Hidden History: The Supreme Court Reversal of Muhammad Ali’s Draft Resistance Conviction

The Trials of Muhammad Ali

Directed by Bill Siegel (2013)

Film Review

Although I’ve watched several documentaries about the life of Muhammad Ali, I was previously unaware that the Supreme Court overturned his conviction for violating the Selective Services Act (for refusing to fight in Vietnam) – nor of the highly unusual circumstances under which they did so.

In 1966, world heavyweight champion Muhammad Ali was convicted of draft evasion and sentenced to five years in prison. Although he remained out on bail during his five-year appeal, the felony conviction caused boxing commissions in most states to suspend his license to box. During this period, he supported himself and his family through paid speaking engagements.

Ali claimed conscientious objector status as a Black Muslim (contrary to popular belief, most interpretations of Islam are nonviolent). Giving up his slave name Cassius Clay, he joined the Nation of Islam in 1961. He also rejected the notion of Black Americans killing non-white Vietcong when their real enemies were white Americans. Although Martin Luther King rejected the nationalist stance of the Nation of Islam, he supported Ali’s stance on Vietnam.

The initial Supreme Court vote on Ali’s case was 5 to 3 (African American Thurgood Marshal recused himself) in favor of upholding the conviction. Assigned to write the opinion for the majority, Justice John Harlan learned a prior ruling regarding a Jehovah’s Witness draft evader set a clear precedent. In the end, all eight justices agreed to overturn the conviction.

Ali won a gold medal at age 18 in the light heavyweight division at the 1960 summer Olympics, and he won the heavyweight championship from Sonny Liston at age 22.

He would later disavow the Nation of Islam, adhering to Sunni Islam and supporting racial integration like his mentor Malcolm X.

In 2005, President George W Bush awarded him the medal of freedom.

Public library members can view this film free at Beamafilm.

 

The FBI’s War on Black People

The FBI’s War on Black People

Directed by Deb Ellis and Dennis Mueller (1990)

Film Review

This 1990 documentary is based on interviews with Black Panther Party (BPP) activists who directly experienced Cointelpro. The latter was a secret FBI counterinsurgency program created and run by late FBI director J Edgar Hoover. Allegedly shut down in the mid-seventies, there is strong evidence it continues to operate under a different name.

The film begins by quoting directly from secret FBI memos (released under the Freedom of Information Act) detailing the official purpose of Cointelpro – namely to “neutralize: charismatic Black leaders capable of organizing effective resistance to the white supremacist power structure.

The film then explores the suspected Cointlpro role in the assassination of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King* and the proven Cointelpro role in the murder of Chicago BPP leader Fred Hampton. The latter was shot in his sleep by Chicago police with the help of an undercover FBI infiltrator who provided a layout of Hampton’s apartment.

The documentary also covers the less publicized FBI role in the Klan murder of southern civil rights leaders. During the sixties, again according to FOI documents, 25% of Klansmen were FBI informants or agents. Although the FBI nearly always had foreknowledge of these murders, not only did they fail to prevent them – but in many cases FBI plants pulled the trigger.

Surviving Panther members also speak bitterly about the role of FBI infiltrators in fomenting rumor campaigns and factional fighting within BPP groups and between the BPP and other activist organizations. Hoover was also directly responsible for the media’s negative portrayal of the Panthers as dangerous people who hated whites and wanted to hurt them.

In my view, the most powerful weapon Hoover deployed against the BPP was to deliberately frame and imprison their leaders on false charges.

The film contains rare footage of late political Geronimo Pratt describing attempts to frame him for one of Charles Manson’s murders before they framed him for the “Tennis Court” murder.

Pratt served 27 years until the phony charge was vacated in 1997. He died in Tanzania in 2011.**

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*In 1999 the jury in a civil case brought by the King family, found the US government responsible for King’s 1968 murder. See The Truth Behind the Assassination of Martin Luther King

**See Geronimo Pratt