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(RNS) As a federal appeals court in Denver considers whether Oklahoma
voters had the right to ban Islamic law in state courts, a coalition of
Muslim groups say they don't want to live under Shariah law in Michigan
or anywhere else.

An umbrella group called the American Islamic Leadership Conference
recently announced its support for a proposed Michigan law that would
forbid state judges from enforcing foreign laws, including Shariah, when
they violate the U.S. Constitution.

The statement said the group recognized that people of faith had the
right to religious arbiters so long as their decisions didn't conflict
with American law.

At the same time, the groups said the Michigan bill would protect
"Muslims and non-Muslims alike from extremist attempts" to use Shariah
to institute a "highly politicized and dangerous understanding of Islam"
in the West.

Said Manda Ervin, one of the nine signatories and head of the
Maryland-based Alliance of Iranian Women: "Many of us fled the Muslim
world to escape Shariah law. ... We do not wish these laws to follow us
here."

While many Muslim organizations have called the anti-Shariah laws
discriminatory and unnecessary, the statement said such bills "protect
and integrate our communities into the fabric of this great nation, by
strengthening our accountability to the laws of the land, and the
constitutions of the various states in which we live."

Many mainstream Muslim leaders and Shariah scholars warn that such
bills dangerously create the impression that Muslim Americans are
demanding that judges give Shariah precedence over the Constitution,
when they are not.

"It's fearmongering and it's reckless," said Abdullahi Ahmed
An-Na'im, an Islamic law professor at Emory University in Atlanta. "It's
ridiculous that state legislatures are wasting time on a law that tells
judges to do what they are already constitutionally bound to do anyway."

Michigan and Oklahoma are among more than 20 states that are
considering laws to ban Shariah in courtrooms. Zuhdi Jasser, executive
director of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy and one of the
statement's signatories, said the group supported the Michigan law
because it only mentioned foreign laws. The group did not support
similar bills in states like Arizona and Oklahoma that singled out
Shariah over other religious laws.

"Once you identify one religion, it becomes a quagmire because you
have to identify all the religions," said Jasser, a leading Muslim
conservative.

Jasser said he did not oppose Shariah per se -- his own marriage
contract and will were drafted after he consulted several imams, he said
-- but opposed the institutionalization of Shariah in U.S. courts.
"We believe the majority of the imams in America who would be
issuing decisions under this system are not ready for modernity," said
Jasser.