Oklahoma's ban on Sharia law thrown out by federal judge

Kresta in the afternoon ^ | August 17, 2013 | David Harper

[NYer]

An Oklahoma constitutional amendment that would bar the state's courts from considering or using Sharia law was ruled unconstitutional Thursday by a federal judge in Oklahoma City.

In finding the law in violation of the U.S. Constitution's Establishment Clause, U.S. District Judge Vicki Miles-LaGrange issued a permanent injunction prohibiting the certification of the results of the state question that put the Sharia law ban into the state constitution.

"While the public has an interest in the will of the voters being carried out, the Court finds that the public has a more profound and long-term interest in upholding an individual's constitutional rights," the judge wrote.

Muneer Awad, a Muslim and American citizen who was executive director of the Oklahoma Chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations at the time, filed the lawsuit on Nov. 4, 2010, seeking to block the so-called "Save Our State" constitutional amendment that had been approved by 70 percent of Oklahoma voters two days earlier.

Awad claimed that State Question 755 violated the Establishment Clause and the Free Exercise Clause of First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Miles-LaGrange issued a temporary restraining order on Nov. 8, 2010, finding that enjoining the certification of the election results for SQ 755 would not be adverse to the public interest.

On Nov. 29, 2010, she issued a preliminary injunction, finding that Awad had legal standing and that SQ 755 likely violated both the Free Exercise Clause and the Establishment Clause.

Miles-LaGrange also found then that the balance of harms weighed strongly in favor of Awad, that the alleged violation of Awad's First Amendment rights constituted irreparable injury and that the public interest demanded protection of these rights.

On Jan. 10, 2012, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed Miles-Grange's preliminary injunction ruling, and on July 29, 2012, the lawsuit was amended, adding four additional plaintiffs.

In her opinion Thursday, Miles-LaGrange noted that the 10th Circuit wrote in January 2012 that "when the law that voters wish to enact is likely unconstitutional, their interests do not outweigh Mr. Awad's in having his constitutional rights protected."

Miles-LaGrange found "that any harm that would result from permanently enjoining the certification of the election results is further minimized in light of the undisputed fact that the amendment at issue was to be a preventative measure and that the concern that it seeks to address has yet to occur."

She pointed out in a footnote that attorneys defending the amendment at the November 2010 preliminary injunction hearing admitted that "they did not know of any instance where an Oklahoma court had applied Sharia law or used the legal precepts of other nations or cultures."

Miles-LaGrange also rejected the argument that the amendment could be salvaged by severing certain language that specifically mentioned Sharia law. That option would have retained less precise wording saying that Oklahoma courts "shall not look to the legal precepts of other nations or cultures."

The judge wrote in her order that "it is abundantly clear that the primary purpose of the amendment was to specifically target and outlaw Sharia law and to act as a preemptive strike against Sharia law to protect Oklahoma from a perceived 'threat' of Sharia law being utilized in Oklahoma courts."

She added that the plaintiffs "have shown that the voters would not have approved the amendment without the unconstitutional provisions."

She noted that "the public debate, public discussions, articles, radio ads and robocalls" regarding SQ 755 all primarily and overwhelmingly focused on Sharia law. "Given this context, the court finds any reasonable voter would have perceived SQ 755 as a referendum on Sharia law," she wrote.

Awad moved to New York City in August 2012 to accept a position with another CAIR affiliate, according to Thursday's opinion.

On Thursday night, Adam Soltani, the current executive director of CAIR's Oklahoma Chapter and a fellow plaintiff in the lawsuit, issued a statement in which he said: "As Oklahomans, we are incredibly thrilled at the decision and applaud the judicial system for upholding our constitutional rights. This is a victory not only for Oklahoma Muslims, but for all Oklahomans and all Americans."

Ryan Kiesel, executive director of the ACLU of Oklahoma, issued a written statement saying: "This law unfairly singled out one faith and one faith only. This amendment was nothing more than a solution in search of a problem. We're thrilled that it has been struck down."

Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt said in the wake of the appellate court decision in January 2012 that his office "will continue to defend" the state's position.

However, spokeswoman Diane Clay said Pruitt would have no comment on Thursday night.

Despite the legal setbacks for SQ 755, Gov. Mary Fallin signed House Bill 1060 into law last April. Proponents said that without specifically mentioning Sharia law, the measure would prohibit the application of foreign laws when it would violate either the Oklahoma Constitution or the U.S. Constitution.

[GraceG]

Does Islam allow woman judges?

Throw the Judges decision out for not being Sharia Compliant....

It’s a PARADOX!!

[Innovative]

“Miles-LaGrange was nominated by President Bill Clinton on September 22, 1994, to a seat on the United States District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma vacated by Lee Roy West. She was confirmed by the United States Senate on October 7, 1994, and received her commission on November 28, 1994. She began her service as chief judge in 2008. Judge Miles-LaGrange’s preliminary ruling [4] enjoining amendment of the Oklahoma Constitution to prohibit the state’s courts from either “considering or using” international law or Islamic Sharia law has attracted considerable attention and has prompted one Oklahoma state legislator to urge Congress to impeach her.[5]’

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vicki_Miles-LaGrange

[Innovative]

The judge is female, appointed by Bill Clinton.

