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The Muhammad Ali Boxing Reform Act, commonly referred to as the Ali Act, is a federal law that was introduced in 1999 and enacted on May 26, 2000, by the 106th Congress to:
The Act amends the 1996 Professional Boxing Safety Act [2] by expanding upon legislation against exploitation, conflict of interest, enforcement, as well as additional amendments. [3] The Act was enacted in response to widespread abuse of boxers by means of exploitation, rigged rankings, and rigged matches. [4]
The United States Congress noted through research that there were a number of problems with the sport of boxing which needed to be changed to ensure the safety and protection of professional boxers. Listed are a number of discoveries made by Congress:
The Act received several criticisms. One criticism was that the Act provides rules but leaves the enforcement of these rules to the state without defined guidelines. [5] Other criticism stems from the belief that Congress has no purpose regulating the boxing industry, as there is no precedent of Congress regulating any other sport. [6]
In May 2016, a bill was introduced to Congress by politician and former mixed martial artist Markwayne Mullin, to extend the Ali Act to mixed martial arts. [7]
Boxing is a combat sport and a martial art in which two people, usually wearing protective gloves and other protective equipment such as hand wraps and mouthguards, throw punches at each other for a predetermined amount of time in a boxing ring.
Larry Holmes is an American former professional boxer who competed from 1973 to 2002 and was world heavyweight champion from 1978 until 1985. He is often considered to be one of the greatest heavyweight boxers of all time. He grew up in Easton, Pennsylvania, which led to his boxing nickname of the "Easton Assassin".
Teófilo Stevenson Lawrence was a Cuban engineer and amateur boxer who competed from 1966 to 1986.
The Contract with America was a legislative agenda advocated by the Republican Party during the 1994 congressional election campaign. Written by Newt Gingrich and Dick Armey, and in part using text from former President Ronald Reagan's 1985 State of the Union Address, the Contract detailed the actions the Republicans promised to take if they became the majority party in the United States House of Representatives for the first time in 40 years. Many of the Contract's policy ideas originated at The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank.
The two fights between Muhammad Ali and Sonny Liston for boxing's World Heavyweight Championship were among the most controversial fights in the sport's history. Sports Illustrated magazine named their first meeting, the Liston–Clay fight, as the fourth greatest sports moment of the twentieth century.
Eddie Futch was an American boxing trainer. Among the fighters he trained are Joe Frazier, Ken Norton, Larry Holmes, and Trevor Berbick, four of the five men to defeat Muhammad Ali. Futch also trained Riddick Bowe and Montell Griffin when they handed future Hall of Fame fighters Evander Holyfield and Roy Jones Jr. their first professional defeats. In Baltimore, Maryland, the Futch Gym boxing gymnasium is named after the trainer. He also trained Ireland’s first ever WBC World Champion, Wayne McCullough. Eddie Futch was married to Eva Marlene Futch from March 21, 1996, until his death. Futch often called her "The love of his life."
Thomas C. Hauser is an American author known for his biographies and novels.
The proposed Citizenship Reform Act of 2005 was a U.S. congressional bill introduced in the 109th United States Congress by Re. Nathan Deal (R-GA). The legislation aimed to deny birthright citizenship to individuals born in the United States whose parents were not citizens or permanent residents.
The Joint Association of Boxers is an attempt to unionize professional boxers, who are often called "the most exploited athletes." The union's stated goals are:
United States v. International Boxing Club of New York, 348 U.S. 236 (1955), often referred to as International Boxing Club or just International Boxing, was an antitrust decision of the U.S. Supreme Court. By a 7–2 margin, the justices ruled that the exemption it had previously upheld for Major League Baseball was peculiar and unique to that sport and that it did not apply to boxing. Since it met the definition of interstate commerce, the government could therefore proceed with a trial to prove IBCNY and the other defendants had conspired to monopolize the market for championship boxing in the United States.
The Congressional Accountability Act of 1995 (CAA), the first piece of legislation passed by the 104th United States Congress, applied several civil rights, labor, and workplace safety and health laws to the U.S. Congress and its associated agencies, requiring them to follow many of the same employment and workplace safety laws applied to businesses and the federal government. Previously, agencies in the legislative branch had been exempt from these laws. The act also established a dispute resolution procedure as an alternative to filing claims in federal court. The act is administered and enforced by the Office of Congressional Workplace Rights.
The Office of Congressional Workplace Rights was created through the Congressional Accountability Act of 1995 (CAA) which applied workplace protection laws to approximately 30,000 employees of the legislative branch nationwide and established the Office of Compliance to administer and ensure the integrity of the Act through its programs of dispute resolution, education, and enforcement. The OCWR educates members of Congress, employing offices and employees, and the visiting public on their rights and responsibilities under workplace and accessibility laws. The OCWR also advises Congress on needed changes and amendments to the CAA; and the OCWR's General Counsel has independent investigatory and enforcement authority for certain violations of the CAA.
The Northern California Coastal Wild Heritage Wilderness Act is a U.S. federal law enacted in 2006 that enlarged existing wilderness boundaries and created new wilderness areas for protection under the National Wilderness Preservation System. These newly designated protected wilderness areas help safeguard habitat for more than 250 endangered species including the California condor and the bristlecone pine, the oldest living trees on earth.
The Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 was an Act of Congress that was signed into federal law by United States President Barack Obama on August 3, 2010, that reduces the disparity between the amount of crack cocaine and powder cocaine needed to trigger certain federal criminal penalties from a 100:1 weight ratio to an 18:1 weight ratio and eliminated the five-year mandatory minimum sentence for simple possession of crack cocaine, among other provisions. Similar bills were introduced in several U.S. Congresses before its passage in 2010, and courts had also acted to reduce the sentencing disparity prior to the bill's passage.
Muhammad Ali vs. Antonio Inoki, billed as The War of the Worlds, was a fight between American professional boxer Muhammad Ali and Japanese professional wrestler Antonio Inoki, held at the Nippon Budokan arena in Tokyo, Japan, on June 26, 1976. At the time, Ali had come off a knockout victory over Richard Dunn in May and was the undisputed heavyweight boxing champion. Inoki, who had been taught catch wrestling by wrestler Karl Gotch, was staging exhibition fights against champions of various martial arts, in an attempt to show that pro wrestling was the dominant fighting discipline.
Pamela B. Gilbert is an American lawyer and has been a partner of the law firm Cuneo Gilbert & LaDuca, LLP since 2003, where she heads the firm's lobbying practice. Gilbert is a noted consumer rights advocate who has testified before Congress over fifty times and made dozens of appearances in the national print and electronic media. Gilbert leads the Committee to Support Antitrust laws (COSAL), an organization supportive of antitrust legislation.
Michael Schwartz is an American physician who specializes in the field of ringside medicine. As Chief Ringside Physician for Professional Boxing and Mixed Martial Arts, he was responsible for creating many of the medical protocols utilized in boxing. He founded the first Medical Association for Professional Ringside Physicians.
Premier Boxing Champions (PBC) is an ongoing series of televised boxing events connected to manager Al Haymon.
Muhammad Ali visited China on three occasions. Ali's visits to China resulted in a revival of boxing in China, and influenced the development of the sport in China.