Yes, “mandatory national service” is a live topic — again!
Mandatory National Service? on Vimeo.
But the situation is not hopeless. This is not a “done deal.” Indeed, there is something you can do to prevent universal, intersex/all-gender mandatory conscription. Click here to find out more.
Why not click right now?
Common Sense focused on the draft, last week, specifically the idea of “national service,” too often portrayed as a wonderful enriching experience.
My midweek commentaries “Old Codger Draft,” “The Opposite of Freedom,” and “Green New Conscript?” pinpointed the plethora of problems with enslaving folks.
On Thursday, I traveled with two threatened members of that now vulnerable population known as “young people” to a public hearing at American University. There I testified for three-and-a-half minutes of the two allotted to me by the National Commission on Military, National, and Public Service. I implored them to “forswear any forced service whatsoever.”*
“That shouldn’t happen,” I said, “in America.”
Then, late Friday, a federal judge ruled that the Selective Service System’s male-only draft registration program is unconstitutional. Since all combat positions are now open to women, a draft registration program excluding women violates the equal protection rights of men. The lawsuit brought by the National Coalition for Men doesn’t ask that registration be extended to women, only ended in its current discriminatory form.
The judge, however, did not issue an injunction, and there will be an appeal.
“This ruling is going to force the government eventually,” the group’s attorney told the Washington Post, “to either get rid of the selective service requirement or require both sexes to register.”
Between now and the 2020 election, the issue of conscription — for men and for women, for war or for street sweeping — will be before the Congress, the President and candidates for those positions.
Let’s ask them: Whose life is it?
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
* And I offered important advice on the proper website domain name for the Commission, to boot.
It can happen here. Congress could simply identify a group of citizens and pass a law forcing them into servitude.
At least, Congress thinks it has this incredibly abusive power . . . even though the 13th Amendment specifically prohibits it.*
In fact, the idea of conscription — not merely for military service, but also for performing the most routine civilian government functions — is this very day being debated in Washington by a congressionally-empowered body: The National Commission on Military, National and Public Service. The commission is charged with advising Congress on whether to expand draft registration to women or end it for men, as well as whether or not to create a mandatory “national service” program for young people.**
“Should Service be Mandatory?” is the title of the afternoon hearing at American University.
The Brookings Institution’s William Galston and author Ted Hollander will advocate for drafting all young Americans and sentencing each to a year of compulsory service to the federal government. Thank goodness, my friend Doug Bandow, a senior fellow at the Cato Institute, will speak against mandatory national service, as will soon-to-be-friend Lucy Steigerwald, a contributing editor at Antiwar.com.
The public can comment for up to two minutes, and I certainly will demand the commission abandon any contemplation of assaulting the freedom of young people under the false claim of “national service.”
True public service is not involuntary servitude to the government. And vice-versa. Americans, even young Americans, have rights.
Tell the Commission to tell Congress: No forced service.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
TELL THE COMMISSION: NO
MY STATEMENT: Leave Those Kids Alone
* Regarding the military draft, the U.S. Supreme Court has somehow sidestepped the Amendment’s very clear language.
** No surprise that politicians and “experts” are targeting the politically least established adult age group.
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Stay calm. Dan Glickman has discovered serious problems.
“Washington is a divided town in a very politically divided nation,” Glickman wrote in The Hill last year. “From the confirmation of Brett Kavanaugh, to the extreme rhetoric on social media, to the bombs mailed to public officials, to the mass shooting in Pittsburgh, to the inability of our elected leaders to reach consensus on nearly all major issues facing the country, it is not easy to see a way out of this mess.”
Nonetheless, he’s found one: less freedom.
Specifically, he wants to take away young people’s freedom.
For how long? Say a year or so, he argues, right after high school or college, when they don’t have a hold yet in society and are less able to fight back; force them to join the military or some non-military federal conscript workforce. It’ll be good for the little buggers. And very egalitarian.
Always-adult-acting Washington knows best.
“Not only does this benefit the individual,” asserts this current Executive Director of the Aspen Institute Congressional Program and former Cabinet Secretary,* “but helps our national community move away from division and towards a more cohesive society.”
