talented golfer to ride in a cart, would not fundamentally alter the nature'' of the tournaments. ``We observe that the use of carts is not itself inconsistent with the fundamental character of the game of golf,'' Stevens wrote.

``Indeed the walking rule is not an indispensable feature of tournament golf either. In a dissenting opinion, justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas said the ruling ''exercises a benevolent compassion that the law does not place it within our power to impose.``

They also claimed that the majority stretched the meaning of a ''public accommodation.`` Organisations advocating rights of the handicapped had supported Martin in his case.

Martin's Attorney Roy Reardon was elated by the ruling, calling it ''a great result for the millions of other disabled in the United States who are simply looking, through the Americans with disabilities act, for an opportunity to just participate,`` he said.

PGA lawyer H. Bartow Farr argued earlier in court that the disabilities law does not apply to professional golfers, and most importantly walking a golf course is a key part of the game. Reardon disagreed. ''Walking is not the game,`` he said during his Supreme Court presentation in January. ''The game is hitting the ball.``- AFP.

Handicapped pro-golfer Casey Martin who won a U.S. Supreme Court case against the PGA Tour, allowing him to use an electric cart to ride around golf courses during pro tournaments.

- Reuters

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