“I, Keith Ellison, do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic,” said the soon-to-be congressman in his 2007 oath of office, “that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same.” The Minnesotan Democrat legislator concluded, with his right hand held high, “and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.”
It was this last word that raised eyebrows among many American citizens and congresspersons. As the first Muslim elected to Congress, Ellison’s beliefs make him a constant target of criticism. Despite the Constitution’s instructions that “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States,” Capitol Hill echoed with indignant murmurs on the swearing-in day. Upon hearing that Ellison would pose for photos with a Qu’ran (from Thomas Jefferson’s personal library), Rep. Virgil Goode (R-Va.) displayed discomfort with the idea, saying that “many more Muslims” like Keith Ellison would be elected without tighter immigration rules.
In an America gripped by fears of terrorism in which Muslims are the perpetual bogeymen of American politics, Muslims are rarely able to muster any sort of political clout. Islamophobia and Muslims’ relatively small numbers (they are less than two percent of the population) contribute to their political weakness. Yet despite many Americans’ belief that Islam is antithetical to American values, a few Muslim politicians have been able to assume office. Fortunately, considering the precedent of once-discriminated groups gaining political clout exists in American history, the increasing presence of Muslim politicians will help to slowly garner acceptance for their faith.
Racism By Any Other Name
A 2014 Pew Research Center poll found that Islam had the lowest favorability of any major religion in the eyes of the American public. Protestors gathered in Manhattan in 2010 to prevent the construction of the supposed “Ground Zero Mosque” (which in reality was a small Muslim prayer space tucked into a building blocks away from Ground Zero). Mosques across the country are regularly attacked. People merely perceived to be Muslim are not spared; in 2012, a gunman entered a Sikh temple in Wisconsin under the belief that it was a mosque and killed six people.
This broad fear of Muslims has been forged into a powerful political weapon to attack Muslim candidates. In an interview with the HPR, Corey Saylor, a spokesperson for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (the most prominent civil liberties advocacy group for Muslims in the United States) described Islamophobia as a tool that has two major political purposes. “One—it gives politicians an ‘other’ to vilify. … If I were a politician and I had to choose between talking about my budget plan, which may alienate some voters, or talking about the threat of Islam, which alienates relatively few voters, some politicians opt for the latter. Two—Islamophobia can be used as a hammer to attack Muslim candidates directly.” Saylor directed attention to the extensive apparatus created to attack Muslims and Muslim politicians. “We discovered 37 different organizations committed to vilifying Islam with a combined revenue of $119 million. … Elected officials then recite the nonsense put out through the anti-Muslim network. Herman Cain said any Muslim in his cabinet would have to take a loyalty test. [Former senator Rick] Santorum was applauded for advocating the profiling of Muslims.” Islam now serves as one of the chief scapegoats in American politics.
Erasure from American Society
Because of the terrified frenzy following September 11, 2001 the prevailing xenophobic narrative has been that all Muslims are newcomers to the United States. This is a willful ignorance of history, part of a concerted effort by certain politicians and interest groups to monger fear at the expense of Muslims. Harvard Divinity School professor Jocelyne Cesari, the director of Harvard’s Islam in the West Program, told the HPR, “There is a long presence of Muslims in U.S. history, going back to slavery. Ten percent of slaves were Muslims. People tend to forget that Malcolm X was a part of the Nation of Islam. Mohammed Ali was Muslim.” Despite the prominent role that Islam has played in black history, racial identity often overshadows Muslim identity, especially in a media culture that tends to negatively portray Muslims. The erasure of Islam from American history makes it convenient to label candidates as being un-American by pointing to their faith. Cesari claimed that some opponents of President Obama are leery of attacking Obama “for color or race, but see it as being okay to attack him for his supposed Muslim background.”
