"My conscience won't let me go shoot my brother, or some darker people, or some poor hungry people."

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4. peculiar case, as supreme court cases go.

seems like a one-off kind of decision that should have been resolved in ali's favor by a lower court.

then again, many people just had it in for ali, which no doubt had much to do with why he had to go all the way to the top court.

that said, the supreme court generally prefers to clarify law and establish judicial guidelines and principles, and this really did none of that, being decided on a technicality.


on the merits, in the end, i'm not sure ali would have won. i'm not disputing that his beliefs weren't sincere, but i was under the impression that conscientious objector status couldn't pick and choose which war to fight in. if ali objected to the war in vietnam, but believed that war was ok if called for by "allah or the messenger", then i would think that would disqualify him from conscientious objector status.

regardless, i admire him for sticking to his principles, even at the expense of several years of what would have been the peak of a career that was incredible even without being able to box during that time.