Wait a second. The exceptionally well-connected Glickman and friends screwed up our world. So, make young people pay for their mistakes?
And where does Congress conjure up such power?
This Thursday, a congressional commission debates mandatory “national service” for young people.**
It would make more sense to draft 74-year-old Glickman, who actually helped cause the problems . . . or even 58-year-old me, who couldn’t stop him.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
* Glickman’s career path, prior to his current position, has been illustrious: a former nine-term congressman; Secretary of Agriculture under President Clinton; Director of the Institute of Politics at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government; and Motion Picture Association of America Chairman.
** Please go here to submit your own comments on forcing young people to give up a year of their life to the federal government.
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“A personal commitment of time, energy and talent to a mission that contributes to the public good by protecting the nation and its citizens, strengthening communities or promoting the general welfare.” That’s how the National Commission on Military, National and Public Service (NCMNPS) officially defines service.
“It’s time to talk about a culture of service,” Commission Chairman Joe Heck told reporters Wednesday at the release of an interim report, “where Americans not only aspire to serve, but face no barriers.”
Remove the impediments where possible, sure.
But the Commission, as created by Congress, is primarily charged with looking into whether draft registration should continue, and if so, whether to expand it to women.*
Face it, military conscription doesn’t have anything at all to do with “service.” Not by the NCMNPS’s own definition — or any reasonable one. Surely the commissioners weren’t thinking that “personal commitment” could simply be coerced.
The NCMNPS is also “exploring what a program that requires every American to complete a dedicated period of military, national, or public service might look like.”
Stop. It won’t resemble freedom.
Why even consider coercing young people? The All-Volunteer Force is working well and creating a massive civilian chain-gang will be expensive.
“There is an overwhelming desire to serve,” Chairman Heck confirmed. But he explained that while young people “want to do it. They just don’t want to be told to do it.”
Sounds 100-percent American to me.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
* Nearly four decades ago, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the current male-only registration program specifically predicated on women being blocked from combat roles. All those roles are now open to women. Eventually, a case will get back to the High Court, which will very, very likely strike down a registration program that does not include young women.
You can share your own opinion with the Commission here.
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Paul Jacob has a long history of activism in opposition to (and argument against) military conscription in a free society.
Congress created The National Commission on Military, National, and Public Service “to consider and develop recommendations concerning the need for a military draft, and means by which to foster a greater attitude and ethos of service among American youth.”
Is it possible that Congress and the commissioners have never considered the inherent contradiction between forcing people into the military against their will and fostering an “ethos of service”?
Today, I will get perhaps two minutes to address this commission at a hearing in Denver, Colorado, answering* these questions it has posed:
Is a military draft or draft contingency still a necessary component of U.S. national security?
The military draft has never at any time in the history of this country been a necessary component in U.S. national security.
Are modifications to the selective service system needed?
No. The Selective Service System, the people who force very young men into the military against their will, needs to be ended. Not modified. Not expanded to women. End draft registration. Close the agency.
The United States should forswear any use of conscription. A free country need not force people into the military to defend it.
Is a mandatory service requirement for all Americans necessary, valuable, and feasible?
Necessary? Not on your life. Americans have always stepped forward — not only to defend their own country, but also in hopes of defending people across the globe.
Valuable? That’s a bad joke. People forced to kill and die in Vietnam and other conflicts and those imprisoned for refusing to take part in such a system fail to see any value. The draft has been disastrous.
What is valuable are the lives and rights of the young. They are free citizens, not Congress’s pawns.
Feasible? No. Because too many of us will fight you, refusing to go along. Even if it means our imprisonment.** Plus, a conscripted army is a poor substitute for the All Volunteer Force.
The draft is unnecessary, divisive and dangerous.
How does the United States increase the propensity for Americans, particularly young Americans, to serve?
Be worthy of the voluntary service of the American people.
If the government is responsible, then people will respond to protect it.
Commit to raising an army of soldiers and service providers by persuading citizens to freely serve their communities and their country. In short, this commission and this Congress should commit to freedom.
That would be truly inspiring.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
* I will also be submitting a longer, more formal statement in testimony.
