Which famous people avoid the draft in the 60's and 70's

1. Famous names and how they avoided service

Muhammad Ali is among the most prominent: he refused induction on conscientious and religious grounds and faced legal consequences for that refusal, a position documented in histories of resistance to the draft ^[1]. Bruce Springsteen has described using various tactics from the “draft‑dodgers textbook” to avoid service and has called himself a “stone‑cold draft dodger” in later interviews ^[2]. Donald Trump received multiple draft deferments during the Vietnam era, including one for bone spurs that kept him out of service, a fact reported in contemporary and retrospective accounts ^[3]. Other celebrities and public figures have been named repeatedly in lists of draft avoiders—Chevy Chase has joked about telling a draft board he was gay to be rejected, and country/rock figures like Ted Nugent are tied in pop accounts to colorful avoidance stories—though these are sometimes anecdotal or sourced to popular outlets ^{[6] [7]}.

2. Politicians: accusations, explanations and incomplete records

Several later political leaders have been accused of dodging Vietnam, including Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush and Vice Presidents Dan Quayle and Dick Cheney; mainstream historians and news outlets note these accusations even while emphasizing that no top politician was convicted of draft crimes in this era ^[4]. The forms of avoidance cited range from student deferments and claimed medical disqualifications to National Guard or reserve assignments that kept men stateside, and records and narratives differ—Bush’s Air National Guard service, Cheney’s reported waivers, and Clinton’s draft history have all been subject to political debate and differing interpretations ^{[4] [5]}.

3. Methods: deferments, service alternatives, exile and fakery

Contemporary and later sources catalogue common methods of avoiding the draft: educational deferments, medical disqualifications (real or alleged), joining the National Guard or reserves, leaving the country for Canada or elsewhere, and fraudulent or theatrical measures intended to fail induction exams; cultural figures even satirized the options in songs like Phil Ochs’s “Draft Dodger Rag” ^{[5] [7]}. Some avoided combat by securing non‑combat postings or being stationed outside Vietnam, while others openly resisted and accepted legal risk; personal accounts and press reporting document both legal deferments and illegal evasion throughout the period ^{[5] [1]}.

4. Ambiguities, politics and contested claims

Reporting on draft avoidance is entangled with political motives: accusations were used in campaigns, personal reputations were reshaped by memoirs and new evidence, and some claims remain contested or anecdotal rather than adjudicated—news compendia and historians repeatedly caution that “draft dodger” is sometimes applied as political shorthand rather than a legal finding ^{[4] [5]}. For many famous names, available sources document the claimed method (e.g., Trump’s bone‑spurs deferment) while other details—motivation, timing, or whether any laws were broken—remain discussed or disputed in secondary reporting ^{[3] [4]}.

5. Aftermath: pardons, patterns and inequality

The postwar settlement included President Jimmy Carter’s 1977 pardon of many draft evaders, and historians note that draft avoidance disproportionately affected socioeconomically advantaged men who could secure deferments or supportive legal advice, leaving poorer and working‑class men overrepresented in combat roles—a central critique of the system that shaped later debates about fairness and accountability ^{[4] [7]}. Scholarship and contemporary reporting underline that while many famous people used lawful deferments, the optics and politics of who served and who did not have had lasting cultural consequences that continue to surface in public life ^{[4] [5]}.