ACLU to sue Twin Cities charter school that caters to Muslims

[question everything]

Source: Star Tribune

The American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota filed suit Wednesday against a publicly funded charter school alleging that it is promoting the Muslim religion and is leasing school space from a religious organization without following state law. The suit was filed in U.S. District Court in Minneapolis against Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy, known as TIZA, and the Minnesota Department of Education, which the ACLU says is at fault for failing to uncover and stop the alleged transgressions. The suit names the department and Alice Seagren, the state education commissioner, as co-defendants.

The department investigated the Twin Cities school last year, and the school said it had taken corrective actions in response to concerns about the practicing of religion on campus. TIZA said in a written statement on Wednesday that the school is nonsectarian and in compliance with federal and state regulations. But the ACLU claims the school is using federal and state money to promote religion in violation of the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

(snip)

Founded in 2003 , it receives state per-pupil funding that the state education department expects to total $4.7 million for the current school year. Samuelson said the school has used some government aid money to pay rent to holding companies, which then funneled it to the Muslim American Society of Minnesota and Minnesota Education Trust, a group the ACLU says is a non-profit that also promotes Islam. The school and the society were incorporated on the same day by the same person, which Samuelson said creates a conflict of interest. “They created legal fictions, but it’s the same organization,” Samuelson said. Minnesota law requires that charter schools be non-sectarian in their programs and policies. It allows charter schools to lease from religious organizations, but only if other suitable space is not available, the space rented was built as a school and the state approves of the lease.

(snip)

The suit also alleges that there are prayers on the walls of the school entry and that teachers have participated in student prayer activities. Samuelson said the school has used its website to seek volunteers to lead prayers, and that it requires students and staff to dress in attire that conform to Islamic religion. He also said the school has issued a handbook instructing staff to not discuss what goes on at the school.. The ACLU is not targeting Muslims but defending the U.S. Constitution, whose First Amendment states in part, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion,” Samuelson said. Federal guidelines allow students to pray and organize prayer groups in public schools, but teachers and other school employees may not compel students to pray or actively participate in student prayer while acting in their official roles.



Read more: http://www.startribune.com/local/east/38034459.html

[tekisui]

1. I love the ACLU!

[defendandprotect]

17. Me, too ---

But they do get public money and it hurts the public schools ---

[Realityhack]

44. +1 n/t

[barb162]

50. Me too!

[muntrv]

2. Good. ACLU is consistent in opposition to mixing government & religion.

[chaplainM]

3. "I'll bet the ACLU would never have the guts to sue Muslims!" n/t

[pocoloco]

4. Fuck the aclu!!

Fuck the ac"impeachment is a bad idea" lu!!

[PatrynXX]

15. They have their moments, this isn't one of them

Thin argument and ACLU doesn't understand the term Coexist. Wish there was some way of knowing if the Founders meant that religion, any religion wouldn't face the gauntlet from the government instead of the government avoiding religion altogether.


Taking this argument quite well, I'd assume we'll be kicking the Native American's off the land or forcing them to cut there hair because the schools can't look like they are supporting religion. One can take extremes on this. Way weird for me to be standing up for the Muslim's on this. I'm Christian, Lutheran and not a church goer.

Also a member of the ACLU. But that's how things get changed. I'm just a little out of practice for a rant on ACLU right now. Especially what St Paul did last year.

[Zhade]

39. No, the Founders did NOT mean that religion would be free of challenge from the government.

The first amendment is quite clear: government endorsement of ANY religion or its practices is ILLEGAL. Period.

[Realityhack]

45. No you do not understand constitutional law.

The ACLU has a much better grasp of it.

The founding fathers would not be happy with tax money going to promote a specific religion.

The Muslim group intentionally knowingly blatantly broke the law.

[NeedleCast]

34. Didn't think I'd ever see that on a progressive message board

[Jim Sagle]

37. What kind of Democrat is against separation of church and states?

The ACLU RRRRRRRRRRRAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[barb162]

54. It certainly does.

Imagine what this thread would be like if Catholics or Jews or Protestants were getting special treatment. :eyes:

[whoneedstickets]

5. Bring it on! More Muslim charter madrases....

As these things start popping up around the country, the RWingers and fundies who have been pushing charters and vouchers to kill public schooling may wake up and realize the value of secular public education.

[No Elephants]

52. As well as the value of separation of church and state in general.

[Indenturedebtor]

6. Hah wtg ACLU! And I wonder how many will fawn over Al Jazeera's coverage of this

:popcorn:

[Bozita]

7. A friend taught at a very similar charter in MI about 9-10 years ago.

The lunchroom was divided in two; Tables on one side, prayer rugs on the other.

We did all the math on the school. After all costs were totaled, the woman running the operation ran a profit between $700-800K.

Health insurance was a visit to a local doctor, a cousin of the boss. If a teacher took a sick day, the doctor visit was mandatory.

My pal lasted roughly two months.

