Editorial: First Amendment protects all faiths – NorthJersey.com
NorthJersey 6:00 a.m. ET June 11, 2017
In this Sept. 23, 2016, file photo, Muslim worshippers pray during a service at the Bernards Township Community Center in Basking Ridge.(Photo: Julio Cortez/AP)
The right to worship, or not to worship at all, is one of the basic principles that has guided this nation since its founding. That right, though, increasingly, has come under siege lately as communities in New Jersey and across the country have tried to stymie Muslims in their efforts to practice their faith as they see fit.
As Staff Writer Hannan Adely reported, Muslims from New York to Minnesota are fighting what they believe to be an ongoing anti-Muslim campaign by filing lawsuits whenever they feel threatened. One such case recently involved Bernards Township in Somerset County. The U.S. Department of Justice announced that Bernards Township will pay $3.25 million to a settle a lawsuit over its denial of a permit to build a mosque.
Part of that settlement requires the township to train, within 180 days, all current and future members of its Planning Board and Township Committee in diversity and inclusion, particularly focusing on Islam and Muslims. It should never have had to come to this, not in diversity-rich New Jersey, and not anywhere in this country where people merely seek a place to pray or worship without feeling threatened.
Now, a new and similar case has surfaced in Bayonne, where a Muslim group filed a federal-discrimination lawsuit in late May after the city rejected its plan to convert an old warehouse on a dead-end street into a mosque. Indeed, as anti-Muslim sentiment has increased including reports of anti-mosque fliers being placed in childrens mailboxes at school Muslim groups have remained undeterred, and more determined than ever to press the issue.
Municipalities around the country should pay close attention to what happened in Bernards Township, said Adeel Abdullah Mangi, an attorney representing Muslim groups in the Bernards and Bayonne lawsuits. The American Muslim community has the legal resources, the allies and the determination to stand up for its constitutional rights in court and will do so.
The U.S. Department of Justice, in a report last year, said there had been a sharp increase in the number of its investigations into religious discrimination involving mosques or Islamic schools over the past six years. The same report noted particularly severe discrimination faced by Muslims in land use.
The founders of this nation were not perfect men, but they knew enough to realize the importance of religious liberty, the practical right of individuals to practice their faith without interference from the state. That right is enshrined in the Constitution, and it is going to stay there. Local municipalities around the country opposed to the building of mosques had better get used to the idea.
Read or Share this story: https://njersy.co/2t8LOrD
See the original post here:
Editorial: First Amendment protects all faiths - NorthJersey.com
- South Bend Stops YouTubers Bid to Revive First Amendment Claim - Bloomberg Law News - May 17th, 2025 [May 17th, 2025]
- Trump Administration Likely Violated American Bar Association's First Amendment Rights - Reason Magazine - May 15th, 2025 [May 15th, 2025]
- Perkins Coie Litigation Team Secures First Amendment Federal Court Win for DEF CON - Perkins Coie - May 15th, 2025 [May 15th, 2025]
- How swiftly power can be weaponized against dissenting voicesincluding the free and open press as protected by the First Amendment - Northeast Valley... - May 15th, 2025 [May 15th, 2025]
- NYUs First Amendment Watch Launches Trump 2.0: Executive Power and the First Amendment - NYU - May 10th, 2025 [May 10th, 2025]
- CCIA Files Amicus Brief Defending the First Amendment Rights of Email Service Providers - CCIA - May 10th, 2025 [May 10th, 2025]
- Zick on executive orders and official orthodoxies First Amendment News 469 - FIRE | Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression - May 10th, 2025 [May 10th, 2025]
- Why Journalists Must Band Together to Defend the First Amendment - PEN America - May 10th, 2025 [May 10th, 2025]
- Youngkin vetoes Confederate tax break roll back, but First Amendment scholar says that might be best - WHRO - May 10th, 2025 [May 10th, 2025]
- Baxter County facing $102,757 payment after losing eight-year First Amendment lawsuit - Mountain Home Observer - May 10th, 2025 [May 10th, 2025]
- DOJ to investigate this new Washington law for first amendment violations - KGW - May 10th, 2025 [May 10th, 2025]
- Judge orders Tufts scholar Rumeysa Ozturk released from ICE detention after serious First Amendment and due process questions - MSN - May 10th, 2025 [May 10th, 2025]
- The First Amendment and the Trump Administration's Anti-DEI Executive Orders - Reason Magazine - May 10th, 2025 [May 10th, 2025]
