Quietly nestled on Alabama’s ballot on Election Day at the top of a list of proposed amendments was Amendment Number One, a measure that would ban the application of “foreign law” in Alabama when it would violate the rights of the state’s citizens. The measure overwhelmingly passed, and at the surface seems like a legitimate amendment. Voters may have glazed over it because the wording seems benign:
Proposing an amendment to the Constitution of Alabama of 1901, to prohibit the State of Alabama from giving full faith and credit to public acts, records, or judicial proceedings of another state that violate the public policy of the State of Alabama and to prohibit the application of foreign law in violation of rights guaranteed natural citizens by the United States and Alabama Constitutions, and the statutes, laws, and public policy thereof, but without application to business entities. (Proposed by Act No. 2013-269)
No one wants any laws to violate Alabamans’ rights, right? That is all the amendment appears to ensure, but in context, it may have some unintended consequences. Foreign law often does need to be interpreted in U.S. courts. There are private disputes relating to foreign or religious law that often need to be settled in the U.S. and there are cases that are litigated in Alabama but are governed by the law of another jurisdiction, Vox notes. Marriages and adoptions that occurred outside the country but came to Alabama are a good example.
All this falls under “choice of law,” the notion that courts have to reconcile the differences between the relevant laws between two jurisdictions if a case involves them. Since this is so common, Alabama’s Amendment One could be redundant or problematic, depending on how courts interpret it.
So why was this amendment on the ballot in the first place if it’s so questionable? The amendment appears to a revision of one that didn’t make it onto the ballot in 2012. That amendment, introduced by Alabama State Senator Gerald Allen, was known as the Sharia Law Amendment, specifically targeting Islamic law in an effort to prohibit its use in judicial decisions. A similar measure in Oklahoma was struck down by an appeals court on the grounds that it was unconstitutional.
After his first measure failed, Allen reintroduced the measure without any explicit reference to Sharia law, though the media is still talking about it as if it is the Sharia Law amendment. The amendment that Alabama voters actually passed on Tuesday is about all foreign law.
But let’s talk about Sharia law. What is it? Is it foreign? Does it pose a threat to the United States judicial process? Simply put, Sharia law is a set of rules aggregated from the Quran, the Islamic holy book, and the hadith, the teachings of the Islamic prophet Muhammad. While it does come from sacred sources, there is no single codification of Sharia law, leaving the interpretation of what is or isn’t Sharia law up in the air, and usually in various courts’ hands. Different Muslim-majority countries apply it in different ways. Generally, it encompasses everything from finance to marriage to prayer. Theoretically, there are instances where Sharia law and U.S. law coincide (for instance, murder is prohibited under both). So you can see why blanket bans on Sharia law are laughable, and why the ACLU denounced the idea that “anything Islamic is un-American.”
In fact, to say that anything Islamic is automatically un-American may be un-American itself. After all, so much of this nation’s history is inextricably linked to religious freedom. You probably didn’t learn this in your eighth grade civics class, but Thomas Jefferson owned a Quran. Yes, Thomas Jefferson, founding father, author of the Declaration of Independence, and third U.S. president. A 2013 book by Denise A. Spellberg details Jefferson’s role as an advocate to allow Muslims and all religious groups the ability to hold citizenship and public office.
Whether or not Amendment One was an attempt to bring back the Sharia Law Amendment, maybe only the Alabama lawmakers who approved it know. But one thing remains clear. The United States is not a legal island. It is influenced by foreign and religious law and it’s often necessary to use those laws for the country to carry on its judicial process.