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The Islamic Center of Murfreesboro is an Islamic community organisation located in the town of Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Established in the early 1980s, the ICM supports about a thousand congregants at its mosque in Murfreesboro, drawn from local permanent residents and students at the Middle Tennessee State University.

By 2009 the ICM's growth meant that its existing mosque and community center in central Murfreesboro became increasingly inadequate for the number of worshippers it had to support. The ICM bought a vacant lot on the outskirts of Murfreesboro and submitted plans to build a new community center and mosque on the site. Although the plans were approved unanimously by the local county planning commission, they sparked intense opposition from some local residents and other anti-Islam activists. Rival demonstrations were held in the town to express support and opposition to the mosque project.

During the following two years, the mosque site was subjected to vandalism and arson, and the ICM was accused by a number of right-wing politicians, commentators and activists of supporting terrorism and of plotting to overthrow the US Constitution and impose Sharia law. Opponents of the mosque project sued to block its construction, arguing that Islam was not a religion. The building was finally permitted to open in time for the end of Ramadan in August 2012 after a US federal court lifted a county court's prohibition on the new mosque receiving a certificate of occupancy.

Background

Murfreesboro is a town of about 100,000 people located in Middle Tennessee about 30 miles south of the state capital, Nashville. Although the area's population is dominated by white conservative Christians, in recent years the local Muslim population has grown substantially to about 25,000 people. The increase has been driven by the arrival of refugees from Somalia and Kurds from Iraq, who were resettled there by the federal government after fleeing the repression of Saddam Hussein after the first Gulf War. Middle Tennessee now has the largest population of Iraqi Kurds in the US.

Established in 1982, the Islamic Center of Murfreesboro (ICM) formerly occupied a building of 2,100 square feet located on Middle Tennessee Boulevard near Middle Tennessee State University. Its congregation consisted of about 250-300 local families and 400-500 Muslim students from the university – in total, about 1,000 people. By 2009, the congregation had outgrown the space available. Prayers were held in a poorly ventilated 1,200 square foot room while women, who worship separately from men, had to use a converted garage nearby to watch the proceedings on closed-circuit TV. Many worshippers frequently had to stand in the parking lot during prayers.

The ICM began looking for a new location in March 2009. Members raised about $600,000 to fund the construction of a new building that would include a mosque, school, swimming pool and cemetery. In November 2009, the ICM purchased a property at the intersection of Bradyville Pike and Veals Road on the outskirts of Murfreesboro, about 4 miles (6.4 km) from its existing location in the town center, at a cost of $320,000 cash. A sign advertising the "Future Site of Islamic Center of Murfreesboro" was put up on the vacant lot but in January 2010 it was vandalised during the holiday weekend leading up to Martin Luther King, Jr. Day when someone spray-painted the words "NOT WELCOME" on the sign. The local newspaper, The Daily News Journal, condemned the vandalism as "a sign of stupidity" and commented that "for someone to paint such an idiotic message on the center's billboard is a clear sign that we have some backwards nuts in our midst." The sign was replaced but was subsequently ripped up and destroyed.

Planning controversy

In April 2010, the ICM sent the Regional Planning Commission of Rutherford County a request for the approval of the construction of a 52,000 square foot building on the Veals Road lot. The Commission's next meeting, and the proposals, were advertised in advance in the print and online versions of the Murfreesboro Post newspaper. The Commission unanimously approved the plans at its monthly meeting on May 24, 2010. County law did not require public hearings on religious construction projects and took a "use-by-right" approach, under which all that was needed for approval was a satisfactory set of plans, the approval of the commission at a single public meeting and the advertisement of that meeting in advance in a local newspaper. Other local religious buildings, such as the 80,000 square foot World Outreach Church, had been approved on a similar basis. Additionally, federal and state law made it all but impossible for local government bodies to deny building permits for religious institutions.

Although the application process attracted little comment at the time, a controversy broke out after the ICM's plans were approved. At the Commission's next meeting on June 17, 2010, more than 600 people, some wearing Christian- or patriotic-themed clothes, turned out to protest its approval of the ICM's plans. Many said they had only become aware of the plans after they had been approved. Opponents were harshly critical both of the ICM and of Islam itself. The World Outreach Church's pastor, Allen Jackson, told the meeting: "We have a duty to investigate anyone under the banner of Islam". Local residents quoted by the media claimed that Muslims "seem to be against everything that I believe in, and so I don't want them necessarily in my neighborhood spreading that type of comment", and "We are fighting these people, for crying out loud, we should not be promoting this." Other residents complained that the new mosque would have a harmful effect on traffic and housing values, noting that it was located in a primarily residential area. Commission officials rejected the criticism, stating that the plans met zoning requirements and that the law did not allow them to reject a project on religious grounds.

