News Versus
History
By Steve Casey
Stonewall, LA
The
fact that Americans are not the students of history
they once were has allowed major national headlines
of the past few weeks to go unchallenged.
Keith Ellison from Minnesota has been hailed as
the first Muslim elected to Congress. This is
not true. The first Muslim elected to Congress
was John Randolph of Virginia, who served in Congress
from 1799-1834. During his political career, Randolph
was befriended by Francis Scott Key, author of
the "Star Spangled Banner," and president
of the American Sunday Union – a position
he held for 55 years. Through the influence of
Key, Randolph later converted to Christianity.
But, the fact remains, when he was elected to
congress, Randolph was Muslim.
A second irony in the news vs. history of this
event was that there was much to do about Ellison
being sworn into office with his hand on a Qur’ran
that had been owned by Thomas Jefferson. That
copy of the Qur’an had a very interesting
history, which apparently Ellison did not know.
In 1784, Jefferson was part of a delegation of
Americans sent to negotiate with the Barbary Powers,
which consisted of four Muslim countries - Tunis,
Morocco, Algiers, and Tripoli. These groups had
been attacking American merchant ships and enslaving
their crews. The American delegation found that
it was necessary to understand the Qur’an
in order to seek to negotiate with this enemy.
Since America did not have a Navy at the time,
we had no choice but to pay high ransoms and extortion
fees to protect our merchant ships.
While John Adams was President, America developed
a Navy. Then when Jefferson became President,
knowing from experience that negotiations were
not possible, he sent the American Marine Corps
aboard our new Navy vessels to subdue the Barbary
Powers. Facing the force of the new American Navy
and the Marine Corps, three of the Barbary nations
backed down, but Tripoli did not. Therefore, the
American Marines stormed the "shores of Tripoli"
and successfully subdued America’s first
major post-revolutionary enemy. This was done
under Commander-in-Chief, Thomas Jefferson.
For Keith Ellison to take his Oath of Office on
the Qur’an that belonged to Jefferson was
certainly not a compliment to the Muslims.
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