Early American toleration debates explicitly extended civil rights to Muslims.

Evidence

For instance, a petition by citizens of Chesterfield County, Virginia to their state assembly argued in 1785, “It is mens [sic] labour in our Manufactories, their services by sea and land that aggrandize our Country and not their creeds…Let Jews, Mehometans, and Christians of every denomination find their advantage in living under your laws.” More famously, Thomas Jefferson rejected an effort to insert “Jesus Christ” into a Virginia bill for religious freedom. He noted, “The insertion was rejected by a great majority, in proof that they meant to comprehend, within the mantle of its protection, the Jew and the Gentile, the Christian and Mahometan, the Hindoo, and Infidel of every denomination.” … In it he promoted the inclusion in public life of all Protestants – whatever their sect – before going a step further: “Nay, if we may openly speak the truth, and as becomes one man to another, neither pagan, nor Mahometan, nor Jew, ought to be excluded from the civil rights of the commonwealth, because of his religion. The Gospel commands no such thing.” — Peter Gottschalk and Gabriel Greenberg, Common Heritage, Uncommon Fear, 46

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Jefferson’s religious freedom legacy and the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom; also the Locke-Atlantic-ideas thread. — connects to: Substantial minorities of Americans endorse curtailing Muslim civil liberties — Arsalan Iftikhar, Fear of a Muslim Planet_ Global…, 756; Locke’s toleration simultaneously depicted Muslims as both dangerous and tolerable; State interests, not religion, defined early US dealings with Muslims. (+2 more)
• SEED: An essay contrasting the inclusive 1785 imaginings of Muslims with later American Islamophobia could be striking.

Broader Connections

• Substantial minorities of Americans endorse curtailing Muslim civil liberties #complicates (0.60) — Arsalan Iftikhar, Fear of a Muslim Planet_ Global…, 756
• State interests, not religion, defined early US dealings with Muslims. #qualifies (0.60)
• Locke’s toleration simultaneously depicted Muslims as both dangerous and tolerable #expands (0.50)
• Anti-Muslim prejudice was deliberately deployed by elites at specific political moments. #complicates (0.50) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 25