For nearly one year now, House Judiciary Chair John Walsh (R-Livonia), has curiously choked back in committee HB 4769 which simply affirms the supremacy of our US Constitution and protects against the application of foreign laws that would deny American citizens and residents the freedoms, rights and privileges guaranteed by our Constitution.  The bill was introduced by Republican Caucus Chair Rep. Dave Agema  (R-Grandville) and is modeled after the American Laws for American Courts legislation that has been enacted in three states,  introduced in some 20 more, and just won unanimous bipartisan passage in the Kansas House and sailed through its Senate.  The bill is needed to stave off unrelenting efforts by transnationalists and their allies to undermine US sovereignty.  

Nationally, the bill has been endorsed by heavy hitters from the Intel and National Security community, veterans and civic organizations, interfaith leaders, think tanks, policy centers and scores of pundits.  All the major GOP candidates for US Senator in Michigan have publicly expressed their support for ALAC and the Republican Women's Federation of Michigan, representing clubs of politically and communally engaged activists from all across the state, last year approved a resolution supporting passage of ALAC legislation. Oakland County Circuit Court Judge Colleen A. O'Brien, a candidate for the Michigan Supreme Court backed by a who's who of state Republicans, told a Farmington forum that foreign laws have no place in American courts.  And AG Bill Schuette inveighed against the threat of incompatible foreign laws at a Romeo gathering last year.

A legislative rally at the state capitol in support of Agema's  ALAC bill May 10 drew a standing room only crowd.  Joining Rep. Agema explain the imperative of ALAC passage were  Cooley Constitutional Law Professor William Wagner, former Oakland County Prosecutor and President and Chief Counsel of the Thomas More Law Center Richard Thompson and Manda Zand Ervin, president of the Alliance of Iranian Women and a founding member of the American Islamic Leadership Coalition.  

The audience cheered the speakers' impassioned pleas to safeguard  the Constitution from foreign laws and doctrines which have no respect for due process, freedom  of religion, free speech, free press, equal protection, and any right of privacy or marriage as specifically defined by the constitution of the state. The measure is needed especially to protect women and children, identified by human rights organizations as the most vulnerable victims of harshly discriminatory foreign laws.

What freedom-loving, non-seditious citizen of the US could object to that?  Few indeed, according to both a Detroit News survey last year (http://apps.detnews.com/apps/forums/newstalk/lettersindex.php?topic=sharia_081311) that showed 78 percent of respondents favoring passage of ALAC to "strengthen our legal system" and a CBS Detroit poll taken just two weeks ago showing an overwhelming margin of  70-30 in support of ALAC. http://detroit.cbslocal.com/2012/05/14/should-michigan-ban-sharia-law/#respond

So why the intransigence from Rep. Walsh, word has it, acting on orders from House Speaker Jase Bolger and Senate Majority Leader Randy Richardville [blocking the companion SB 701 introduced by Sen. Roger Kahn (R-Saginaw)]?  

Could it be capitulation to the hooey emanating from the quarters of CAIR & Co?  CAIR -Council on American Islamic Relations -- was designated an unindicted co-conspirator and identified as a front for the Muslim Brotherhood and part of a domestic network bankrolling Hamas, a US-designated terror organization, in the nation's largest ever terror financing case.  The FBI has since severed ties with CAIR and the US Congress just passed a bill containing a recommendation that the Department of Justice follow suit and also cut ties with CAIR. (http://dailycaller.com/2012/05/14/house-report-urges-justice-dept-to-cut-ties-with-cair/).  The IRS stripped CAIR of its tax-exempt status after the group failed to file required annual reports documenting revenues and expenses and politicians on both sides of the aisle have renounced CAIR.

Most tellingly, CAIR co-founder Omar Ahmad famously told a crowd: ""Islam isn't in America to be equal to any other faiths, but to become dominant. The Koran, the Muslim book of scripture, should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on Earth."

CAIR's howls have been echoed, not surprisingly,  by Rep. Rashida Tlaib and by Victor Begg and the Council of Islamic Organizations of Michigan, as documented previously on Michigan Right by Corinthian Scales http://www.rightmichigan.com/story/2011/8/15/11611/2104.  

Their objections, called "hogwash" by Agema, have been shot down by authoritative sources.  The US Congressional Research Service reviewed the bill and gave it a thumbs up as entirely constitutional and since passage in other states, it has never been challenged in court. The need for ALAC is especially compelling, given that reviews of court records provide extensive evidence that foreign laws and legal doctrines have been introduced into U.S. state court cases  across the country, including, notably, Islamic Shariah law (including in Michigan), in contravention of the Constitution and state public policy.

Indeed Muslim America patriots, many of whom fled repressive regimes for the freedoms of this country, are the loudest supporters of ALAC.  A press release issued by a diverse coalition of American Muslim leaders last year in support of Agema's HB 4769, states:

As American Muslims, we believe that the law should treat people of all faiths equally, while protecting Muslims and non-Muslims alike from extremist attempts to use the legal instrument of Shari`ah (also known as Islamic jurisprudence, or fiqh) to incubate, within the West, a highly politicized and dangerous understanding of Islam that is generally known as "Islamism," or "radical Islam."

We see no evidence that statutes like HB 4769 will adversely impact the free exercise of our personal pietistic observance of Islam, which is not in conflict with the U.S. or Michigan constitutions...

As American Muslims we are conscious of the fact that Muslim Brotherhood legacy groups and other Islamists and their surrogates in the U.S. are trying their best to portray any opposition to manifestations of Shari`ah  law as "racism" and "discrimination against Muslims." However, as a coalition of traditional, liberal and secular Muslim Americans, we denounce this fear-mongering and playing of the race card, which only serves to mask the Islamists' highly politicized agenda."

Manda Zand Ervin, one of the speakers at the Lansing legislative rally to support ALAC, was one of the signatories to the statement by American Muslims speaking out against the encroachment of Shariah law in America and warning of its consequences in Muslim dominant countries, as well as in the UK, where more than 80 parallel Shariah courts have proliferated and contributed to ghettoized, separatist Muslim communities.

"Shari`ah law, wherever it has been applied in the public domain, be it in Iran, Saudi Arabia or Pakistan, has resulted in untold misery and oppression of Muslims, in particular Muslim women, by Islamists and dictators who invoke Shari`ah law to justify their rule," said Ervin. "Many of us fled the Muslim world to escape Shari`ah law and to practice Islam in our personal lives, by moving to the USA and other western countries. We do not wish these laws to follow us here."

It is unconscionable that Rep. Walsh and Sen. Richardville are holding up such critical legislation.  At a minimum, they should not be obstructing the legislative process and should release the bill to the floor for consideration and a vote.  There is NO excuse for not doing so expeditiously, seeing as they have already stalled the measure one full year, when it should have been fast-tracked given the number of other bills of lesser import that have seen the light of day.

Let us hope that Rep. Walsh et al see the light as well.  Dave Agema's election to National Committeeman at last week's state convention was a landslide victory over Saul Anuzis and the entrenched interests of the party machine establishment.  It's high time Republicans show their strong constitution in support of America's Constitution!