How They Started, And What Came Of Them

As a consequence, the Selective Service System began to call on military-age males to aid in the war effort — which many men and families actively resisted.

Pictured: Mark Satin (left) sits in on a call with American draft resisters, 1967. The political theorist moved to Canada at age 20 to avoid the war, where he helped found the Toronto Anti-Draft Program.

Pictured: A man burns his draft card, March 1970.

One such individual was legendary boxer Muhammad Ali, who filed for conscientious objector status in 1967. When the Selective Service rejected his application, Ali refused to join the military and was thus stripped of his heavyweight title and sentenced to five years in prison.

Pictured: Muhammad Ali walks through the streets with members of the Black Panther Party, New York, New York, September 1970.

Still, thanks to the draft's implicit racial bias, African-Americans disproportionately served in Vietnam. This is largely because then-college students — the majority of whom were white men — could defer enlistment. As such, the burden of enlistment fell more on non-college educated men, particularly non college-educated black men. As a result, by 1967, 64 percent of all eligible African-American males had been drafted. Only 31 percent of eligible white men had.

“It would be very inconsistent for me to teach and preach nonviolence in this situation and then applaud violence when thousands of thousands of people, both adults and children, are being maimed and mutilated and many killed in this way.”

Fewer than two weeks later, King would lead a 125,000-person protest against the war.

Pictured: Counter protesters show their support for the war during an anti-Vietnam War demonstration in New York City, 1967.

Archival Gallup opinion polls show that public sentiments began to change in mid 1966, when the percentage of those who said it was not a mistake to send troops to Vietnam fell from 69 percent to 49 percent. By May 1971, that percentage fell to 28 percent.

Pictured: A female demonstrator offers a flower to military police at the Pentagon, 1967.

"I remember many cops, many people chanting and, of course, Pete Seeger singing from a makeshift stage. There was some rock throwing and shouting from what we called "hardhats", i.e., those who were pro-war, or more likely, anti-hippy.

Coretta King made her first public appearance there after Martin [Luther King]'s death earlier in the month."

Pictured: Demonstrators against the Vietnam War display banners in a Paris street, 1967.

Americans engaged in self-immolation as well. In 1965, Baltimore Quaker Norman Morrison would light himself on fire below Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara's Pentagon office.

Inside the convention center, protestors from all walks of life hurled insults at delegates and party leaders. Outside, demonstrators got into extended snarls with police officers, who used tear gas and clubs to control the unrest.

Pictured: Demonstrators clash with police in Grant Park, 1968.

Pictured: A photographer bleeding from a head wound given to him by police during the riots in Grant Park outside the 1968 Democratic National Convention gives the peace sign.

For eight days, two different protest groups — one rebelling against Columbia's plans for a segregated gym and its encroachment into Harlem, the other against Columbia's recently revealed connections to a Department of Defense-affiliated weapons think tank — battled with both student counter-protestors and the police, who eventually moved in with tear gas to put an end to this round of demonstrations.

Pictured: Joan Baez and Bob Dylan.

That same year, the couple sent acorns to global leaders with the hope that they would plant them in the name of peace.

It was here that Jimi Hendrix would perform his distortion and whammy bar-heavy version of "The Star-Spangled Banner."

Pictured: Opening ceremony at Woodstock, August 1969.

Initially, conservatives viewed the Vietnam War as part of the U.S.’ general Cold War containment policy, and thus supported it as a matter of principle. Over time, some historians say that conservatives would support the war because doing so separated them from hippies, whom pro-war conservatives viewed as traitors, “anti-patriots,” and communists.

Pictured: Demonstrators from both sides stand on the sidelines of an anti-Vietnam War march in New York on April 27.

Pictured: William F. Buckley in Vietnam, 1969.

After days of demonstrations, dozens of National Guard members would open fire on demonstrators, killing four students and wounding nine.

In court, guard members said they shot out of fear for their lives. Of the four students killed that day, the closest stood 225 feet away from the guards. Two were walking to class.

In California, demonstrations grew so raucous that then-governor Ronald Reagan shut down the entire California university system for a week.

Pictured: An anti-war demonstrator at the University of California, Berkeley throws a tear gas canister at police.

Daniel Ellsberg, a RAND Corporation researcher, had uncovered the documents in 1969, copied them, and offered the papers to the Times. Upon their leaking, Ellsberg was charged with conspiracy, espionage, and theft of government property.

Pictured: Ellsberg, left, testifies as leadoff witness at second day of the three-day conference sponsored by 17 antiwar congressmen, all Democrats.

It was here where Kerry made one of the most biting remarks about the Vietnam War: “How do you ask a man to be the last man to die in Vietnam? How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?”

Pictured: John Kerry talks at a press conference in Washington, D.C.

By the time that news broke that Nixon had authorized (and attempted to cover-up) the break-in of the Democratic National Committee Headquarters, Nixon's approval rating dropped to a historic low of 24 percent. He would resign in August of 1974.

Pictured: A protester in Chicago, 1973.

In total, the Congressional Research Service estimates that the U.S. spent over $700 billion on the Vietnam War, making it the second costliest war of the 20th century.

The Vietnam War would kill nearly 60,000 Americans, wound more than 150,000 Americans, and leave more than 23,000 U.S. soldiers permanently disabled. Anywhere from 70,000 to 300,000 Vietnam veterans committed suicide upon their return.