University of Virginia Library

Draft Problems Noted

Selective Service is coming
under greater and greater fire. The
American Civil Liberties Union has
now decided to initiate litigation
against the system on the basis of it
being an unnecessary infringement
upon civil liberties. Their rationale
follows from the assumption that
the constitution allows conscription
only when a sufficient emergency is
at hand that will justify the
expensive infringement that accrues
from Selective Service.

In other areas, a decision has
been handed down by a federal
court judge that would allow
conscientious objection on the basis
of moral or philosophical training
rather than just religious training
and beliefs. While this decision is
still awaiting appeal to the Supreme
Court it seems likely that unless
there is undue governmental and
military pressure, the measure will
receive a favorable decision.

Furthermore, increasing numbers
of clergymen are supporting
the concept of selective conscientious
objection, allowing an objector
to a particular war to receive
a 1-0 classification.

While the courts and churches
are doing much to relieve the
inequities of the present system,
there are still major areas of
injustice which continue to be
unrecognized.

Local boards across the country
are still refusing to consider equally
the claims of conscientious objection
of Protestants. Catholics, and
Jews, preferring instead to hang on
the pre-World War II recognition of
CO claims from members of established
pacifist churches only. Despite
the directives and court actions
taken, these local boards still
discriminate on the basis of religious
training.

The anxiety (mentioned earlier)
that many students feel is not in
fact a by-product of the system,
but rather one of General Hershey's
intended ingredients. On a number
of occasions this demigod, for
indeed his powers are such, has
stated that this is the only way to
keep students on the path chosen
for them by their local boards (at
the direction of the National
Security Council). Hershey has used
the draft to make Americans
"healthy" whether they want to be
or . Furthermore the Selective
Service System has established itself
as the arbitrator making decisions
based on the relative value of one
man's occupation or aspirations as
opposed to another's and in deciding
such personal matters as family
dependency, occupational and
educational value, and matters of
conscience.

Readers may dispute the existence
of this anxiety, or the extent
of its intrusion into the emotional
lives of some registrants. Measure
however the benefits of a system
effects when people measure their
own well-being in terms of how
much is wrong with them, when
people destroy the proper functioning
of their own bodies and minds
to avoid the military; when people
abandon a country because they no
longer can live under such a system.

Estimate the anxiety of a man,
married with two children to a
woman from another country, who
because of her and the children's
native birth cannot function in the
American Society, when his local
board refuses his dependency deferment.
Measure the effect of the
system on a graduate student who
has only one year of work to
complete, and faces induction,
knowing full well that if he is
inducted his previous work may in
the long run become valueless and
he may not have the desire or
motivation to go through the entire
process another time.

The ACLU's present court
action raises many questions. If the
government cannot and evidently
has not, proved to the most
respected legal body in this country
that it needs conscription, how can
we condone it? If the psychological
and emotional effects on the
individual are so severe, multiply
those effects by thousands and then
take into consideration the fact
that General Hershey admits to
intentionally causing them.

Is it any wonder that men like
Benjamin Spock and William Sloane
Coffin raise their voices against the
system? Men who are dedicated to
the preservation of human life and
spirit. Incidentally, the federal laws
concerning counseling aiding and
abetting felony are different from
those of Selective Service. A citizen
of this country can be prosecuted
for verbally encouraging resistance
to the draft. Federal courts in
federal felony cases demand that
effect of the counseling be proven
as well as showing a profit motive
for the individual doing the counseling.
Selective Service can prosecute
for simply counseling resistance,
without any of the other
proofs needed in another court.

What is needed is a full scale
investigation into the system, with
a re-evaluation of the motivations
of the directives coming out of
Washington. Furthermore, on a
secondary and college level, widespread
information should be distributed
to students to counter-effect
the tactics of the military and
ROTC recruiters who further
exploit the conditions of the
system.

Until then, one might best
consider the statement of Thoreau
who once commented, "in our
society, free men are in jail." More
and more people are considering
that alternative, the alternative of
resistance and all that it implies. If
after careful consideration, taking
into account the obvious factors of
the system, a man believes that the
best way to show his opposition is
to resist induction, who has the
right to argue, and is he not
justified?

For those who the onus of the
system now directly threatens,
might it not be worthwhile to
investigate the alternatives rather
than submitting dociley to a corrupt
and legally questionable system of
involuntary servitude?