"What concerns me is the fact that the end all of Shariah compliant financing is Shariah law, " said Cassara.

CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Center For Security Policy

Islamic financing differs from conventional financing in its adherence to Shariah, or Islamic law, which among other things bans the charging of interest.

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The president of the Ontario Medical Association was only going a step further when last year he denounced the 1984 law as stifling innovation and barring new financing options (translation: fees for acute care).

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In the 1974 law, Congress had tried to set up a tightly controlled system for financing campaigns: the government would monitor and regulate both the inflows and the outflows of money.

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Thus, I fear the end result of allowing third-party financing to flourish is a slow but steady shift away from the traditional understanding of law as a profession toward a conception of law as just another money-making venture, where the investors inevitably call the shots.

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This legislation became Public Law 105-118 on November 26, 1997 in the Foreign Operation, Export Financing, and Related Programs Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year 1998.

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Partly just because commercial contracts can be simpler when done that way: but also because so much of the financing is done through London and things just happen to get done that way, money and law being organised in the same place.

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One reason for New York's low interest level: European and Asian governments have been eager to change regulations to adapt to and attract Islamic finance--for example, Britain struck down a law that double-taxed homebuyers who used a murabaha, a two-part Islamic financing structure, rather than a mortgage.

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