Letter · Pre-Founding
1689
A Letter Concerning Toleration
John Locke
Locke argues civil authority should tolerate 'Mahometans, Jews, and pagans' — a framework Jefferson and Madison later inherited when drafting religious-liberty protections.
Archive
Primary Source Explorer
Treaties, letters, statutes, and Arabic manuscripts that document the Muslim thread in the American founding.
Showing 17 of 17 sources
- Autobiography · Pre-Founding1734
Some Memoirs of the Life of Job
Thomas Bluett (on Ayuba Suleiman Diallo)London-published account of the Fulani hafiz enslaved in Maryland (1731), whose Arabic literacy secured his freedom and return to Africa in 1734.
- Naval Record · Founding1782
Continental Navy Records — USS Hyder-Ally
Continental Navy / Pennsylvania State NavyA Continental-era warship named for Haidar Ali of Mysore, who fought the same British empire. Captured HMS General Monk in the Delaware Bay, April 1782.
- Letter · Founding1785
Letter to Tench Tilghman on Hiring Craftsmen
George WashingtonWashington instructs his agent that hired workers at Mount Vernon may be of any faith — explicitly naming Muslims and atheists as acceptable.
- Statute · Founding1786
Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom
Thomas Jefferson (drafted 1777, enacted 1786)Jefferson's landmark law disestablishing religion in Virginia; his autobiography records the defeated amendment that would have named it a Christian statute — proof the framers meant to include Muslims.
- Treaty · Founding1786
Treaty of Peace and Friendship (Morocco)
Thomas Barclay & Sultan Mohammed IIISigned at Marrakesh, ratified by Congress in 1787. Still the longest unbroken treaty in U.S. history. Morocco was the first sovereign to recognize U.S. independence (1777).
- Autobiography · Founding1790
Autobiography — on Religious Pluralism
Benjamin FranklinFranklin describes his subscription for a Philadelphia hall open to preachers of any creed — including a hypothetical Mufti of Constantinople. Written c. 1788–1790, describing events of the 1730s.
- Manuscript · Early Republic1819
Portrait of Yarrow Mamout
Charles Willson PealeOil portrait of a free Muslim of Washington, D.C., who purchased freedom and became a property owner. Peale's diary records their conversation about Yarrow's faith.
- Letter · Early Republic1828
Freedom of Abd al-Rahman Ibrahima
U.S. State Department correspondenceThe Fulbe prince, enslaved in Mississippi for 40 years, was freed after the Sultan of Morocco petitioned President John Quincy Adams on his behalf.
- Manuscript · Early Republic1829
The Bilali Document
Bilali MuhammadA thirteen-page Arabic manuscript on Islamic law and daily practice, written by an enslaved West African imam on Sapelo Island, Georgia.
- Manuscript · Early Republic1831
The Life of Omar ibn Said, Written by Himself
Omar ibn SaidThe only known Arabic autobiography by an enslaved person in the United States. Opens with Surat al-Mulk, affirming God's sovereignty over all kingdoms.
- Book · 20th Century1846
Emir Abdelkader & the Naming of Elkader, Iowa
Abdelkader Education ProjectIn 1846, lawyer Timothy Davis named a new Iowa settlement after Emir Abdelkader, the Algerian scholar who later sheltered thousands of Christians in 1860 Damascus. Elkader remains the only US city named for an Arab or Muslim figure.
- Military Record · Reconstruction1863
55th Massachusetts Regiment enlistment (Nicholas Said)
US Army / Commonwealth of MassachusettsEnlistment of Muhammad Ali ben Said in the 55th Massachusetts Colored Infantry; among nearly 300 documented Muslim Civil War soldiers.
- Photograph · 20th Century1929
The Ross, North Dakota Mosque
Community and historical archivesThe first purpose-built mosque in the U.S., erected by Syrian-Lebanese homesteaders; demolished 1979, commemorative mosque rebuilt on the site in 2005.
- Building Record · 20th Century1934
Mother Mosque of America
Islamic Center of Cedar RapidsOldest surviving purpose-built mosque in North America; on the National Register of Historic Places.
- Event Record · 20th Century2007
Ellison oath on Jefferson's Qur'an
Library of CongressThe first Muslim member of Congress takes his ceremonial oath on Thomas Jefferson's 1764 copy of George Sale's Qur'an translation.
- Book · 20th Century2013
Bengali Harlem and the Lost Histories of South Asian America
Vivek Bald (Harvard University Press)Documents Bengali Muslim sailors who settled in U.S. port cities and married into African American and Puerto Rican communities.