In the long run, the eventual conclusion of the War on Terror will likely help to alleviate some of the Islamophobia faced by Muslim candidates. Because of a lack of interaction between many Americans and Muslims, Cesari believes, “the only proximity [non-Muslim Americans] tend to have is what is projected from what is happening overseas.” From the start of America’s democratic experiment, it has been a common theme that foreign events have generated targeted yet fairly short-lived xenophobia at home. As a result of the Quasi War with France, the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798 allowed the government to imprison or deport aliens at will. In the hysteria of World War I, German newspapers, once commonplace in the Midwest, were driven out of business by protests. During World War II, public opinion turned sharply against German and Japanese immigrants living in the United States. This last event, of course, led to one of the most heinous abuses against immigrants in American history, as the U.S. government placed over 110,000 Japanese-Americans into internment camps.
The fear of Muslims is, in many ways, a result of September 11 and the ongoing war against Islamist terror groups. It is not so much the result of a lack of compatibility between “Muslim values” and “American values,” but rather more or less the product of on ongoing American conflict in the Middle East. Saylor laments that “most people were introduced to Islam on 9/11 with planes smashing into buildings. It takes time to introduce the faces of billions of peaceful Muslims, especially when violent extremists get the majority of the media attention.” If this is taken to be the case, then the current strain of xenophobia may abate once the War on Terror winds down. Just as Americans of German ethnicity were able to find political office after World War II, the prospects for American Muslims holding office will be brighter if and when Islamic terrorism is no longer one of the primary focuses of American foreign policy.
A Tool to Humanize
However, Muslims do not have to wait idly by until U.S. foreign policy changes in order to achieve acceptance; increasing numbers of high-profile Muslims have the capability to slowly humanize practitioners of the religion for the American public. Keith Ellison’s 2007 election as the first Muslim in Congress burst open a floodgate to mainstream recognition. It is no coincidence that it took 231 years for the first Muslim to be elected to Congress, but only one year for the next Muslim, André Carson (D-Ind.), to join him. Muslims serving as leaders improves perceptions of the religion in a powerful way. Muslims serving as leaders in America improve perceptions of the religion in a powerful way by exhibiting a positive side of their faith to other Americans. Saylor is acutely aware of the power that prominent Muslim community leaders can have in humanizing the religion: “Society as a whole must see Islam not through the lens of violent extremism but [rather through] the regular practitioners who are interested in their communities. As a community we have a lot of doctors who are public servants. We must reach a point when people recognize doctors as Muslims, not just violent extremists.”
There are historical precedents to look to for leaders aiding public opinion about a religion. Prior to the 1960s, there were strong fears among the American population that a Catholic president would be loyal to the Pope and not the Constitution. Although John F. Kennedy was held to a higher standard on the campaign trail, once he did take office, he turned fear of Catholicism into a thing of the past. He was particularly effective in assuaging the concerns of the public when he professed his faith in “an America where the separation of church and state is absolute.” Similarly, Muslim politicians today may be held to a higher standard than their Christian peers. Saylor acknowledges that Muslim politicians “know these allegations will be hurled. But you stand up for your country. … Muslims must be shining example of strong morality, family values. They must be shining examples of public service.”
At a 2011 hearing convened by Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) to test the loyalty of the American-Muslim community to the country, Ellison broke down in tears describing the story of Mohammad Salman Hamdani, a Muslim who ran into the World Trade Center on September 11 to save others. Ellison emotionally testified that Hamdani was “an American who gave everything for his fellow Americans.” In an era that at least nominally condemns racism and discrimination, it is considered acceptable to attack 1.3 billion people for their religion. This could be a temporary phenomenon, rather than a permanent bias. Once prejudice against Muslims begins to wane because of external politics, they can follow in the path of other immigrants before them and achieve gradual acceptance. As more Muslims are elected and become more present in institutions, the nonsensical taboo against them may weaken even further, creating a self-reinforcing cycle that may allow Muslims to finally be treated as full Americans.
Source Credit: Wikimedia Commons/Michael McNichol, Library of Congress