Mandatory Military Service in the United States

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Table of Contents

Introduction
Background
Main Discussion
Conclusion
Annotated Bibliography
Works Cited

Introduction

Currently, the military service in the United States does not presuppose compulsory conscription. Nevertheless, there is still the current practice of recruiting men under the age category from 18 to 25 for the Armed Forces, which raises concerns from a human rights viewpoint. On the one hand, the recruitment procedure requires especial attention because it is put in effect in case of the threat of war.

On the other hand, the military service in the United States is based on volunteering technique. Such a contradiction creates significant problems in terms violation of human rights and most of these procedures are not supported by military and political experts.

Specific attention also requires the U.S. Selective Service System according to which the registration process excludes the volunteer-based conscription. It also highlights such moral and ethical problems as the right to conscientious objection, recruitment practice initiated by the U.S. Armed Forces, and limitation to the right to abandon the Military Service.

Background

The history of the Armed Forces in the United States focuses on the governments reliance on the civilians who should consider military service as their moral duty and obligation to contribute to the protection and equality in the American society.

Therefore, the United States relies on civil citizens to take part in military conflicts. Opinions and outlooks on the conscription and compulsory military services have been changed dramatically over centuries (Escott 28). Nevertheless, the historic evidence shows that the mandatory service in the United States has still flashbacks from the past.

The events of the World War II also contributed to the development of the selective service legislation and compulsory recruitment for military service. In this respect, the mandatory conscription was the only defense mechanism for the country to resist aggression during subsequent wars in Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq (Johnson 1).

As a result, over 25 years, marked by military actions and the Cold War, the Selective Service System had provided the U.S. citizens with new efficient responding mechanisms to react to varied challenges that contradicted the democratic principles.

Currently, the debate over the initiative of the Selective Service System to introduce the draft is predetermined by ambivalent vision on the rights and duties of citizens. On the one hand, the awareness of the military service is explained by the necessity to ensure protection and security of the American society (Johnson 1).

Consequently, though the government has integrated selective service during peaceful time, the policy is, first of all, oriented on enriching and broadening the common concept of citizenship, as well as on understanding the democratic aspects of equality, freedom, opportunities, and privileges.

Despite the fact that the military recruitment is recognized as a voluntary action, there is still the legislature that requires men from 18 to 25 to apply for the military service (Johnson 1).

Due to the fact that the current Selective Service Act is now obsolete, the number of men who are 18-year-old has increased by almost 60 % in the second half of the twentieth century (Johnson 1). The debates on equality of the mens duties in front of law confront the challenges of adherence to the principles of human freedom and rights.

Main Discussion

Considering the Legal Issues of Conscription

In 1917, at the threshold of the World War I, the Supreme Court made the decision to introduce mandate military services that excluded the use of the U.S.

Constitution, particularly the 13^th Amendment revealing human rights to freedom of choice and equality. In this respect, the introduction of the draft and its impact on the civilian population until 1970s has created serious problems in terms of the recruitment strategies and obligation to military conscription.

The legality of the military reforms could be severely undermined due to the governments negligence of civil rights during the Vietnam War. In particular, the case Holmes v. United States (1968) reveals that the government is entitled to recruit men in wartime. However, the Court also argued that much concern should be paid to the constitutionality of the conscription due to the absence of the official declaration of war.

The debates concerning the number of soldiers needed for ensuring defense system, as well as what expenses these selective service policies will endure provoke further contradictions.

In this respect, Cowen points to the numerous arguments that exclude the possibility of introducing two-fold social organization because the United States should decide whether it should remain a powerful state, or it should maintain the all-volunteer military reform (168).

History proves, however, that military service was once the central obligation of national citizenship, but today it is disconnected from the life of work of most members of the political community (Cowen 168). The current gap between civil and military obligations in the country has introduced a number of suggestions to reconsider the necessity for national conscription.

Therefore, the arguments against conscription take advantage over the conservative policy of the draft that lost its actuality since the introduction of neo-liberalist views on social development and democratic welfare. In fact, Cowen supports the idea that the American liberalism introduces stronger rationale for creating all-voluntary military system than the policies on mandate conscription (169).

Considering the Contradictions of the Selective Service System in the United States

An in-depth evaluation of the Selective Service reforms in the time of World War II concerning wartime strikes induces significant controversies on the policies in the United States. The debate reveals whether the draft should be restricted to the purpose of obligatory commitment to the countrys welfare and protection or it can be used as a tool for controlling nonmilitary workforce (Blum 381).