- Here Is Why Harvard Argues That Trump's Funding Freeze Violates the First Amendment - Reason Magazine - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- Thankfully, Larry David mocks Bill Maher First Amendment News 467 - FIRE | Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- No, Gov. Lombardo, nobody was being paid to exercise First Amendment rights - Reno Gazette Journal - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- Letter from the Editor: The First Amendment shaped my time on the Hill - WKUHerald.com - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- Analysis: Pro-Hamas speech is protected by the First Amendment - Free Speech Center - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- Who Will Fight for the First Amendment? Protecting Free Expression at a Critical Time - - Center for Democracy and Technology - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- What the Doxxing of Student Activists Means For the First Amendment - The Progressive - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- Does Gov. Landrys bid to restrict attorney advertising violate the First Amendment? - Baton Rouge Business Report - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- Harvard invokes First Amendment in US lawsuit over academic control - Times of India - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- Fun with the First Amendment: Why Sarah Palins lawyers are happy, and why Deborah Lipstadt isnt - Media Nation - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- The First Amendment Is Being Rewritten in Real Time - Rewire News Group - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- Criminalizing the Assertion of First Amendment Rights - Law.com - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- Massachusetts First Amendment case: Harmony Montgomerys custody hearing audio to be released - Boston Herald - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- Harvard, Trump and the First Amendment: Will Others Follow Suit? - Law.com - April 25th, 2025 [April 25th, 2025]
- Executive Watch: The breadth and depth of the Trump administrations threat to the First Amendment First Amendment News 465 - FIRE | Foundation for... - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- Rising Wave of Funders and PSOs Stand Up for the First Amendment Freedom to Give - Inside Philanthropy - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- Clear commands of First Amendment precedent: Trump-appointed judge rejects government motion to stay court order allowing Associated Press back into... - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- Distinguished lecture series on First Amendment at URI adds Visiting Professors of Practice Rhody Today - The University of Rhode Island - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- Everything starts with a voice: Understanding the First Amendment - The Tack Online - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- This is an all-out war on the First Amendment - mronline.org - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- The lost right in the first amendment - The Tack Online - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- Zero-tolerance laws on Tennessee school shooting threats raise First Amendment worries - The Tennessean - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- Federal Judge Orders White House to Restore Access to AP, Citing First Amendment - Democracy Now! - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- Does the First Amendment apply to the students in Texas who had their visas revoked? - Fort Worth Star-Telegram - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- Guest Column: Detention of Tufts Student a Brazen Attack on the First Amendment - The Bedford Citizen - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- KU students protest for First Amendment rights - The Washburn Review - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- Trackergate: The First Amendment Fights Back as Schieve and Hartung Face the Music - Nevada Globe - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- A friend's wedding, the First Amendment - Delta Democrat-Times - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- Judge rules against White House in AP's First Amendment case - newscentermaine.com - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- UMass Amherst library hosts webinar on the First Amendment and book banning - Massachusetts Daily Collegian - April 12th, 2025 [April 12th, 2025]
