The day boxing legend Muhammad Ali faced jail for refusing to fight in the Vietnam War

On June 20, 1967, boxing legend Muhammad Ali was convicted for refusing the draft for the Vietnam War in Houston, Texas. Ali had been a vocal opponent of the US war, expressing his views by saying, “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 while so-called Negro people in Louisville are treated like dogs?”

In an attempt to suppress the growing resistance to the war, Ali was given the maximum sentence of five years imprisonment and a $10,000 fine. However, these efforts proved unsuccessful as the anti-war movement continued to gain momentum. Despite the Nation of Islam starting to distance themselves from Ali, demonstrations in support of him took place worldwide, from Egypt to Guyana, London to Ghana. Four years later, the Supreme Court overturned his conviction.

Ali remained steadfast in his convictions, stating, “I wasn’t trying to be a leader. I just wanted to be free. And I made a stand all people, not just Black people, should have thought about making because it wasn’t just Black people being drafted. The government had a system where the rich man’s son went to college, and the poor man’s son went to war. Then, after the rich man’s son got out of college, he did other things to keep him out of the Army until he was too old to be drafted.”