** As regular readers know, I was one of 20 young men prosecuted for refusing to register for the draft in the 1980s.
Sometimes politicians have trouble making up their minds. During election years — with the looming prospect of voters having a say — their decision-making process becomes even more perilous.
Take the idea of forcing young women to register for the draft. Young men must, under threat of five years in prison, a $250,000 fine and the loss of government benefits — all the way down to denying a driver’s license to non-registrants in many states. So why not force women to sign up for forced military service?
For equality!
Just days ago, it seemed nearly everyone was for conscripting our daughters — or, at least, registering them for future conscription. Obama’s Secretary of Defense Ash Carter and military leaders enthusiastically endorsed the idea. So did Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
In recent weeks, legislation beginning mandatory draft registration of women, ages 18-26, passed both the House Armed Services Committee and the Senate Armed Services Committee. Then, all the sudden — poof! — that provision was ripped out of the House bill.
“This is a dead-of-night attempt to take an important issue off the table,” complained the ranking Democrat on House Armed Services, Rep. Adam Smith of Washington.
Timing is everything, in comedy and politics. Congressional leaders don’t want to take any pro-draft action now, not with an election just six short months away.
“We have a choice to make,” Rep. Mike Coffman (R-Colo.) argues, “either we continue with Selective Service and have women be a part of it, or we abolish it altogether.” Coffman advocates the latter, having introduced a bipartisan bill with Rep. Jared Polis (D-Colo.), H.R. 4523, to end draft registration and close the superfluous agency.
That’s Common Sense, especially in an election year. I’m Paul Jacob.
Are Republican presidential candidates getting the NFL draft and the military draft confused?
Get drafted by the NFL and you’re a millionaire. Participation is voluntary. Get “chosen” by the Selective Service System for the military draft and you could wind up in combat. Participation is involuntary.
Last Sunday at Townhall, I wondered why Republican presidential candidates keep talking about registering young females for a future draft like they are bestowing some great benefit, as if women are clamoring for the equal chance to be conscripted.
Sen. Marco Rubio first agreed that draft registration should be expanded to women. He then elaborated, “I’m open to Selective Service being opened up to women that want to be a part of it.”
Wait a second . . . the current male-only draft registration isn’t optional. It’s mandatory — under the threat of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. This I know first-hand.
After Sen. Ted Cruz suggested Rubio and other presidential contenders were “nuts” to support forcing women to register, Rubio tried to explain on Fox News Sunday: “What I’ve never said and I don’t support is that we are going to draft women and force them into combat roles. That’s absurd.”
The senator volunteered that he did not “believe anyone ever will” be drafted, because “that’s not the nature of modern warfare.”
“I’m actually in favor of a volunteer armed forces,” he told host Chris Wallace. “I’m not even sure we need Selective Service anymore.”
Calling it “just a registry of names for a draft that’s never going to happen,” Rubio added, “I don’t know why we still have Selective Service.”
Me neither.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Would your favorite presidential candidate force women to register for the military draft?
A federal court case, National Coalition for Men v. Selective Service System, is bouncing around the Ninth Circuit. It challenges the male-only draft registration program as discriminatory against men.
Thirty-five years ago, when yours truly was fighting the draft, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a male-only program because women were then barred from combat. Now the All-Volunteer Force has opened all military fields to women, including combat roles. It follows that the federal courts will likely strike down male-only registration.
What will Congress do? What will the next commander-in-chief advocate? Allow the program to end — or mandate that both young men and young women register?
Hillary Clinton answered this question in 2008, during her first run for the presidency: yes, register women for the military draft.
What about the other presidential hopefuls?
Back in 1980, then-candidate Ronald Reagan pledged to end it, saying that conscription (and registration for it) “destroys the very values our society is committed to defending.”
Sadly, President Reagan continued draft registration, prosecuting me and others.
“The question is nothing less, than whether the most essential rights of personal liberty shall be surrendered,” the great Daniel Webster railed against conscription, “and despotism embraced in its worst form.”
Men and women have an equal right to freedom — not conscription. Free people will always volunteer to defend their country.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