The controversy gained national currency soon afterwards when it was taken up by Lou Ann Zelenik, a Tennessee Republican Party candidate for a vacant seat in Tennessee's 6th congressional district. In a statement issued on June 24, 2010, Zelenik denounced the planned mosque as "an Islamic training center" that was not a bona fide religious institution but a political one "designed to fracture the moral and political foundation of Middle Tennessee". She declared: "Until the American Muslim community find it in their hearts to separate themselves from their evil, radical counterparts, to condemn those who want to destroy our civilization and will fight against them, we are not obligated to open our society to any of them."

Another Republican, Ron Ramsey, the Lieutenant Governor of Tennessee questioned whether Islam is "actually a religion, or is it a nationality, way of life, cult or whatever you want to call it" and described it as resembling "a violent political philosophy more than peace-loving religion." His comments, made in the runup to a Republican primary election, were strongly criticised by a spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Murfreesboro's local state Senator, Bill Ketron, subsequently introduced what The American Prospect described as "one of the most extreme anti-Sharia-law bills in the country", authorizing the state attorney general to designate "Sharia organizations" and imposing a 15-year jail term on anyone convicted of supporting such an organization. The law was passed, though the state legislature took out direct references to Sharia and Islam.

In mid-July 2010, supporters and opponents of the mosque organised rival marches to the Rutherford County courthouse. Around 800 people turned up, with about the same number on either side. Supporters organised by a group called Middle Tennesseans for Religious Freedom promoted slogans such as "Freedom of religion means freedom for all religions", while opponents circulated a petition asking the planning commission to overturn its decision and expressed concerns that the mosque's members wanted to overthrow the US government and impose Islamic law. The mosque's opponents wore "Vote for Jesus" t-shirts, carried signs with slogans such as "Keep Tennessee Terror Free", chanted "USA! USA!", conducted Christian group prayers and heard anti-mosque pastor Dusty Ray of the Heartland Baptist Church telling them, "Lord, we're trying to stop a political movement."

Televangelist Pat Robertson weighed in during August 2010, telling his TV audience, "You mark my word, if they start bringing thousands and thousands of Muslims into that relatively rural area the next thing you know they're going to be taking over the city council." As the barrage of criticism from right-wingers continued, the ICM received a series of threatening and offensive anonymous phone messages such as, "You need to leave American soil. You are not wanted here", and "Your 'religion' is a sham .... My God says you will be crushed in the end."

Litigation and attacks against the ICM

The Planning Commission gave final approval in early August 2010 and on August 20, contractors broke ground on the site. However, on August 28, an arsonist doused four excavators with an accelerant and set one on fire, destroying it. The incident was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and a $20,000 reward was announced for information leading to the arrest of the perpetrators. Although the attack did not substantially delay the construction project, it had the effect of worsening local tensions. Tennessee's governor, Phil Bredesen, responded to the incident by calling on state residents to "please have great respect for anyone's religious preferences and their rights to practice those in the United States" while fellow Republican Sue Myrick, a North Carolina member of the United States House of Representatives, called the attack "un-American".

The planning commission's September 17, 2010 meeting was dominated by supporters of the mosque, who said that they represented the majority opinion in Murfreesboro and expressed concern that the controversy was hurting the town. One of the most influential supporters was Ernest G. Burgess, a Republican former mayor of Murfreesboro and an elder at the North Boulevard Church of Christ, who argued that it was a matter of principle to uphold the constitutions of the United States and the state of Tennessee. However, the following day, several opponents of the ICM filed a lawsuit against the county to block the mosque's construction.

The litigation was spearheaded by a local lobbyist, Laurie Cardoza-Moore, who demanded that the Rutherford County sheriff investigate a supposed conspiracy linking the mosque with Islamic militants in Somalia and Gaza. In an interview on Comedy Central's The Daily Show, she said that her campaign against the mosque "has nothing to do with religion, it's about stopping the advancement of radical Islam in the United States of America" and claimed that 30 per cent of Muslims were terrorists. The most prominent of the plaintiffs was Kevin Fisher, an anti-mosque activist who had led the July protest march. He claimed that the planning commission had improperly rushed the application process in an attempt to avoid a panic among the local population - a claim that was dismissed by the director of the commission. He had walked out of the planning commission's meeting the previous day, telling the Murfreesboro Post newspaper, "All I heard was this socialist garbage being spewed by the pro-mosque crowd. It was too much. The things that they represent offend me."

