http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/36457
Bill DOES NOT violate rights of Muslims, though Jihadists would have us
believe otherwise
Anti-foreign law bill will protect all S.C. citizens
- Chris Carter Friday, May 13, 2011
The South Carolina Senate is currently debating legislation that would ban
the enforcement of foreign and religious laws - including Islamic sharia
law-but opponents claim the bill would violate the constitutional rights of
Muslims. Nothing could be further from the truth.
In April, a Judiciary subcommittee conducted two hearings (on two separate
days) on Senate Bill 444
<http://www.scstatehouse.gov/sess119_2011-2012/bills/444.htm> , which would
prevent foreign and religious law from violating an individual's
constitutional rights. A third subcommittee hearing is in the offing.
S.C.'s bill does not mention sharia law, and appears to avoid religious
infringement altogether, unless the religious law would violate the rights
of another: "A court, arbitrator.or enforcement authority may not enforce a
foreign law if it would violate a constitutionally guaranteed right of this
State or of the United States. The provisions of this section apply only to
actual or foreseeable violations of the constitutional rights of a person
caused by the application of the foreign law."
Howard Stravitz, a professor at the University of South Carolina School of
Law, testified at the South Carolina subcommittee hearing that the bill
would violate Muslims' freedom of religion. Stravitz did not respond to The
US Report's request for clarification.
"The backers of these discriminatory proposals realize if they put specific
references to Sharia or Muslims, it won't pass constitutional muster," said
Ibrahim Hooper, Director of Communications at the Council on
American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).
When The US Report contacted Hooper to clarify which elements of S. 444 he
considered unconstitutional, Hooper instead sent material related to
Oklahoma's attempt at banning sharia rather than South Carolina's
legislation. Senate Question 755 was approved by 70 percent of voters before
being blocked by a federal judge.
It bears noting that CAIR recently made headlines when the Department of
Justice scuttled pending terror-financing prosecutions against the
organization and one of its co-founders. Both were listed as un-indicted
co-conspirators in the trial against the Islamic charity group, Holy Land
Foundation, which sent over $12 million in donations from the U.S. to the
Palestinian terrorist group, Hamas. CAIR is linked to both Hamas and the
Muslim Brotherhood, which seeks to establish
<http://www.investigativeproject.org/documents/misc/135.pdf> sharia law not
only in the U.S., but worldwide.
David Yerushalmi, a lawyer and expert on Islamic law, called Oklahoma's
Senate Question 755 "poorly drafted" as sharia was left open for vague
interpretation. Yerushalmi wrote
<http://www.centerforsecuritypolicy.org/p18588.xml> that "There are
patently constitutional ways to legislatively preclude sharia from raising
its ugly head in our legal system and to do so in clearer, more legally
precise ways than was achieved by Question 755."
It appears that the stumbling block is to what degree each state defines
foreign laws: a federal judge blocked Oklahoma's ban when a plaintiff from
CAIR contended that by blocking sharia in state courtrooms, Muslims' were
essentially denied their freedom of religion as the plaintiff defined sharia
as a religious practice rather than an authoritative
legal-political-military system.
Both Louisiana
<http://www.legis.state.la.us/billdata/streamdocument.asp?did=722536> and
Tennessee <http://state.tn.us/sos/acts/106/pub/pc0983.pdf> passed
anti-foreign law bills in 2010-albeit without specific reference to
sharia-that have not been overturned.
The underlying problem is that many Muslims consider Islamic religious laws
to be divine commandments which trump man-made laws such as the
Constitution.
In 2007, the Assembly of Muslim Jurists of America (AMJA) issued a fatwa, or
Islamic legal ruling stating that "Islamic law does not recognize [man-made
law], either fully or in part." While not all U.S. Muslims may agree with
the supremacy of sharia, the fact remains that a Muslim legal organization
within the United States commanding Muslims to follow sharia and not federal
and state laws.
The AMJA has issued other rulings <http://livepage.apple.com/> which call
for the execution for apostasy and blasphemy, as well as condone marital
rape, female genital mutilation, and the stoning of adulterers.
How could a law preventing an individual from violating the rights of
another be unconstitutional? No one seems to have a substantive answer.
Instead of answering the question, the bill's opponents continue to put
forth strawmen like "the bill would adversely impact international trade,"
which it would not in any way shape or form.
Moreover, according to our sources, when questions by the opponents were
fully and adequately answered by the bill's proponents during the hearings,
the answers were ignored and the same questions were repeated by the bill's
opponents later in the hearings.
Perhaps the focus should be shifted from legislation that aims to protect
constitutional rights to the imported legal system that undermines
constitutional rights.
In a sane world, advocating for the undermining of our Constitution would be
called sedition.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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Brooks Isoldi, editor
[email protected]
http://www.intellnet.org
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