The Qur’an and the U.S. Constitution

On January 4th, 2007, the newest members of the 110th Congress were sworn in to duty. Among that number was House Representative Keith Ellison from Minnesota, an African American, and the first Muslim ever elected to serve in Congress.

Ellison’s historic election should have been celebrated as a great American triumph, a further proof of democracy’s inclusiveness even against the backdrop of the ongoing  conflict in Iraq, and the shadow of 9/11. Instead, in the weeks leading up to his swearing in, Ellison was placed at the center of a nationwide media firestorm. At issue was his decision to take his oath of Congressional office with a hand placed not on the Christian Bible, but instead on Islam’s holiest text, the Qur’an.

Pundits around the country argued that Ellison’s decision was fundamentally un-American. Such claims were made notwithstanding the fact that Ellison—already a popular, two-term state official—had been born and raised in the United States, with an ancestry that could be traced back to 1742.

It may come as some surprise to contemporary audiences to learn that a similar debate had already been enacted over two hundred years ago during the framing of the  U.S. Constitution. Article 6, section 3, specifically states that there shall be no religious test as a requirement of public office. William Lancaster, a delegate from North Carolina, had challenged this provision by arguing that were it to pass, even a Muslim might one day be elected president. At the time Lancaster and others had been mostly concerned that a non-Protestant—or more precisely a Catholic—could be elected, and thereby perpetuate the religious schisms that had divided Europe. However, the rhetorical inclusion of a Muslim in Lancaster’s line of argumentation reveals that a latent consciousness and  fear of Islam had also been transmitted across the Atlantic.

When Ellison finally took his oath of office, he did so using a copy of the Qur’an once owned by Thomas Jefferson. The decision represented not only a bold exercise of Constitutional rights in the present, but also a symbolic nod to the nation’s not-so-distant past.