Muhammad Ali

For my case study research paper, I wrote about Muhammad Ali’s Supreme Court case. In this case, Muhammad Ali was convicted on draft evasion charges because he refused to serve in the United States military during the time of the Vietnam War. Ali based his reasons for refusing service on his Islamic ideals, however, his comments on the war showed that his protest was truly about the racial prejudices and social injustices in the 1960s. For example, Ali stated “My conscience won’t let me go shoot my brother, or some darker people, or some poor hungry people in the mud for big powerful America. And shoot them for what? They never called me nigger, they never lynched me, they didn’t put no dogs on me, they didn’t rob me of my nationality, rape and kill my mother and father. … Shoot them for what? How can I shoot them poor people? Just take me to jail.” Comments like these resulted in vast amounts of criticism for Ali, but he never backed down from these claims. Ali appealed his initial conviction in front of the Supreme Court in 1971 and won in a unanimous 8-0 decision. Even though Ali was hated by the general public during the time of this case, I believe he had a significantly positive impact on our American Society by leading the way for professional athletes such as Colin Kaepernick and Lebron James to participate in social activism. Do you think Muhammad Ali’s stand against the US government was justified, or do you think he should have been forced to serve/put in jail?