Approximately 2.1 million Americans, men and women, members of all branches of the Armed Forces, served in Vietnam. Some volunteered for service while others were drafted. Some served bravely, others not so much.
The draft involved the conscription only of men, and men in large numbers sought to evade the draft. Some refused to answer their country’s call to military service, and others declined to serve in any capacity at all, military or otherwise.
Many draft dodgers, as they were called, fled to Canada and other parts of the world to avoid the consequences of failing to report for service after receiving a draft notice. Others, many brave and honorable men, objected to military service because they believed that waging war is never justified and always morally wrong. These men neither fled to Canada nor attempted to evade the Selective Service System. They expressed willingness to serve their country in ways other than through military service, and they were willing to pay the price for standing on their convictions. One such man was Muhammad Ali.
In 1967 Ali received a draft notice and presented himself as instructed for a pre-induction physical examination. When the time came to take the oath for military service, Ali refused. He didn’t bolt and run to some foreign country. He didn’t leverage his fame or his money to position himself above the law. He was not a draft dodger, just a man of firm religious belief.
Ali was arrested, tried a month later before an all white jury, convicted of draft evasion and sentenced to serve five years in a federal penitentiary. Although Ali was allowed to be free on bond pending his several appeals, his boxing license was revoked, and he was stripped of his standing as the world heavyweight boxing champion.
Four years later, in the summer of 1971, Ali’s appeal was considered by the U.S. Supreme Court, and his conviction was overturned. Ali’s status as a conscientious objector, rather than a draft evader, was finally established by the Supreme Court’s ruling, and Ali was finally vindicated. During the four years of his confrontation with Selective Service officials, arrest, trial and subsequent appeals, Ali showed himself to be a man of extraordinary courage and restraint. The price was four years of his life.
Back in 1967 I didn’t agree with Muhammad Ali. I still didn’t agree with him or his position in 1971 when the Supreme Court ruled in his favor. I would have ruled against him.
At that time in my life I strongly opposed the way our government was getting our boys killed in Vietnam, allowing them to die by the thousands for what… I still do not know what. Nonetheless, I firmly believed that the government had the right to compel military service and those drafted had an obligation to serve. On the other hand, I greatly admired Ali for his courage, for not skipping the country or otherwise running from a fight. He stayed, stood his ground, and fought for what he believed was right.
From time to time in each of our lives we are presented with situations that require us to make choices of conscience. As Americans, standing up for our convictions is considerably easier than it is for, say, the people of Iran. No government goon squads are standing at the ready to squelch all political dissent.
Nonetheless, America has no shortage of zealots itching to eliminate any belief they do not share. So ossified is their thinking that they believe minds and hearts can be persuaded and their agendas advanced by threats, force and hateful speech. Not only would they crush all opposition were it within their power, but they would humiliate, dehumanize and degrade their opponents as well.
In 1967 Muhammad Ali’s stance on military service put him at odds with the majority of his fellow citizens. There were zealots who attributed his unpatriotic position to his race. He was, they said, aligned with militant black groups and an enemy of America. Other zealots pointed fingers at his religion and labeled him not a pacifist, but a hatemonger and enemy of Christian people, despite the fact that he had made not a single public utterance that would suggest he was any such thing.
Unlike many anti-war zealots, Ali never referred to the American boys who answered the call to military service as baby killers, dupes or stooges. He never suggested that his prosecutors were evil men nor that they were motivated by anything other than their duty to uphold and enforce the law as they interpreted it. He respectfully dissented and stood on his principles.
Muhammad Ali advanced my understanding of what it is to conscientiously object, to respectfully dissent and take up an upopular position in the face of overwhelming public sentiment. His example was of no small benefit to me when, in my personal life, it came my turn to stand in opposition to zealots in my community who would have tarred, feathered and destroyed me for personal choices made in my own life had I allowed their hateful speech and ugly actions to stir up a corresponding hate within my own heart.
The lesson is, I suppose, just this. Not every action should prompt an equal and opposite reaction, but hate should always be countered with love, and screams should be countered with quiet.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
I found this site accidently doing a google search about muhammad ali for a summer school paper my grandson is writing. I’ve read several of the stories you have written here and every one of them seems to have a good moral or something uplifting about it. I am also assuming that the people who write this site are a couple who have been together a long time. That is uplifting too in this day and age when it seems like nobody can make their relationships last. My comment is just that I have enjoyed reading the stories here and I will be telling my friends about this site.
The last line is one of such wisdsom, beauty and pure poetry – brilliant my sweet friend!! The thought behind this blog, I understand well and why…..it should always be our right to stand up for what we believe but never at the detriment of others that end up spreading hate or hurt. Instead I wish we all could accept the differences in one another, agree to disagree and love as Christ commanded.
In my most recent comment, which was actually to an original posting you posted later than this one, I commended you for your fine writing of a humorous genre. This post re Ali & Vietnam, etc., is definitely of a serious nature. And yet, the writing here is just as fine as that humorous one! You help me to understand Clay a.k.a. Ali a little better.
However, I still have issues with his objection to serving in the military during the Vietnam War. One is that he was a boxer, for gosh sakes! He was making money from a violent, brutal “sport” — and to turn around and object to fighting in any war is quite hypocritical of the boxer. Plus he had converted from the Catholic faith of his childhood — a faith with a just war doctrine which he might have used for support against fighting in ‘Nam — to the faith created by Mohammed, with its Jihad. And so, the then-new convert to a religion that whole-heartedly endorses holy warfare, seemed to be doubly hypocritcal, back then. But now I can understand him a little better thanks to this post.
It is hypocritical for a boxer to oppose war? Boxing is a sport. It does not involve killing anyone. If it is hypocritical for a professional prize fighter to oppose war then it must be hypocritical for football and hockey players too.
Ali has been a tremendous role model and has reached out to help so many people.