jQuery post causes loss of carriage returns in a Rails 3.2 app

I have a simple form that inserts different types of footnotes into the body of the text. I'll put one of the clickable types below.

    <%= simple_form_for(@tut_text) do |f| %>
        <%= f.input :content, :input_html => {:class => 'w80pct', :id => "#{@tut_text.id}"} %>
        <%= f.button :submit, 'Update Tutorial Text', :class => 'btn btn-primary btn-large' %>
    <% end %>

    <h4>Add Footnotes:</h4>
    <a href="#" onclick="insertFootnoteMarker('<%= @tut_text.id %>','&reg;', 'page');return false;">
        Registered Trademark:<span class = "foot">&reg;</span>
    </a>

Clicking the link for the footnote causes the following jQuery function to access the textarea and inserts the footnote marker where the caret/cursor is.

function insertFootnoteMarker(areaId,text,reload) {
    $("#spinner").show();
    var text = text+"~"
    var reload = reload
    var txtarea = document.getElementById(areaId);
    var scrollPos = txtarea.scrollTop;
    var strPos = 0;
    var br = ((txtarea.selectionStart || txtarea.selectionStart == '0') ? 
        "ff" : (document.selection ? "ie" : false ) );

    if (br == "ie") { 
        txtarea.focus();
        var range = document.selection.createRange();
        range.moveStart ('character', -txtarea.value.length);
        strPos = range.text.length;
    }
    else if (br == "ff") strPos = txtarea.selectionStart;

    var front = (txtarea.value).substring(0,strPos);  
    var back = (txtarea.value).substring(strPos,txtarea.value.length); 
    txtarea.value=front+text+back;
    alert(txtarea.value);
    var url = "/tut_texts/" + areaId + "/" + "new_footnote/?content=" + txtarea.value;

    $.post(url, areaId, function(html) {
        if (reload === 'page') {
            window.location.reload(true);
        } else {
            $("#spinner").hide();
        };
    });
}

Note the alert. In the alert, the carriage returns are retained. Here is the controller action to which the content is posted:

def new_footnote
  @tut_footnote = TutFootnote.create(:tut_text_id => params[:id])
  content = params[:content]
  position = content.index('~')
  front = content.slice(0,position)
  back = content.slice(position + 1, content.length)
  content = front + @tut_footnote.id.to_s + back
  @tut_text = TutText.find(params[:id])
  @tut_text.update_attributes(:content => params[:content])
  render :nothing => true
end

Content in the textarea before adding the footnote:

Paragraph1

Paragraph2

Paragraph3

Content in the textarea after adding the footnote:

Paragraph1Paragraph2®~Paragraph3

Thanks for your help.