[question everything]

13. They can do whatever they want, as long as it is not with tax payers money (nt)

[defendandprotect]

18. They DO GET public money -- !!!

Charter school - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
History|Structure and...|Organizing...|Outside the...
Charter schools are elementary or secondary schools in the United States that receive public money but have been freed from some of the rules, regulations, and statutes that apply to other public schools in exchange for some type of accountability for producing certain...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charter_School - 120k - Cached

[question everything]

19. If ACLU will be successful here, then they should be able to go after

many, similar schools.

[defendandprotect]

23. Presumably, they are reported to them . . . I doubt they track every charter school . ..

[Zhade]

40. Then they're breaking the law.

NT!

[defendandprotect]

49. Are you sure you're familiar with Charter Schools and public money?

Charter school - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
History|Structure and...|Organizing...|Outside the...
Charter schools are elementary or secondary schools in the United States that receive public money but have been freed from some of the rules, regulations, and statutes that apply to other public schools in exchange for some type of accountability for producing certain...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charter_School - 120k - Cached

[progressoid]

8. Wow, suppose we'll hear Hannity and Rush denounce the ACLU for this?

:eyes: They hate them for everything else.

[FatDave]

12. Just what I was thinking.

Freeper heads'll be popping over this one. I mean, who do they hate more? The ACLU or Muslins?

[Shardik]

9. There should be no public funding of any religously based school.

Contrary to popular belief, there is NO state religion... yet. :shiver:

[Veritas_et_Aequitas]

14. Well either that or every religiously based school,

but I suspect we'd run out of money very quickly.

[Zhade]

41. Agreed. And that's what the Constitution says.

NT!

[peacetalksforall]

10. Straight arrow focus. Congratualtions! I like the neutrality of the law and the way the ACLU

proceeds. Though I empathize with what Muslims in the U.S. for what they have to go through, they can't expect to create or receive special privileges that are unlawful if proved.

[Jefferson23]

11. Way to go ACLU, Anthony Romero, the executive director, has done so

much for the ACLU to help expand their ability to take on more cases etc. Although I imagine he would say up front that the Bush Regime helped provide a lot of incentive for people to donate that otherwise would not have, lol. If you can donate, it is a very worthy cause.

[VPStoltz]

16. As long as they piss everybody off - they're doing their job.

[question everything]

21. Right. The way the defended the Nazis' desire to march in Chicago

in a Jewish neighborhood.

(I don't even remember whether that march ever took place..)

[NashVegas]

38. That's What Old School Liberals Do

They give hate groups enough rope to hang themselves.

[Robb]

48. Bingo. /nt

[Sultana]

20. Bravo ACLU

When I first heard this story I was like you've got to be kidding me.

[woo me with science]

22. Good for the ACLU.

I love even-handedness.

[onager]

24. From Egypt, some cultural context (maybe)

Full disclosure: I'm an American and an atheist. I've been in Egypt for more than 3 years now, and also lived in Saudi Arabia for 2 years.

I also tend to be cynical and suspicious when commercialized religion is involved. This line in the article tells me that the people runnng this school know exactly what they are trying to get away with: ...the school has issued a handbook instructing staff to not discuss what goes on at the school.

Having said that, I have to note that many Muslims seem to have absolutely NO concept about a separation of church and state. They just can't get their heads around that idea.

I certainly don't mean to imply they're stupid or willfully ignorant. Many of them are better educated and smarter than me, which now that I think about it is a fairly low standard.

Quite a few times I've tried to explain the Establishment Clause, and the response is usually: "But the United States is a Christian nation. Everybody knows that."

Sometimes the Muslims sound eerily like American Fundie Xians. :-)

This always leads me off into a verbal jungle where I quickly get lost, trying unsuccessfully to explain the difference between what a majority of Americans (claim to) practice, and the actual law in the U.S. Constitution.

One thing that probably leads to the confusion: even in countries seen as "secular" by the West, like Egypt, Islam is usually acknowleged as the official national religion. This is stated unequivocally in Article 2 of the Egyptian Constitution. Which in 1980 was edited to say that sharia law is the source of all jurisprudence.

Not long ago I really had to bite my atheist tongue when I was talking to an Egyptian who spent 2 years in the U.S. He said he was amazed by one thing he noticed in America: that we had all sorts of different people, all races, all religions, etc. And most of the time, we all seemed to get along with one another. (This was right after some horrible religious riots in Egypt between Muslims and Coptic Christians.)

I wanted to say, "That's partly because we leave religion to the person and not to the State." But I kept quiet...remembering that "insulting the nation" is also a serious crime here.

Speaking of that...not too long ago, some tool in the Egyptian Legislature tried to pass a law against "insulting a foreign head of state." He was, of course, referring mainly to a certain shoe-dodging FORMER head of state.

An Egyptian editorial writer asked: "Does that mean we can no longer insult Ehud Olmert?"

:rofl:

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

25. I can't get enough of your "Arabian Nights" posts.

Keep 'em coming!

:yourock:

[question everything]

28. I think that this is the only country that actively works to separate

"church" and state.

