University of Virginia Library

Volunteers

Selective Service extension act
will probably pass in the House of
Representatives if the House Armed
Forces Committee decides to wait
until June; they've already tried
once to pass a temporary extension
act on the Kennedy model. Equally
likely is the probability the Selective
Service will be rejected by the
Senate as a continuing inequity no
matter what the form.

With the conflict suspended
between the House and the Senate
some compromise will occur, one
that will insure the creation of a
volunteer army, and yet insure that
everyone serves the country. A
compromise which will be most
acceptable to the military since it
will allow them to continue to
coerce men into the military and
also influence the civilians through
alternative service. That alternative
has already been mentioned —
National Service. Out of the
conflict between a House almost
sure to continue the draft and a
Senate almost sure to reject it, will
come the least acceptable plan for
maintaining any semblance of free
choice in this country.

The major rationale for
rejecting Selective Service is a
subsidiary of those debated in
Congress. The question is not how
you decide who serves, but whether
that decision even belongs in the
realm of a "Democratic"
government.