Albertson's, Inc. v. Kirkingburg, 527 U.S. 555, 13 (1999)

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Cite as: 527 U. S. 555 (1999)

Opinion of the Court

Circuit mentioned, see 143 F. 3d, at 1232, the court did not identify the degree of loss suffered by Kirkingburg, nor are we aware of any evidence in the record specifying the extent of his visual restrictions.

This is not to suggest that monocular individuals have an onerous burden in trying to show that they are disabled. On the contrary, our brief examination of some of the medical literature leaves us sharing the Government's judgment that people with monocular vision "ordinarily" will meet the Act's definition of disability, Brief for United States et al. as Amici Curiae 11, and we suppose that defendant companies will often not contest the issue. We simply hold that the Act requires monocular individuals, like others claiming the Act's protection, to prove a disability by offering evidence that the extent of the limitation in terms of their own experience, as in loss of depth perception and visual field, is substantial.

III

Petitioner's primary contention is that even if Kirkingburg was disabled, he was not a "qualified" individual with a disability, see 42 U. S. C. § 12112(a), because Albertson's merely insisted on the minimum level of visual acuity set forth in the DOT's Motor Carrier Safety Regulations, 49 CFR § 391.41(b)(10) (1998). If Albertson's was entitled to enforce that standard as defining an "essential job functio[n] of the employment position," see 42 U. S. C. § 12111(8), that is the end of the case, for Kirkingburg concededly could not satisfy it.13

13 Kirkingburg asserts that in showing that Albertson's initially allowed him to drive with a DOT certification, despite the fact that he did not meet the DOT's minimum visual acuity requirement, he produced evidence from which a reasonable juror could find that he satisfied the legitimate prerequisites of the job. See Brief for Respondent 36, 37; see also id., at 6. But petitioner's argument is a legal, not a factual, one. In any event, the ample evidence in the record on petitioner's policy of requiring adherence to minimum DOT vision standards for its truckdrivers, see, e. g.,

567

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