Sports and the Racial Divide: African American and Latino Experience in an Era of Change

2. Battles for Control over Muhammad Ali’s Career and Image

  Battles for Control over Muhammad Ali’s Career and Image —Michael Ezra On January , , Muhammad Ali called a press conference to announce the formation of a new corporation that would promote his fights. The organization was named Main Bout, Incorporated, and its biggest stockholders were prominently positioned within the Nation of Islam. Since the company controlled the ancillary rights to Ali’s title bouts, it would reap most of their revenues, which would come from closed-circuit television broadcasts. Ali envisioned that Main Bout would become the foundation of a larger economic organization designed to create employment and wealth for blacks. Main Bout’s creation, which threatened to shake up professional boxing’s power structure, brought on widespread resistance. Reporters feared a takeover of the sport by the Nation of Islam. Government officials questioned whether the organization should be allowed to make money within their jurisdictions. Motion picture concerns, which owned most of the venues equipped to show closed-circuit fights, refused to do business with the Nation. Ali’s opposition to the Vietnam War, which surfaced a month after Main Bout’s formation, heightened public antipathy towards the new corporation. The resulting backlash made Main Bout vulnerable to a boycott of its first promotion. Main Bout’s story fits into several historical contexts. It reflected the economic nationalism that marked the programs of Booker T. Washington and Marcus Garvey. Like these leaders, and like many of his Michael Ezra  contemporaries in the Civil Rights Movement who were beginning to stress the importance of economic power, Ali believed that financial empowerment was central to black independence and autonomy. The resistance faced by Main Bout illustrated a key theme in African American business history. Black business development in the United States has lagged disproportionately because of undercapitalization and a lack of government support. Main Bout, like thousands of black-run enterprises before it, encountered these problems. Main Bout exemplified the Nation of Islam’s economic tradition. Ali’s plan to cultivate a black-controlled promotional network that included independent theater owners, public relations people, and job programs came from the Nation’s economic collectives. Although the groups were not formally tied, it seems likely that Main Bout enriched the Nation of Islam. Main Bout’s largest two stockholders were members of the organization and Ali tithed a portion of his purses to it. This chapter seeks to locate Main Bout within these economic contexts to address the major inquiries of this essay: how have the battles for commercial control of Muhammad Ali’s career affected his cultural symbolism; how have the narratives, which have defined Ali’s image, reflected the ideas of those who control the Ali industry and those who oppose that control? Main Bout’s takeover of the job of managing and promoting Ali from the all-white Louisville Sponsoring Group, for example, engendered for some people new ways of perceiving the fighter. Even though two of Main Bout’s five board members were white, this transfer of control to Main Bout had racial overtones that were reflected in press coverage and public reception of Ali. Sometimes this process resulted in a positive understanding of the heavyweight champion; other times it caused people to despise him. The central argument of this essay is that Muhammad Ali’s image has always been produced and shaped by financial arrangements. Throughout his public life, Ali has had to balance his own sense of self with the desires of those who have had a stake in the Ali industry. Some critics have positioned this process as an unfortunate by-product of Ali’s concurrent rise as an American icon and corporate pitchman near the end of the twentieth century. However, this essay argues that it has been happening since the beginning of his career. Those who have lamented Ali’s decline from revolutionary political hero to product pusher have ignored the consistent influence of economics on his symbolism and cultural significance. Battles for Control over Muhammad Ali’s Career and Image  To illustrate the dynamic between commercial and cultural control of Muhammad Ali, this essay will explore three periods of his career: his six years with the Louisville Sponsoring Group, his creation of Main Bout, and his three-and-a-half years away from boxing following his  conviction on draft evasion charges. These analyses will highlight the intertwining of economic concerns and Ali’s cultural meanings, and will set the stage...