Nelson Rockefeller Quotes
I do not believe it right for one group to impose its vision of morality on an entire society.
Rockefeller, Nelson A. "Veto of Assembly Bill 11959." Public Papers of Nelson A. Rockefeller, Fifty-Third Governor of the State of New York, 1972. State of New York, 1972.
This quotation illustrates that a narrow orthodox view of Islam is not the only one in Arab nations. Khaled is not an obscure cleric, but a popular television personality. While his views are considered heresy by many orthodox Muslims, the narrow view is by no means universal. Orthodox Islamists believe that God has commanded that all mankind be Muslims and the ones who are not are either ignorant so need to be “educated”, or evil and therefore should be killed. However, Muhammad ordained that an exception should be made for “Children of the Book”—Jews and Christians who revere the Old Testament. This was at a time when Christians would not allow any other form of worship but Christianity. Christianity, Judaism and most other religions have become tolerant of other religions and allow open alternative worship. Islam which early on led the way to tolerance, has in many countries gone back to the intolerance that existed amongst many Christians at the time of Muhammad.
Fiji is a nation which at the time was beset with ethnic strife and tension. In addition to the religious tension there were Indian immigrants who tended to be economically more successful than the indigenous Fijians. There was an English tradition from the days of being a British Colony and the traditional tribal leaders and chiefs were being disenfranchised by modern democratic structures. The military was not under the control of the civilian government and coups pitted some ethnic groups against others.
Dewey was opposing the concept of “released time” from the public schools for religious instruction.
He was referring to whether or not Iraq should be a Muslim state.
After Independence, the original credo of the Indonesian hero and leader was slowly ignored. The Muslim majority established Islam as the dominant religion and began to create laws that discriminated against Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, and Jews. The ethnic Chinese had been very successful in business and commerce and soon they were discriminated against and even physically attacked in Pogroms.
At the time Turkey was the only Muslim majority country where there was coexistence with secularism but with Christians and Jews as well. Ataturk, the great Turkish leader, turned Turkey around, modernized it, Westernized it, and made it a secular state with freedom of Religion, much like the United States. However, Erdogan’s party was constantly trying to make the state more Islamic as his electoral base were the poor, religious, Muslims.
Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller was an American businessman and politician who served as the 41st vice president of the United States from December 1974 to January 1977, and previously as the 49th governor of New York from 1959 to 1973. He also served as assistant secretary of State for American Republic Affairs for Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman (1944–1945) as well as under secretary of Health, Education and Welfare under Dwight D. Eisenhower from 1953 to 1954. A grandson of billionaire John D. Rockefeller and a member of the wealthy Rockefeller family, he was a noted art collector and served as administrator of Rockefeller Center in Manhattan, New York City.