- Kansas Statehouse clownery has torn First Amendment to shreds. Who will tape it back together? - Kansas Reflector - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Is Mahmoud Khalil protected by the First Amendment? - CNN - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- D.C. Media's Gridiron Dinner Features A Toast To The First Amendment --- And Not To The President - Deadline - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Mayors Threat to Close Miami Cinema Over No Other Land Screening Condemned by Film Groups as First Amendment Violation - Yahoo - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- TSA Screeners' Union Sues the Trump Administration for Violating Its First Amendment Rights - Reason - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Kevin McCabe: Why defending the First Amendment means protecting the Second - Must Read Alaska - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Murder the Truth explores the campaign against the First Amendment - The Washington Post - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- The Trump-Musk Administration Is Running Out of Ways to Ignore the First Amendment - Balls & Strikes - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- From Gods to Google: DU Law Professor Sounds Alarm Over First Amendment and Technology Regulation - University of Denver Newsroom - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Intimidating abridgments and political stunts First Amendment News 461 - Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Opinion | The Khalil case is a threat to First Amendment rights - The Washington Post - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Fallout from campus protests sparks debate on limits of the First Amendment - Spectrum News - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Troy Carico: Stabbing the First Amendment in the back in Alabama | - 1819 News - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Donald Trump Is Tearing Up The First Amendment - HuffPost - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Sorry Mahmoud Khalil, Aliens Do Not Have the Same First Amendment Rights as American Citizens - Immigration Blog - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- BREAKING: Bill Nye to headline annual Loyolan First Amendment Week - Los Angeles Loyolan - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Spokane and Bonner county sheriff's offices can no longer hide or delete critical Facebook comments after First Amendment concerns, judges rule - The... - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Paula Rigano: Last time I checked, the First Amendment still stood - GazetteNET - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Trump is using antisemitism as a pretext for a war on the first amendment | Judith Levine - The Guardian - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Professor Can Continue with First Amendment Claim Over Denial of Raise for Including Expurgated Slurs on Exam - Reason - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Free Mahmoud Khalil and protect students exercising their First Amendment rights! - MoveOn's petitions - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Guy Ciarrocchi: The lesson from Covid the experts hate our First Amendment - Broad + Liberty - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Trump Administration Faces Growing Backlash Over First Amendment Concerns and Threats to Free Speech - Arise News - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- The Lobby, Mahmoud Khalil & the First Amendment - Consortium News - March 18th, 2025 [March 18th, 2025]
- Expressive Discrimination: Universities' First Amendment Right to Affirmative Action Part 2 - Reason - March 3rd, 2025 [March 3rd, 2025]
- Inside Israel's Plan To Resume the War and 'Eradicate Hamas.' Plus, Trump's Press Pool Takeover Is Not an Assault on the First Amendment. - Washington... - March 3rd, 2025 [March 3rd, 2025]
- Expressive Discrimination: Universities' First Amendment Right to Affirmative Action - Reason - March 3rd, 2025 [March 3rd, 2025]
- OPINION: Attacking the First Amendment and America's free press - Midland Daily News - March 3rd, 2025 [March 3rd, 2025]
- Press pool takeover drowns First Amendment - Freedom of the Press Foundation - March 3rd, 2025 [March 3rd, 2025]
- First Amendment Victory! Wyoming Airport Agrees to Settlement After Rejecting PETA Ad - PETA - March 3rd, 2025 [March 3rd, 2025]
- Our View: Theres nothing murky about the First Amendment - Palestine Herald Press - March 3rd, 2025 [March 3rd, 2025]
- Ohio Universitys complicated history with the First Amendment and student expression - The New Political - March 3rd, 2025 [March 3rd, 2025]
- A free press makes a country free The First Amendment protects the liberty of all - Hawaii Tribune-Herald - March 3rd, 2025 [March 3rd, 2025]
- Whats the First Amendment Got to Do With It? The White Houses Associated Press Ban - Law.com - March 3rd, 2025 [March 3rd, 2025]
- Opinion | The First Amendment Isnt on Trumps Side - The Wall Street Journal - March 3rd, 2025 [March 3rd, 2025]
- Trump Tries To Carve Out a First Amendment Exception for 'Fake News' - Reason - March 3rd, 2025 [March 3rd, 2025]
- MTHS receives its 15th First Amendment Press Freedom Award - MLT News - March 3rd, 2025 [March 3rd, 2025]