Some Democrats and allies of the John Kerry campaign are trying to scare voters, particularly parents and college-age students, by suggesting that President Bush has a secret plan to bring back the military draft if he is re-elected. These rumors have found their way into MTV get-out-the-vote ads and stories on the evening news. But anyone who knows the history of the draft in modern times (over the past 100 years) also knows that it is probably much more likely that the Selective Service System would be revived under a Democratic administration rather than under a Republican administration.
During the 20th century the draft or registration was instituted or reauthorized six times. Three of those were during periods of peace. But a closer look at the record reveals that all six were during Democratic administrations. The first was during the World War I presidency of Woodrow Wilson. This progressive-era Democrat was so wary of a volunteer army that when he instituted the Selective Draft Act of 1917, he simultaneously outlawed volunteering for the military. Consistent with the central planning mentality of the Democratic Party, both then and now, it was feared that to allow any choice when it came to military manpower would yield less-than-efficient results.
The first peacetime draft was instituted in 1940 by Franklin D. Roosevelt and reauthorized after the beginning of WWII. The second peacetime draft was sponsored by Harry Truman and reauthorized at the beginning of the Korean War. Interestingly, the first real opposition to the draft during the 1960s came not from the antiwar movement but from conservative Republican presidential candidate Barry Goldwater, who ran antidraft ads and made opposition to the draft a central part of his 1964 campaign.
The only time draft legislation was actually repealed was in 1973 during the Republican Nixon administration. Gerald Ford went a step further by granting clemency to all draft resisters. When peacetime draft registration for all 18-year-old males was brought back in 1980, it was due to the efforts of Democratic President Jimmy Carter. Most recently the loudest calls to renew the draft have come from Charlie Rangle, D-N.Y., who is the primary sponsor of legislation that has been languishing in Congress for two years. In fact, all 14 co-sponsors of this legislation are Democrats.
None of this should come as any surprise. There is nothing inherently inconsistent between left-wing ideology and conscription. After all, the draft simply pushes socialism to its logical conclusion — it nationalizes human beings. The egalitarian nature of the draft, especially one based on a lottery, has always had an inherent appeal to the left. The liberal argument for the draft, which has been adopted by Rangle, is that the all-volunteer army exploits the downtrodden and minorities. Allegedly, people who have no other options for employment flock to the military to fight and die while “rich kids” sit back and enjoy their lives.
The fact is that left-wing opposition to the draft during the 1960s was an anomaly. Unlike Goldwater’s position, it was not rooted in opposition to involuntary servitude or coercion, but in opposition to a particular war. One must remember that since the end of the military draft in the 1970s many on the left, including Sen. Edward Kennedy and President Carter, have actually spoken in favor of coerced, universal service, which would force young adults to devote a year or two of their lives to either the military or to a government-approved humanitarian cause such as the Peace Corps.
Bush should bring back the great conservative-libertarian tradition of principled opposition to the draft. He should lay these rumors to rest by not only declaring his unwillingness to reinstate the draft but also by pledging that if re-elected he will abolish draft registration and the Selective Service System.