In this respect, the legal and ethical basis for developing the draft for other than main purposes is not justified because of the evident violation of civil rights (Foster 390).

According Blum, wartime strikes have triggered further contradictions related to the essential purposes of Selective Service Reforms according to which the recruitment for military purposes, but not for the purpose of controlling labor market, should not be approved (380). Though the modern conscription policies admit the conscientious objection to mandate service, there were still inadequate treatment of the U.S. citizens.

As an alternative to the Selective Service System, there is an option of conscientious objection, which implies that individual should be a conscientious objector to all wars, but not to a specific war (Blum 380). Therefore, the individual must express his/her protest against all wars; otherwise, he/she should be involved in accomplishing noncombat duties to prove his/her unanimous opinion on all wars.

Conscription Controversies at the Beginning of the Twenty-First Century

Apart from the violation of the civil rights of the U.S. citizens, the intended conscription has become the controversial issue due to the rise of discriminative policy. In particular, Cowen has stressed that the military services recruited men predominantly from the middle and working classes, which comprised mostly of ethnic minorities and women (170).

Therefore, the government has reconsidered the compulsory military recruitment to have found out that labor market dynamic allows to meet ethical and legal concerns regarding individual rights and equality. Unequal recruitment of population for military service has caused serious political debates concerning the rise of a warrior class that was composed mostly of African American women and people of color.

Rationale for Introducing Mandate Conscription

Certainly, the mandatory military service creates a number of contradictions concerning the justice and equality of recruiting people. To begin with, the failure to introduce the draft and Selective Service policy seem to be irrational for some reasons.

The proposed perspective reveals the necessity of introducing the conscription in the United States due to the previous events, including 9/11 attacks and War in Iraq. Specifically, the U.S. government should focus on the efficient defensive mechanism to maintain the image of a power-state. However, the introduced reforms should be used for other than military services.

Conclusion

With regard to the above-presented arguments, it should be stressed the Selective Service System provides contradictory issues concerning the cancellation of conscription in the United States. In particular, it contradicts the principle of equality and voluntary-based recruitment for military service.

Moreover, the conscription terms also violate the constitutional rights of individuals. This is of particular concern to equality, discrimination, and freedom of choice. The U.S. government, therefore, should reconsider its policy toward middle class population to eliminate the discriminative policy.

Annotated Bibliography

The article introduces the main contradictions of the draft and the selective reforms during the Second World War. In particular, the author criticizes the governments inappropriate policy toward the labor workforce and its irrelevant use of Conscription Act of 1917. The source, therefore, is relevant for the research because it introduces the major debates concerning the adequacy of the Selective Service reforms.

In the article, the author provides a wider picture on the conservative approach to treating conscription in the United States, as well as neo-liberalist trends in reshaping the terms of the military service in the United States. Therefore, the article is useful for understanding new solutions toward the reconstructing the military service and social organization.

The book refers to historical background of civil-military relations in the United States. It provides outlook on conscription at the end of nineteenth century and, therefore, it gives a better understanding of the problems related to current military debates.

The article produces an overview of conscientious objection to wartime, as well as contradictions toward Selective Service reform. Such an aspect is useful to consider in the research studies to define how it influences the debate on the mandatory military service.

The case under analysis focuses on the Court decision that undermined the constitutionality of the conscription during the Vietnam War. Such a perspective introduces a supportive argument against the mandatory military service in the United States.

The article under analysis describes the advantages and disadvantages of the Selective Service due to the equality and freedom concerns. Once again, the source can contribute significantly to the research studies because it explains how conscription constrains violate the civil and moral rights of the U.S. citizens.

Works Cited

Blum, Albert A. Work or Fight: The Use of the Draft as a Manpower Sanction During The Second World War. Industrial & Labor Relations Review, vol. 16, no. 3, 1963, pp. 366-380.

Cowen, Deborah. Fighting for Freedom: The End of Conscription in the United States and Neoliberal Project of Citizenship. Citizenship Studies, vol. 10, no. 2, 2006, pp. 167-183.

Escott, Paul. Military Necessity: Civil-Military Relations in the Confederacy. Greenwood Publishing Group, 2006.

Foster, Gregory. Selective Conscientious Objection. Society, vol. 46, no. 5, 2009, p. 390.

Holmes v United States, 391 U.S. 936. 1968.

Johnson, Lyndon. 92 Special Message to the Congress on Selective Service. March 6, 1967. American Reference Library Primary Source Documents, 2001, pp. 277-288.

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