Below are pictures of Muhammad Ali during his boxing life and a newspaper showing his results in his appeal in court.
Muhammad Ali felt that it wasn't right to go to the vietnam war. He wanted his draft status changed because of his non violent Muslim faith. He was later arrested after refusing to be inducted by the Army. Once he was arrested, his boxing license was suspended by the NYSAC (New York State Athletic Commission) and had his World Heavyweight title stripped from him. In an interview a week before his expected induction, he stated that he wouldn't accept his induction. During his interview, he asked reporters "Why should they ask me to put on a uniform and go 10,000 miles from home and drop bombs and bullets on brown people in Vietnam?"
The Vietnam War was still supported by a majority of Americans at the time; Ali's decision to speak out against it was hugely controversial, and he was pilloried by politicians and the media as a coward and traitor. "I ain't got nothing against them Vietcong," explained Ali of his motivations. "How can I shoot those poor people? Just take me to jail." But Ali's principled stand essentially jump started the Sixties antiwar movement, and helped encourage Martin Luther King to come out against the conflict in Vietnam in April 1967.
"His humanity — that’s where Ali’s true greatness lies. Sports fans can say we were robbed of Ali’s true prime, but society gained something much better: a leading voice against the class and race issues that intertwined with one of the deadliest foreign wars in U.S. history."
Muhammad Ali felt that it wasn't right to go to the vietnam war. He wanted his draft status changed because of his non violent Muslim faith. He was later arrested after refusing to be inducted by the Army. Once he was arrested, his boxing license was suspended by the NYSAC (New York State Athletic Commission) and had his World Heavyweight title stripped from him. In an interview a week before his expected induction, he stated that he wouldn't accept his induction. During his interview, he asked reporters "Why should they ask me to put on a uniform and go 10,000 miles from home and drop bombs and bullets on brown people in Vietnam?"
The Vietnam War was still supported by a majority of Americans at the time; Ali's decision to speak out against it was hugely controversial, and he was pilloried by politicians and the media as a coward and traitor. "I ain't got nothing against them Vietcong," explained Ali of his motivations. "How can I shoot those poor people? Just take me to jail." But Ali's principled stand essentially jump started the Sixties antiwar movement, and helped encourage Martin Luther King to come out against the conflict in Vietnam in April 1967.
"His humanity — that’s where Ali’s true greatness lies. Sports fans can say we were robbed of Ali’s true prime, but society gained something much better: a leading voice against the class and race issues that intertwined with one of the deadliest foreign wars in U.S. history."