Ronald L. Kovic (born July 4, 1946) is an anti-war activist and veteran who was paralyzed in the Vietnam War. He is best known as the author of the memoir Born on the Fourth of July, which was made into an Academy Award-winning movie directed by Oliver Stone, with Tom Cruise playing Kovic. Kovic received the Golden Globe Award for Best Screenplay on January 20, 1990, exactly 22 years to the day that he was shot and paralyzed in the Vietnam War. He was also nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay (Kovic and Stone co-wrote the screenplay for Born on the Fourth of July). During the filming of his autobiography, he reconciled with his parents. Bruce Springsteen wrote the song "Shut Out The Light" after reading Kovic's memoir and then meeting him. Tom Paxton, the folksinger/political activist wrote "Born on the Fourth of July" which is on his "New Songs from the Briarpatch" album.

Kovic was born in Ladysmith, Wisconsin, and grew up in Massapequa, New York. He is a decorated U.S. Marine who served two tours of duty in the Vietnam War, where he was awarded the Bronze Star and the Purple Heart. In combat on January 20, 1968, he was shot and suffered a spinal cord injury that left him paralyzed from the chest down. He became one of the best-known peace activists among the veterans of the war. Kovic has been arrested for political protest 12 times.

In 1974 he led a group of disabled Vietnam Veterans in wheelchairs on a 17-day hunger strike inside the Los Angeles office of Senator Alan Cranston. The veterans protested the "poor treatment in America's Veterans Hospitals" and demanded better treatment for returning veterans, a full investigation of all V.A. facilities, and a face-to-face meeting with head of the V.A. Donald E. Johnson. The strike continued to escalate until Johnson finally agreed to fly out from Washington, D.C., and meet with the veterans. The hunger strike ended soon after that. Several months later Johnson resigned.

Kovic was a speaker at the 1976 Democratic National Convention, seconding the nomination of draft resister Fritz Efaw for Vice President of the United States.

He is an outspoken critic of the Iraq War. In November 2003, he joined protests in London against the visit of George W. Bush. He was the guest of honor at a reception held for British peacemakers at London's city hall by Mayor Ken Livingstone. The following day, he led a march of several hundred thousand demonstrators on Trafalgar Square, where a huge rally was held protesting the visit of George W. Bush and the war in Iraq.

In March 2007, Kovic checked into the Ernst Bors Spinal Cord Injury ward of the Veterans Administration Hospital in Long Beach, California, for an undisclosed illness.

Quotes

• "I am the living death, the Memorial Day on wheels. I am your Yankee Doodle Dandy, your John Wayne come home, your Fourth of July firecracker exploding in the grave."

• "We who have witnessed the obscenity of war and experienced its horror and terrible consequences have an obligation to rise above our pain and suffering and turn the tragedy of our lives into a triumph."

• "I have come to believe there is nothing in the lives of human beings more terrifying than war and nothing more important than for those of us who have experienced it to share its awful truth."

• "War is not the answer. Violence is not the solution. A more peaceful world is possible."