Selective Service

My earlier post on the draft controversy prompted an e-mail from a friend wondering if there were a way to serve subversively on a draft board, exempting young men from service.

That made me curious, and so I started poking around on the net.

One thing I found was another article (see my earlier post) showing Professor Ned Lebow (presidential scholar at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire and former professor of strategy at the National War College in Washington) to be wrong in his statement that the recent DoD website ad constituted the "first public call to reconstitute draft boards since the compulsory draft was abolished in 1973." This one from September 21, 2001 reports that the Pentagon intended to fill the numerous vacancies on local draft boards and describes who may serve:

The composition of the boards must reflect the racial, ethnic and cultural diversity of the communities they serve. The work is uncompensated, though board members are reimbursed for expenses. To preserve the board's impartiality, members cannot be retired military officers, law enforcement officers or judges.

Ultimately, prospective board members must be nominated by the governor. The nominees must be appointed by the director of the Selective Service System.

I don't know how the board members' votes are cast when deciding whether a registrant actually gets drafted, but if they're cast anonymously, then I suppose you could just always vote "no" on each potential draftee. Beyond that, you might have to actually "edit" some papers, which, if possible, would probably carry a very stiff penalty.

I had a friend in San Francisco years ago who had been drafted into the Viet Nam war. He was crafty besides being clever, but he hadn't tried to get himself out of serving. What he did do, however, was pretty remarkable. It wasn't planned, but luck and fate (or whatever it is that shapes a person's life) put him in a position to get lots of young soldiers sent home.

Here's how he did it.

When he was shipped over to the war, he had no transition time between stateside and battle. He said they put him on a helicopter and set him down in the middle of a battle - a 19-year-old boy from upstate New York. By an incredible stroke of miscommunication, or mis-assignment, an officer came looking for a new soldier who was supposed to be a law student; he was needed to serve behind the lines in a clerical position, and for some reason, he was needed immediately. The soldier-student's name was somehow missing, and my friend, being at hand, volunteered himself as that student. He said he just grabbed the opportunity to get out of the line of fire. I don't know whether the boy they were looking for was actually there or not, and maybe if he was, it's not a good story on my friend. But I'm not qualified to judge a young man who's life is in imminent peril.

At any rate, they never found out any different, and my friend was taken to a millitary law office where he managed to figure out whatever it was he needed to know. His boss turned out to be the officer who granted discharges. And so, my friend learned to forge the officer's name.

Maybe it was all illegal. Maybe he should have been arrested and prosecuted for criminal acts. But I always think of his action as that of a man of conscience placed by fate where he could do something morally right, even if it was legally wrong.

Curious about the questions from my e-mail correspondent, I looked up a few articles and found some interesting information.

The men and women arrested that summer of ’71 in Camden called themselves “America’s conscience.” The government called them the Camden 28.

Surprisingly, included among the Camden 28 were four Catholic priests and one Lutheran minister. All but one of the remaining 23 were Catholic laypeople. All were part of a nonviolent antiwar movement the government and the media referred to as the “Catholic Left.”

One of the most dramatic tactics utilized by this movement was breaking into Selective Service offices across the country to remove and destroy government draft records that identified young men available for military service.

The activists claimed that their civil disobedience was meant to call attention to their belief that killing – even in war – was morally indefensible. They targeted the draft for the simple fact that it was the clearest symbol of that immorality because it compelled citizens to kill.

Between 1967 and 1971, members of the “Catholic Left” claimed responsibility for over 30 draft board raids and the destruction of close to a million Selective Service documents. By 1971, the “Catholic Left” had become one of the most inventive forces of the antiwar movement. article

I already have a link on my website to a Primer on Draft Resistance. And in my search this evening, I found that new information is being posted as people truly are concerned about the possibility of a reinstatement of the draft.

From a National Catholic Reporter article, Early documentation is key to conscientious objector status:

“[A]ccording to the Selective Service they’ve even prepared two drums to be ready for a lottery at a moment’s notice, one with the numbers 1-365, and one with all the birth dates of the year,” [Albuquerque attorney Tova Indritz] said.

She laid out what she said would be a likely scenario should the president call for a draft in the name of a “national emergency.”

“On Day 1, Congress passes a law” to reinstate the draft, and the president signs the bill the same day or the next, said Indritz. A lottery, “which could take as few as two hours,” is held the next day, she said, to match each birth date with a number 1 through 365.

The Selective Service then immediately issues letters to those men who turn 20 years old in that calendar year whose numbers matching their birthdays were drawn in the lottery. The letters contain orders to appear for a “physical, mental and moral evaluation” 10 days from the postmarked date of the letter, said Indritz, citing government documents.

Indritz explained that a claim for conscientious objector status must be turned in before the date of the evaluation.

One of the recommendations to young men who want to claim CO status is that they write directly on their registrations that they are COs. A new Kansas law takes that possibility away.

Under the law, which went into effect July 1, the personal information of any male age 16 to 25 who applies for a Kansas driver's license is automatically forwarded to the Selective Service System. article

Kansas is not the only state that has that law, which effectively takes away a young man's right (and perhaps personal or religious duty) to not register as an act of civil disobedience and war resistance.

As I said to my e-mail correspondent, life is complex and challenging, and whatever our individual choice may be, I feel strongly that we need to have all the information we can get in order to make the best one according to our own beliefs and principles.

....but hey, you do what you want....you will anyway.