The plaintiffs asked for a temporary restraining order to halt construction and the voiding of the construction permit, arguing that the planning commission had broken state law by not giving adequate notice of the meeting at which the ICM's building plans had been approved. They also claimed that the project put local residents at risk because "there was considerable evidence of elevated risks to the public safety of citizens of Rutherford County from the proposed ICM compound." They argued that they "have been and will be irreparably harmed by the risk of terrorism generated by proselytising for Islam and inciting the practices of sharia law," which, they claimed, "advocates sexual abuse of children, beating and physical abuse of women, death edicts, honour killings, killing of homosexuals, outright lies to Kafirs (those who don't submit to sharia law), Constitution-free zones, and total world dominion."

The Anti-Defamation League intervened in the case, Estes v. Rutherford County Regional Planning Commission, to support the mosque on the grounds that the plaintiffs were seeking to unjustifiably interfere with the builders' religious freedoms. The ADL's amicus brief pointed out that the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA) requires courts to "apply a strict standard for reviewing laws that substantially burden religious exercise." The United States Department of Justice also submitted an amicus brief to support the county's position. As well as reiterating the requirements of RLUIPA, the Justice Department's brief affirmed that Islam was protected under the First Amendment to the United States Constitution and emphasized that mosques should be treated no differently from churches or synagogues. The local U.S. Attorney, Jerry Martin, commented that the suggestion by the plaintiffs that Islam was not a religion was "quite simply ridiculous."

Despite this, the plaintiffs' lawyer spent six days trying to convince the court that Islam should not be considered a religion and that the mosque was not entitled to religious land use zoning regulations "because these are the same people who flew jets into the World Trade Center on 9/11." The lawyer, Joe Brandon Jr, called a series of non-expert witnesses including anti-Islam activist Frank Gaffney, accused the ICM of being linked to terrorism, and claimed that its members wanted to impose Sharia law on the United States and thereby legitimise "beating their wives, sexually abusing children and seeking to fly the flag of Sharia over the White House". The proceedings were criticised by the county's attorney as a "circus". The media compared the case to the Scopes Monkey Trial, held in Tennessee in 1925, at which evolution was effectively put on trial, while Miami Herald columnist Leonard Pitts characterised the mosque's opponents as a "clownish band of bigots".

The lawsuit was denied on November 17, 2010 by Rutherford County Chancellor Robert Corlew, who ruled that he did not believe that the county had "acted illegally, arbitrarily or capriciously" in approving the plans. He said that there were some legitimate concerns about the county's public notice requirements and suggested that they should be reviewed, but found that the ICM's members did not adhere to extremist religious ideas. In his ruling, he dismissed the plaintiffs' claims that "Kevin Fisher, an African American Christian, would be subject to being a second-class citizen under Sharia law; Lisa Moore would be targeted for death under Sharia law because she's a Jewish female; Henry Golzynski has been harmed because he lost a son fighting in Fallujah, Iraq, by insurgents pursuing jihad as dictated by Sharia law."

Controversy over the mosque continued despite the failure of the lawsuit. In July 2011, Herman Cain, a former pizza tycoon and candidate for the 2012 U.S. Republican Party presidential nomination, told Fox News viewers that residents of Murfreesboro should have the right to reject the mosque, arguing that "it's not a mosque for religious purposes". His remarks were strongly criticised by commentators. The ongoing controversy had an impact both on the building project, with some contractors becoming hesitant to help, and on local community relations. According to Professor Saleh Sbenaty of Middle Tennessee State University, a board member of the ICM, "kids asking their mothers who have head scarves not to go to the malls because they're scared of seeing their mom being harassed" while adults had become "afraid to come to the mosque and pray." One contractor told ICM officials that although he needed the work, "I don't want to get on bad terms with my preacher." The ICM had to pay significantly more for the project because of contractors' reluctance to work on it, as well as having to hire a security guard to protect the Veals Road construction site and installing a security system in its existing building.