[Lil Flower]

*A Lesbian Black Muslim?*

She’d be the first one they would stone to death.
Idiot.

[ronnie raygun]

Liberty amendments

[Jumper]

The defining mission of the Muslim Brotherhood is the implementation of sharia, as noted for several years by a hardy few of us Islamophobes. An “Islamophobe,” by the way, is someone who takes seriously the things Muslim Brotherhood operatives say and the scriptures on which they rely; the Muslims who say the things that Islamophobes have the temerity to mention are called “moderates” — see how this works?

Sharia is Islam’s societal framework and legal code. Particularly as construed by Islamic supremacists, whose ideology dominates the Middle East, sharia is authoritarian, anti-liberty, anti-equality, and intolerant of minority rights. Indeed, in 1990, Islamic supremacists felt the need to issue their own “Declaration of Human Rights in Islam,” precisely because they cannot abide the aspirations laid out in the purportedly “Universal Declaration of Human Rights” promulgated by the United Nations in 1948. Human rights, for the Islamist, must bow to the repressive injunctions of sharia.

Elections do not equal democracy. To the contrary, democracy is a culture of governance committed to the protection of minority rights and equality of opportunity. Sharia abides neither of those principles. Turkey’s Islamic-supremacist prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, that ought to be a lot more notorious: “Democracy is just the train we board to reach our destination.” Islamists step off the train at sharia station, which is a civilization’s distance away from liberty and equality. In a sharia society, “democracy” — taken to mean mere voting — is not a culture. It is just another means of imposing totalitarian sharia. To be sure, it is a means less brutal than violent jihad, but a means to the same sorry end.

The Muslim Middle East is part of a different civilization and does not share our core beliefs. Adherent to supremacist Islam, it rejects equality under the law (the rights of non-Muslims are inferior to those of Muslims, and those of women to those of men). In Muslim countries, religious minorities are systematically oppressed and persecuted. The sovereign is deemed to be Allah, acting through the Muslim ruler or caliph. There are no “constituents” to “represent”; the people are subjects who owe the caliph obedience and whose only legitimate expectation of the caliph is his fidelity to sharia.

[Hugh the Scot]

Pretty simple, really.

Sharia is not a religion.

[NurdlyPeon]

Ruling that the establishment of a regime of Sharia law cannot be prohibited?

I don't even think it's so much a matter of prohibiting Sharia law. It's a matter of the legislature trying to limit, in any way, the power of the courts. So, the courts get to decide whether or not their power is going to be limited. Gee, what do you think the courts are going to decide?

[Talisker]

um... wouldn’t USING sharia law be violating the establishment clause???

HELL YES!

[Rome2000]

Anybody who thinks this is a free country is out of their mind
We are slaves to the political class in DC and their apparatchiks
The Governor should tell the “judge “ to get bent and and see what the DC mafia does about it

Only 15 months to the midterms

[Rome2000]

Oh hell yeah, I figure we slipped into a parallel dimension just about the time Nixon resigned

Dan Rather is somehow involved, that’s why they were trying to get him to disclose the frewuency

[XenaLee]

I found a link here that confirms that he said it:

http://thepoint.gm/africa/gambia/article/america-and-islam-are-not-exclusive-says-obama

[AmericanExceptionalist]

"While the public has an interest in the will of the voters being carried out, the Court finds that the public has a more profound and long-term interest in upholding an individual's constitutional rights," the judge wrote.

There is an implied "but" between the first clause of the sentence, above, and the second clause.

And, as Peter McWilliams put it in his bestseller from about two decades ago, Do It! Let's Get Off Our Buts: "'But' is the word we use to mean, 'Ignore everything I have said up to this point. Here comes the real scoop.'"

In this case, "the real scoop" may be found in the second clause to the sentence outlining the judge's rationalization...uh, reasoning...

[AmericanExceptionalist]

"While the public has an interest in the will of the voters being carried out, the Court finds that the public has a more profound and long-term interest in upholding an individual's constitutional rights," the judge wrote.

There is an implied "but" between the first clause of the sentence, above, and the second clause.

And, as Peter McWilliams put it in his bestseller from about two decades ago, Do It! Let's Get Off Our Buts: "'But' is the word we use to mean, 'Ignore everything I have said up to this point. Here comes the real scoop.'"

In this case, "the real scoop" may be found in the second clause to the sentence outlining the judge's rationalization...uh, reasoning...

[MadMax, the Grinning Reaper]

I guess neither judge knows a damned thing about Sharia Law as a “weapon” of aggressive and expansive Islam. If it was just the law of a country, for internal use, it would not be a big issue, but it has been declared a “weapon” of domination in other lands that either voluntarily submit to Islam or are converted to it at sword point.

Some of our judges as just fucking dumb and need to be replaced when possible.

[GrandJediMasterYoda]

Thanks for finding that. This Obama is completely and utterly out of his freakin’ mind.