When John Dickinson, delegate to both the Continental Congress and Constitutional Convention, described the advancement of nations, he (mistakenly) noted that the Portuguese arrival in India disrupted the advent of Muslim power. This proved providential since “there [is] the least reason to question, that they would have strenuously employed the increase of wealth and power in their favourite design of reducing all Christendom to the same miserable slavery, with which by their oppressive superstition, so many celebrated parts of it, including the Birthplace of its religion, have already been overwhelmed.”
Evidence
However, Jews weren’t marching armies into Christian capitals. They were not a threat to the elites in the way the Muslim empires were. Thus, as Richard Southern suggests, it was easy for Christianity to dismiss the Jewish challenge because of the “economic and social inferiority of the Jews.” In other words, Jews did not have the social, economic, or political power to threaten Christendom. — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 65 (
#qualifies, via linked claim)
While the framers disagreed about and hotly debated matters ranging from the breadth (or limits) of federal power to the sovereignty of the states, anti-Muslim animus was not a wedge issue. It was a matter that unified the fiercest rivals at the Constitutional Convention and beyond. — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 165 (
#contradicts, via linked claim)
Categorization
- XREF: connects to: Medieval Christendom defined itself by expelling threatening forces beyond its perimeter; The Portuguese era uniquely shaped African ethnic influence in the Americas — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 561; Although Britons in India differed from Americans because of the active (if exaggerated) threat to their political order, both shared a conviction regarding two alleged qualities of Islam that made it a perennial menace: the proclivity of Muslims to spread their religion and to do so violently. In their reflections on the proselytizing power of Muslims – an issue among Europeans since at least the eighth century when predominantly Christian north Africa and Spain converted almost entirely to Islam – Americans and Britons almost universally explained mass conversion as the result of coercion. (+3 more)
Related
- American founders framed Muslim power as a mortal threat to Christendom (similarity 0.86)
- Enlightenment-era American statesmen framed Islam as implacably hostile to all Christendom. (similarity 0.85)
- Anti-Muslim animus united Federalists and Republicans at the Constitutional Convention. (similarity 0.81)
- Christians read celestial portents as harbingers of Muslim invasion. (similarity 0.79)
Broader Connections
- Although Britons in India differed from Americans because of the active (if exaggerated) threat to their political order, both shared a conviction regarding two alleged qualities of Islam that…
#expands(0.70) - Islam’s demonization varied with its military threat to Christendom
#qualifies(0.55) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 65 - Anti-Muslim animus united Federalists and Republicans at the Constitutional Convention.
#contradicts(0.40) — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 165