Certainly most European countries were part of the Roman Christendom and Muslim countries, well... they are Muslim. It took the Age of Enlightenment to get, at least, Western Europe, to embark on life outside the church teaching.

I think that even with Eastern religions, while not as dogmatic as the big three Abrahamic ones, religion and faith are interwoven in daily life and teaching.

I don't know if this is still the custom in Italy where, after WWII, to prevent new parents from naming their new born son "Benito" or "Mussolini" the law was that only a name from the Book of Saints - whatever that means - could be given.

So I can see why people from other countries would be puzzled by how our First Amendment is so fiercely guarded. Still, once people from other cultures arrive on our shores, or to Western Europe, they should abide by the law of the land. The founder of the Muslim Brotherhood came to New York in the 50s and was enraged by our open society, by the dress of women in the street and went back to Egypt to found an extreme Islamic movement that wants to convert all of us. There are immigrants from Pakistan in Britain, France, Germany and the Netherlands who are enraged at the open, Western society and plot acts of terror. This, we should not tolerate.

[onager]

36. Minor correction...

The Egyptian Muslim fanatic who visited the U.S. and, as you correctly put it, got "enraged" was Sayyid Qutb. You only have to read a little of his writing to see that he was absolutely obsessed with sex. (As are many Muslim fanatics. They are so touchy about THAT topic, they usually threaten to murder anyone who even mentions it. As we said when I was growing up in the South--"The bit dog always hollers.")

Qutb got especially worked up when he went to a church party somewhere out west. Colorado, I think. Kids of opposite gender were dancing together. And IN A CHURCH! Qutb returned to Egypt, where the government spent years trying unsuccessfully to compromise with him. Fanatics don't compromise and Qutb was finally hanged in 1966.

The founder of the Muslim Brotherhood (in 1928) was Hassan el-Banna. He was killed in 1949, shortly after the M.B. assassinated the Egyptian Prime Minister.

Oddly enough his brother, Gamal el-Banna, is a leading progressive Muslim scholar in Egypt: "There is no such thing as an Islamic state. It is impossible to create. Our future lies in a democratic state and it doesn’t have to be a Western democracy. Democracy is not a one-size-fits-all thing."

The quote is from a short article about him in Egypt Today:

http://www.egypttoday.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=2269

[question everything]

56. Thank you for the corrrection

And, yes, fanatics do not compromise and this holds for all religions. This is why when Obama, for example, has been talking about reaching out for the Christian evangelicals, I have often commented about the futility of it. When you claim that you get your marching orders from "god," of course you are not going to compromise. After all, this is what "god" demands.

[Zhade]

42. "many Muslims seem to have absolutely NO concept about a separation of church and state."

Yeah, there's a couple of idiots on DU who argue, WRONGLY, that it doesn't exist.

[HopeHoops]

26. Here's a story FOX will *somehow* manage to overlook.

I bet that really has Hannity's Sponge Bob undies in a twist. Imagine, the terrorist-lovin' ACLU suing a Muslim school. It must be making his head explode. They just can't grasp that fact that the ACLU looks at the circumstances, not the ideology, when deciding to take on a case. Now, if this was a Christian school, FOX would have 24x7 coverage!

[question everything]

29. What, you expect reason from Fox?

Or any logical thinking?

[HopeHoops]

35. About as much as I suspect opening a can of Bud Lite will cause busty babes to come out of nowhere.

Wait, haven't I seen that happen somewhere before?

[harun]

27. They are not promoting Islam, they are practicing it. ACLU will lose this.

[question everything]

30. They establish an atmosphere where every student has to practice it

The Supreme Court banned prayers at school because of "impressionable" young minds. Same holds for any prayer, whether Christian or Muslim.

[AndrewP]

31. Exactly

They can't create an environment where they essentially force the mythological stuff on students with public dollars.

[harun]

33. People can pray anywhere they want, they banned the school directing it.

Big difference.

[Realityhack]

47. But the issue is this school DID direct it.

and promoted it in other ways. For example the posting prayers on the walls. Same as another public school posting the 10 commandments.

[leftynyc]

32. ACLU will win this case

and win it big. Let them push that crap on their own dime.

[Zhade]

43. Uh, no, they're promoting it, which is illegal.

Try again.

[Realityhack]

46. The ACLU tends to pick their cases fairly carefully.

This sounds like a fairly clear case of promoting religion and an intentional cover up because the people knew they were violating the law. They should have opened a private school not a charter school. I think the ACLU has a very good chance of winning this.

[barb162]

55. Muslim prayers on the walls? Come on, that's promotion.

[Political Heretic]

51. The ACLU is the most consistent, impartial defender of the constitution we have out there.

I love them.

[No Elephants]

53. For as little as $35 a year, join the ACLU. Because freedom cannot protect

itself. https://secure.aclu.org/site/Donation2?df_id=2125&2125.donation=form1&s_src=UNW090001C00&s_subsrc=MVT_4sqCtl_0808