"Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, said that a minority of Muslims take second wives, and that Islamic scholars would differ on whether one could do so while living in the United States." He didn't say anything about obeying American law.
Sharia Alert: "Some Muslims in U.S. Quietly Engage in Polygamy," by Barbara Bradley Hagerty for NPR, May 27 (thanks to all who sent this in):
All Things Considered, May 27, 2008 · Although polygamy is illegal in the U.S. and most mosques try to discourage plural marriages, some Muslim men in America have quietly married multiple wives.
No one knows how many Muslims in the U.S. live in polygamous families. But according to academics researching the issue, estimates range from 50,000 to 100,000 people.
[...]
Group member Sarah says that in her native Guinea, the husband springs it on his wife that he's going to marry someone else. Sarah, like the others interviewed for this story, would give only her first name.
"Sometimes he say, 'OK, I am going to be married tomorrow,' or 'I'm going to be married today.' He's going ask you like that. It happened to me," she says.
Sarah begins to cry. Others nod in sympathy. These women are all Muslim. The Koran states that men may marry up to four women. The Prophet Mohammad had multiple wives.
But there's a restriction, says Sally, another group member. The husband cannot favor one woman over another – with his wealth or his heart.
"You have to love them the same way, share everything the same way, equally," says Sally. "Nobody can do that. It's impossible."
Indeed. But that doesn't stop it.
Still, Muslims practice polygamy in the U.S., despite state laws prohibiting it.
Here's how a man gets around the laws: He marries one woman under civil law, and then marries one, two or three others in religious ceremonies that are not recognized by the state. In other cases, men marry women in both America and abroad.
Many women keep quiet for fear of retribution or deportation.
For example, Sally's husband moved to the United States from the Ivory Coast before she did. When Sally joined him, she found he had married someone else in America. But without legal immigration papers, she didn't dare come forward and report him to the authorities.
She said when she arrived in the U.S., her husband and his new wife put her in the basement.
"They told me to cook, clean, do everything. I didn't speak English. And he told me, 'Don't say nothing. You say something, she's going make you deported. And me, I'm going to be in jail.'"
Eventually, Sally left the house with her children, and now works at a hair braiding salon. But that fear of deportation prevents many from leaving their polygamous relationships.
"Legally, they're invisible," says Julie Dinnerstein, a senior attorney for Sanctuary for Families. "If you are the second or third or fourth wife, that marital relationship is not going to be recognized for immigration purposes. It means if your husband is a citizen or green card holder, he can't sponsor you. It means if your husband gets asylum, you don't get asylum at the same time. The man is always going to be in a position of greater power."
Secret Ceremonies
In the past decade, Muslim clerics began to notice that some men who wanted a religious wedding were already married to someone else.
According to Daisy Khan, who heads the American Society for Muslim Advancement and is married to an imam, polygamy is more common among conservative, less educated immigrants from Africa and Asia. It is rarer among middle-class Muslims from the Middle East. She adds that nowadays, imams do background checks on the grooms to make sure they're not already married in their home countries.
Some clerics in the U.S. perform second marriage ceremonies in secret....
They ought to be prosecuted for that, when discovered.
Thanks Dhimmi Watch
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