Anti-Shariah Law Bill Dies in Florida Senate

A bill that would have nixed marriage, divorce and custody battles based on foreign law is dead in the Florida Senate—at least for now.

SB 1360 would have prevented Florida judges from enforcing Islamic law, also known as shariah law, as well as laws from other nations. The bill passed the house by a 92-94 margin but died in the Senate.

Perhaps ironically, the bill was opposed and lobbied against by both the Council on American Islam Relations and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), whose mission is to stop the defamation of the Jewish people. In fact, ADL director Abraham Foxman argued that the bill’s passage would have been “harmful to the religious freedom of all Floridians, including observant Jews.”

“The defeated law and others proposed by several state legislators are meant to make it clear that disputes heard in religious alternative courts must not contradict or interfere with the administration, application, or exercise of state and federal constitutional law, and either party has the right to immediate redress in the civil secular court system for enforcement of those rights. These proposed legal guidelines do not prohibit the use of other religious laws—only sharia law,” JanSuzanne Krasner wrote in the American Thinker.

But should shariah law be allowed in America? Should the punishment for crime be public caning and flogging—and even beheading? How about stoning or amputation of a head or foot for stealing? Crucifying and hanging for blasphemy? Killing in the name of family honor?

“The evidence of extreme female and child subjugation in Islamic shariah law should be enough to justify strong American non-partisan support in favor of banning shariah courts without jeopardizing the other religious courts’ status,” Krasner wrote. “Those religious leaders fearing that Halakhah or Canon laws are threatened by banning shariah law need only to take a look at the inherent unconstitutionality of shariah laws before condemning the proposed legislation.”