I think the most important statement is here: "Whether government courts should ever defer to religious ones, writes Liptak, is a question whose answer depends on whether the parties consented to religious adjudication, whether they're allowed to change their minds and whether the decisions of those tribunals are offensive to fundamental conceptions of justice. "The hard questions, as the archbishop learned, arise in the area of family law," says Liptak, "where the agreement to arbitrate may be uninformed or obtained by duress.""
If the informed parties consent to Sharia law, Christian law, Jewish law or what ever. Then a court can make it binding, or they negotiate ahead of time and agree that it's the precedent that they'll use. It's how they make the decisions on the "court" shows legal and binding. But... at no time should this type of religious law be embedded into the Common law of the United States. -- Scott Stewart ColdFusion Developer SSTWebworks 4405 Oakshyre Way Raleigh, NC. 27616 (919) 874-6229 (home) (703) 220-2835 (cell) -----Original Message----- From: Gruss Gott [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, February 19, 2008 12:14 PM To: CF-Community Subject: US Law Defers To Religious Law?? Yup. When the Law of Religion Meets the Law of the State Posted by Dan Slater As many news junkies know by now, on February 7 the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, fueled some serious controversy over a long-running debate in Britain: To what extent should Islamic law be accommodated in a society that's now home to nearly 2 million Muslims? (Click for original reports from the FT, the Times of London, The Economist and the NYT.) Here's what happened: In an interview with the BBC, Dr. Williams known as the spiritual leader of the world's Anglican population suggested that Britain should "constructively accommodate" certain aspects of Sharia law in areas such as commercial and family law. (Sharia is a body of Islamic law based on the Koran, the words and actions of the Prophet Mohammed, and rulings of Islamic scholars.) Doing so, he said, "seems unavoidable" to achieve social cohesion. The Archbishop, who last year said that schools should refuse to teach creationism, clarified that he was not advocating the criminal punishments issued in some Muslim communities where alleged violations of Sharia are sometimes dealt with by stoning and beheading. On Sunday, the NYT's Adam Liptak offered some U.S. context to the debate. In the "Ideas & Trends" column, Liptak gave several examples of U.S. courts deferring to religious tribunals Islamic, Christian and Jewish. In 2003, a Texas appeals court reportedly referred a divorce case to a tribunal called the Texas Islamic Court; in 2005, a federal appeals court in New Orleans affirmed an award in an employment arbitration by the Institute for Christian Conciliation; and, it's common, reports Liptak, for state courts to enforce the decision of Jewish courts, known as a bet dins. Whether government courts should ever defer to religious ones, writes Liptak, is a question whose answer depends on whether the parties consented to religious adjudication, whether they're allowed to change their minds and whether the decisions of those tribunals are offensive to fundamental conceptions of justice. "The hard questions, as the archbishop learned, arise in the area of family law," says Liptak, "where the agreement to arbitrate may be uninformed or obtained by duress." One law professor told Liptak that government courts should refuse to enforce any ruling from a religious tribunal that leaves a woman worse off than she would have been in a conventional divorce. "Society has a stake in the outcome," said Washington & Lee's Robin Fretwell Wilson. "Some religions are tilted against women." ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Adobe® ColdFusion® 8 software 8 is the most important and dramatic release to date Get the Free Trial http://ad.doubleclick.net/clk;160198600;22374440;w Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/message.cfm/messageid:254441 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/CF-Community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=89.70.5
