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Washington Post – December 9, 2006
Conservatives attack use of Koran for oath
Sacred and secular books have subbed for Bible
Omar Sacirbey
When Keith Ellison, the Minnesota Democrat whose election last month will make him the first Muslim in Congress, announced he would take his oath of office on Islam's holy book, the Koran, he provoked sharp criticism from conservatives and some heated discussion on the blogosphere.
The discussion has revived the debate about whether the nation's values and legal system are shaped only by Judeo-Christian heritage or if there is room for Islamic and other traditions.
"America is interested in only one book, the Bible. If you are incapable of taking an oath on that book, don't serve in Congress," Dennis Prager, a conservative talk radio host in Los Angeles, wrote on http://TownHall.com. Prager, who is Jewish and serves on the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Council, said Ellison should not be allowed to take his oath on the Koran. . .
But Ellison, who could not be reached for comment, would not be the first member of Congress to forgo a Bible. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) took her oath in 2005 on a Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible, that she borrowed from Rep. Gary L. Ackerman (D-N.Y.).
"Each of us has every right to lay our hand on the bible that we were raised with; that's what America is all about -- diversity, understanding and tolerance," Wasserman Schultz said. "It doesn't appear that Dennis Prager has learned anything from his time on the Holocaust commission."
Other politicians have departed from the Bible as well. Hawaii Gov. Linda Lingle (R) used the Tanakh when she took her oath in 2002, and Madeleine Kunin placed her hand on Jewish prayer books when she was sworn in as governor of Vermont in 1985. . .
In 1825, John Quincy Adams took the presidential oath using a law volume instead of a Bible, and in 1853, Franklin Pierce affirmed the oath rather than swearing it. Herbert Hoover, citing his Quaker beliefs, also affirmed his oath in 1929 but did use a Bible, according to the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies. Theodore Roosevelt used no Bible in taking his first oath of office in 1901 but did in 1905. . .
On Monday, the Council on American-Islamic Relations called on the Holocaust council, which oversees the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, to remove Prager.
"No one who holds such bigoted, intolerant and divisive views should be in a policy-making position at a taxpayer-funded institution that seeks to educate Americans about the destructive impact hatred has had, and continues to have, on every society," the group wrote in a letter to Fred S. Zeidman, the council chairman….
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/08/AR2006120801482.html
The Southern (Illinois) editorial – December 10, 2006
Sectarian peace begins at home
Clarence Page
WASHINGTON -This country's first Muslim to be elected to Congress has not been sworn in yet but he's already taking heat.
Dennis Prager, a conservative columnist and radio talk show host, objects to the holy book on which Rep.-elect Keith Ellison plans to take his oath of office on Jan. 4.
The Minnesota Democrat plans to use a Koran, the Muslim holy book, instead of a Bible.
Poor naive me. Here I thought it was an encouraging sign of this country's respect for liberty and diversity that Americans would elect a Muslim to Congress in the midst of an international war against Islamic terrorists. No country is perfect, but we've come a long way on the tolerance scale since World War II when thousands of innocent Japanese Americans were rounded up into camps far from home just for having Japanese ancestry.
But, not Prager. Ellison's choice should be blocked, Prager wrote, "not because of any American hostility to the Koran, but because the act (of taking the oath on the Koran) undermines American culture."
Again, poor naive me. I had no idea that American civilization was so fragile. Prager must think that Koran is some truly powerful book…
http://www.southernillinoisan.com/articles/2006/12/10/opinions/columnists/page/18486077.txt
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