During Thursday’s New York City mayoral debate, socialist Zohran Mamdani implied former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is unqualified to be mayor because he hadn’t visited a mosque.
“He had more than 10 years and he couldn’t name a single mosque at the last debate we had that he visited,” Mamdani said, before going on to say that “Muslims … want equality and they want respect! … Can you name a single mosque you went to in 10 years?”
Whether Cuomo has been to a dozen mosques or no mosques matters naught. What matters is that an American politician — in a city that was attacked by radical Islamists less than 25 years ago — apparently has to prove his worth by logging mosque visits.
But this type of pandering requirement is a slap in the face to the founding principles of the nation.
America was founded as nation grounded in a distinctly Christian understanding of human nature: All men are created equal because they are endowed by their Creator with unalienable rights. This claim is rooted in a specifically Christian belief that comes from Genesis 1:27.
John Adams explained why this Christian foundation was so crucial: “One great Advantage of the Christian religion is that it brings the great Principle of the Law of Nature and Nations … to the Knowledge, Belief and Veneration of the whole People.”
The founders understood that our republic requires a governing framework derived from the “law of nature,” and as Adams pointed out, Christianity is the basis for that framework.
That means mass migration from societies with fundamentally different religious and cultural frameworks creates a challenge for the republic. Mamdani’s mosque test applied broadly would force all American politicians to ingratiate themselves with groups whose beliefs are grounded in systems incompatible with the system that sustains self-governance.
Today this may mean visiting a mosque. Tomorrow that could mean adopting policies or positions that conflict with the moral and legal frameworks that underpin the nation. Mass migration, combined with limited to no assimilation, risks gradually bending political norms to accommodate values and belief systems that were never intended to govern America.
Thomas Jefferson and John Adams hinted at the incompatibility of America’s republican virtues with the values of Muslim nations after meeting with the Islamic ambassador about the Barbary states’ inclination to make war upon nations that did them no wrong, after they were informed it was a requirement of the Quran.