Is it unfair for to the American Judical system for a judge to be sworn in under the Quran? I think not, but many critics say it is against what America is founded on.

Taken from BBC.com ~2007~
WASHINGTON - Rep.-elect Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, will use a Quran once owned by Thomas Jefferson during his ceremonial swearing-in Thursday.

Library of Congress’ rare book and special collections division, Mark Dimunation, will walk the Quran across the street to the Capitol and then walk it back after the ceremony.
Ellison, D-Minn., contacted the library about the book last month, Dimunation said.
Some critics have argued that only a Bible should be used for the swearing-in. Last month, Virginia Rep. Virgil Goode (news, bio, voting record), R-Va., warned that unless immigration is tightened, “many more Muslims” will be elected and follow Ellison’s lead. Ellison was born in Detroit and converted to Islam in college.
Ellison spokesman Rick Jauert said the new congressman “wants this to be a special day, and using Thomas Jefferson’s Quran makes it even more special.”
“Jefferson’s Quran dates religious tolerance to the founders of our country,” he added.
An English translation of the Arabic, it was published in 1764 in London, a later printing of one originally published in 1734.
“This is considered the text that shaped Europe’s understanding of the Quran,” Dimunation said.
It was acquired in 1815 as part of a 6,400-volume collection that Jefferson sold for $24,000, to replace the congressional library that had been burned by British troops the year before, in the War of 1812.
“It was a real bargain,” Dimunation said.

Taken from BBC.com ~2005~
N.C. Courts to Allow Swearing In On Quran?

The state’s judges will be asked this week to decide whether witnesses in North Carolina courtrooms can be sworn in on a Quran rather than a Bible.

The move comes after Guilford County judges rejected an offer last week by the Greensboro Islamic center to donate copies of the Quran, the Muslim holy book. The Administrative Office of the Courts will ask the opinion of the state’s judges when they meet this week at judicial conferences in Asheville and Wrightsville Beach, said Dick Ellis, a spokesman for the office.

“We’ll take the input of the judges and bring it together and try to come up with an answer that pleases most people and follows the law,” he said.

That move came after the office got queries on the issue last week.

In a preliminary opinion issued last week, a lawyer for the Administrative Office of the Courts said that state law allows people to be sworn in using a Quran rather than a Bible, Ellis said. But Guilford County judges told officials with the Islamic center Friday that they would not allow that in their courtrooms.

“An oath on the Quran is not a lawful oath under our law,” W. Douglas Albright, Guilford’s Senior Resident Superior Court judge, said earlier in the week.

That decision disappointed Syidah Mateen, who tried to donate the copies of the Quran.

“This is a diverse world, and everybody does not worship or believe the same,” she said.

Ellis said he is not aware of anyone ever being allowed to swear on anything other than the Bible in a North Carolina courtroom.

Anyone who objects to that may take an oath, which means that they raise their hand and affirm to tell the truth.