On 28 April 1967, Muhammad Ali champion refused to be inducted into the U.S. army and was stripped of his heavyweight title. He initially cited religious his reasons not to serve. Ali was a self-convert from Islam. In “Muhammad Ali Refuses Army Induction,” it recalls his statement: “I ain’t got no quarrel with those Vietcong.” This resulted in his temporary three year ban from boxing. In addition, he was stripped of his title and heavily fined.

Boxing was a frequent activity of slaves on early American plantations. Most of the matches were on the slaves own time and against each other, in which they could take out their anger toward their oppressors per say, in an appropriate way. However, sometimes plantation owners got their toughest slave and had them match up against a nearby plantation’s slave for their own entertainment.

An example of this is from a scene in the 2013 film Django Unchained, where wrestling and boxing between slaves had evolved into “Mandingo Fighting”, or fighting to the death for the owner’s wealth, status, and entertainment.

In “Sports in Shackles: The Athletic and Recreational Habits of Slaves on Southern Plantations,” Griffith writes that boxing would not only find popularity among the slave quarters of black slaves, but also in the sports realm of America, where this sport would remain and become part of social and physical competition. Primarily, white people were the main athletes in the Americas during the time of slavery, but the result of slave athletics such as wrestling and boxing lasted in America.

Eventually, slaves were able to fight against whites and that was what the first real boxing matches were like. The early English tradition of boxing was adopted in colonial America primarily by slaves.

Luckily, Ali was able to return to the ring to fight on 26 October 1970, claiming victory over Jerry Quarry. In June 1971, the Supreme Court reversed his conviction and his title of a heavyweight champion was restored.
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–April Vernon

Photo Caption: Muhammad Ali

About the Author

April Vernon is currently a sophomore at Schoolcraft Community College. She is a liberal arts transfer major, and her favorite subjects are humanities and Spanish. She hopes to move out of Michigan in the future and to be able to thoroughly travel the world to experience other places, cultures and ways of life.