Coffin Blasts U.S. Foreign Policy, Discusses Moral Reactions to Draft

Yale Chaplain William Slone Coffin mixed moral persuasion, debating tactics and humor last night when he lambasted the United States Policy in Vietnam.

"You should all be listening to Carl Oglesby," he announced to his audience in Leverett House before he had even been introduced. He was referring to the president of SDS, also speaking at Harvard last night.

But his tone was often serious when he talked about the morality of the United States' position.

"Both you and I know how hard it is to overcome evil with good, and it is certainly impossible to overcome evil with evil. Yet that is exactly the heart of our foreign policy," he said.

"Any college student today who faces the draft and has any moral qualms about the war is going to have a major psychological hang-up," he said. For this reason, he said, there should be "a whole gamut of responses possible" for the potential draftee. He suggested that young men could "share the burden of the war, but not its purposes" by joining the Peace Corps or Vista "until there is a better war to fight," or by volunteering their services to a U.N. standing army.

Salving Consciences

Coffin suggested that the ROTC student who opposed the war could resign his commission--if he didn't mind landing in jail. A more practical possibility for conscience-clearing, he added, might be to "take the $40 a month which is your ROTC pay, and give it to a good peace cause."

"Never repress your moral sensibilities. Never. You have to give them outlets..." he said solemnly. Then he grinned, adding. "Of course money is always a very good way to do it."

Coffin said he hopes that the United States can negotiate an "honorable disengagement," but he likes to speculate on the possibility of an arbitration. "We'd come out looking very good if we became the first major power to submit such a major issue to U.N. arbitration," he said.