Draft Politics

IN this election year, it should come as no surprise that the recent draft decisions were politically motivated. Although some substantive issues played an important role, in the end political considerations governed the President's actions. And make no mistake about the decisions being Johnson's. The Selective Service System is merely a service organization that follows orders, drafting men for the army in a manner prescribed by law. Although draft director General/Hershey undoubtedly influenced the decision to retain the present order of call, the National Security Council- in effect, the President since he heads it-reached the final decisions. Hershey publicly announced the President's directives and will administer them, but he had little hand in the policy-making.

The two questions considered first-graduate and occupational deferments-were from all indications decided substantially on the issues. The views of Labor Secretary W. Willard Wirtz prevailed on both. In testimoney before the Senate Subcommittee on Employment, Manpower, and Poverty last month. Wirtz said that solely on the considerations of civilian manpower supply, neither group of deferments was essential to the nation. Although not a member of the NSC, his views were transmitted to the Council in an official memorandum co-signed by the Secretaries of Commerce and Health, education, and Welfare.

Besides Wirtz's judgement, Johnson made his decisions because of widespread criticism of "pyramiding." Graduate students in the past have been able to pile one deferment on top of another until they were exempt from service because of age. This inequity has been a focal point for the non-ideological criticism of the draft. Johnson's primary goal is known to have been halting that criticism and secondarily alleviating the inequities. Although he seems to have achieved the first, he has only reversed the second, placing the military obligation disproportionately on the formerly-privileged group.

ONCE the question of deferments was settled, the problem of order of call arose. Every group that has studied the draft in recent years-the Defense Department, the Marshall Commission, and the House-appointed Clark Panel-recommended changing the order of call from the present oldest first to 19-year-olds first. The new law empowered the President to make that change but severely limited his choice of a new selection system. It prohibited random selection as well as a shift that would call the youngest men first in ascending age sequence. He could have chosen to induct men from any or all of the seven eligible age groups (19 to 25 years) but was compelled to draft the oldest men first within each group chosen.

Without an extension of graduate deferments, a change in call became particularly important because oldest first would induct nearly all of this years able-bodied male college graduates and first-year graduate students. Johnson was well aware of the effects no change would have on the graduate schools. The American Council on Education, President Pusey, and other education officials had done a thorough job of informing him through personal meetings with Defense Secretary McNamara and Presidential aide Douglass Cater, public testimony before representative Edith Green's (D-Ore.) Special House Subcommittee on Education, and personal conversations behind the scenes.

In terms of actual effect on registrants, this was the most important decision facing the President and also the most politically delicate. His decision was not included in the Concil's official memorandum of advice to Hershey; he was perfectly willing to let the General take the criticism that followed. Although it was not announced publicly, Johnson is known to have considered two alternatives: * Prime age group of age-mix plan. Under this plan, all men losing their II-S deferments in June would be considered to be born in 1949 for draft purposes. These "constructive" 19-year-olds would be put in the pool with the actual 19-year-olds and selected out according to their months and date of birth-oldest first. * Percentage plan. Advocated by President Pusey among others, this plan would draft men according to the percentages of the seven age groups in the total eligible pool. If, for example, 22-year-olds constituted ten per cent of the pool, they would fill that percentage of each month's draft call-oldest men within each group inducted first.

HERSHEY made it known that adminstering either plan would mean "bedlam" for the Selective Service, although last week he denied reports that he had said he could not do it. Some observers believe that his comment alone caused the President to reject the plans, but it was only one of the deciding factors. Another was that age-mix would have exempted the 200.000 men currently classified I-A who are older than 19 but have never held a II-S. The percentage plan was rejected for three additional reasons:

* It would have subjected registrants to seven years of continual liability to induction from age 19 until age 26.

* It began to look like a random selection plan to the President and his advisers without really being fair and impartial, the essence of random selection.

* What administration members have labelled the "displacement effect."

The term "displacement effect" conceals the nature of what one administration source termed the "toughest problem" in the percentage plan. The "problem" was simply that under the percentage plan about 80,000 fewer first-year graduate students would have been drafted than under oldest first, and their places would have had to be filled by men who have never held a II-S, mainly Negroes and members of other economically-disadvantages groups.

The Vietnam war has already been criticized as a "black man's war" and twice as many Negroes as whites have died in combat. Realizing that criticism was sure to accompany a plan that would draft a greater proportion of Negroes, the President decided that retaining oldest first was the most politically sound move. Graduate students have already been attacked for their privileged deferred status, and he realized that drafting them was least likely to provoke widespread criticism outside the academic community. So far he has been right.

THE future for men over 20 looks bleak. Under law, the Defense Department can institute either of the two plans without Presidential action. A very high Pentagon official said last week that he will make no changes because the plans are "administratively unfeasible." Senator Edward M.Kennedy '54 (D-Mass.) will this week propose a comprehensive revision of the draft law, including random selection. Hershey said last week that be could have a lottery working three months after Congress had approved it. The man who could this year push through Kennedy's bill is the same man who killed random selection last year: L. Mendel Rivers (D-SC), chairman of the House Armed Services Committee.

Rivers is probably already getting pressure from his army friends to do something about a system that will deliver groups of inductees that are two-third college graduates. Apparently responding to pressure, Rivers last week publicly demanded to know why Johnson had not changed the order of call as all the study groups suggested. If anyone can push the bill through a reluctant election-year Congress, Rivers is the man, but even the possibility of his help is little cause for hope.