Although Corlew had rejected the initial lawsuit, in September 2011 he issued a final opinion in which he granted the plaintiffs permission to challenge whether the county's approval of the mosque had violated open meeting laws. A few days later, an anonymous caller left a bomb threat on the ICM's voicemail, accompanied by "extreme profanities and derogatory remarks toward Muslims." Federal authorities later arrested and charged Javier Alan Correa, a 24-year-old resident of Corpus Christi, Texas.

Further litigation and federal intervention

In the fall of 2011, seventeen plaintiffs filed a lawsuit against Rutherford County alleging that it had violated Tennessee's open-meetings law. Their attorney also tried to argue that the approval of the mosque violated their constitutional rights on the grounds that "mosque members were compelled by their religion to subdue non-Muslims." This was rejected by Chancellor Corlew, leaving the question of whether there had been sufficient public notice for the planning commission's meeting of May 24, 2010 as the only remaining issue to be decided. Nonetheless the plaintiffs' attorney tried to expand their case to cover wider issues, seeking to compare the mosque unfavourably to a neighboring Baptist church: "Are you aware of any information linking Grace Baptist Church to organizations that call for the killing of Americans?" Because the Islamic Center was not named as a defendant, its members were unable to defend themselves in court against such accusations. If the case went against them, they would be forced to seek fresh approval in a climate that had become intensely hostile towards them.

The issue of whether adequate notice had been given was complicated by the fact that Tennessee law did not define what would count as adequate, and the issue had never been satisfactorily settled in court. The county contended that the notice that had been given – an advertisement in the Sunday edition of the local free newspaper and on that paper's website – met the requirements of the law. Its attorney, Josh McCreary, noted that the approval of the mosque had been a routine matter that had not been controversial at the time, and that the public controversy had been stirred up by the plaintiffs after the fact to make the situation "notorious". He told the court: "In this instance, everything they are relying on to prove this is a matter of pervasive public importance came after the lawsuit was filed".

Chancellor Corlew ruled in favor of the plaintiffs on May 29, 2012, finding that the county had not given adequate public notice to the planning commission's meeting. The ruling found that only about 196 copies of the Murfreesboro Post newspaper, in which the meeting was advertised, had been distributed in unincorporated areas of Rutherford County, where a third of the county's population lived. The county had also failed to advertise the meeting on its website or local cable channel, which officials acknowledged had been an oversight. Corlew stated in his opinion that because of the great public interest in the mosque, the county should have taken extra steps to make the public aware of the meeting. Although the ruling voided the planning commission's approval, the judge noted that the commission was free to reconsider the issue and come to a fresh decision as long as it was taken for "non-discriminatory reasons."

The judge did not order a halt to the mosque's construction, which was by that point nearly finished, but its opponents returned to court to ask for the construction to be suspended. Their bid was rejected by Chancellor Corlew, who ruled that a separate motion would need to be filed. The opponents' subsequent motion to halt construction was denied by Corlew on June 13 but he ruled that the county could not issue the ICM with an occupancy certificate because he had previously voided the approval of the site plan. On June 22, the county appealed the judgment and requested that the court lift the injunction on issuing an occupancy certificate. The request was turned down on July 2, meaning that the full court process – taking up to a year – would be required.

On July 18, however, the US Department of Justice filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee, charging the county with violating the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act. The ICM also filed suit in the same US District Court. The Justice Department's filing criticized Corlew for treating the mosque unequally by imposing a heightened requirement of notice of a kind which other religious organizations had not been subjected to. Judge Todd Campbell issued a temporary restraining order requiring the county to start the process of issuing an occupancy permit. In response, Chancellor Corlew stayed his own actions under the doctrine of Federal preemption but made it clear that he had been preparing to order the full cessation of construction, had the federal authorities not stepped in. The mosque's opponents also filed a motion in the federal district court, claiming that Judge Campbell had accepted "false allegations" and once again questioning whether Islam was a religion.

Opening

After final safety checks, the new mosque finally received a temporary certificate of occupancy on August 7, during Ramadan. The building opened on August 10 for Friday prayers. Although there were concerns about public safety in the wake of recent violence against Sikhs and Muslims elsewhere in the country, the occasion passed off peacefully. Only one opponent turned up, wearing an "I Love Jesus" hat and telling reporters that he was there to "represent the Christians". Ossama Bahloul, the mosque's imam, told worshippers, "This day is a day of forgiveness. We want to say that we have nothing bad in our heart against anyone."

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