Quran worth less than nothing in North Carolina

By: Geoff Rands

Posted: 6/30/05

When Greensboro resident Syidah Mateen tried to donate some copies of the Quran to the courts of Guilford County, N.C., in order to give Muslim witnesses the option of being sworn in on their own holy text rather than the Bible, an interesting situation erupted. Many of North Carolina's state court officials found themselves at odds with their comrades, torn as to whether to allow such a practice.

Near the beginning of this debate, a lawyer from the Administrative Office of the Courts, based in Raleigh, offered his opinion that the state law currently in place allows people to be sworn in using a Quran instead of a Bible.

According to the AP, a week later Judge W. Douglas Albright, who sets the policy for all of the county's nine superior courtrooms, stated, "An oath on the Quran is not a lawful oath under our law." He claims that the law's inclusion of directing one to lay one's hand on the "holy scriptures" means that the Bible is the only book which will fulfill the law. "Everybody understands what the 'holy scriptures' are. If they don't, we're in a mess," Albrecht said.

People may object to swearing on the Bible for many reasons; they may be constitutionalists, they may be atheists, agnostics, or just non-Christian, but they may also be hardcore Christians. To make allowance in the courts for the diverse views of these people, there is the option to give an affirmation, wherein they raise their hands and affirm to tell the truth, and this option exists in North Carolina. However, North Carolina's law requires a person to fear punishment in his or her current life as well as in the hereafter should one give false testimony. I believe that swearing on the Quran, by one who believes that the Quran is the unchanged word of God, would be entirely binding to that person, more so than a simple affirmation. To a nonbeliever, the same oath would be a useless gesture. When someone swears on something, it must mean something to him or her. If they do not respect or revere the object on which they swear, they may as well be swearing on a bag of cheesy poofs.

As things stand now, you can swear on nothing in a North Carolina courtroom, in lieu of a Bible, and it means more than if you were to, as a believer in the Muslim faith, swear on your own holy scriptures. The First Amendment of the Constitution supposedly strips government's ability to pass laws that endorse one religion over another. But there are obviously numerous religions one could wish for one's government to support which are non-Christian. What makes Christianity "better" in this country than any other religion that one may practice? Majority rules?

One problem with "majority rules" is that a great deal of belief in something makes it in no way true. The majority can always be wrong. If America truly wishes to be the melting pot it seemed so proud to be a century or more ago, we must let everyone alone to practice whatever faith they like, we must not tout one group's holy book above another group's, and most of all, we must ensure that our laws, lawyers and lawmakers are truly unbiased.