Who Is Draftable?

Some day soon the U.S. Government may be able to perform a major service for its male citizens: to tell them if & when they will be drafted.

Last week the one man in Congress who knows more about the draft than any other--Senator Robert Taft of Ohio--was striving valiantly to help Selective Service make things plain. The difficulty is in interpreting the revision of the draft law which Congress recently passed to set up clearer standards of selection.

Basically the standards set by Congress are simple enough. There are three separate grounds for deferment:

First is family relationship. Under the recent law, for example, a married man living with his wife may be deferred for that fact alone (although she is not dependent on him). In short, a man may be deferred simply in order not to break up a family.

Second is financial dependency. Whether he has a family or not, a man may be deferred because he has dependents. This kind of deferment is based entirely on the hardship that might be imposed on others.

Third is occupational necessity. Regardless of his family status, regardless of whether he has dependents, a man may be deferred on the grounds of being a necessary man in a necessary job--a job vital either to the war effort directly or to the civilian community which supports the war effort.*

Legally, age alone (i.e., any age between 20 and 44) is not ground for deferment, regardless of the fact that older men may make poorer soldiers and have more responsibilities in civil life.

Permutations. The difficulty in applying these criteria is that there are several kinds and degrees of family relationship, of dependency, of necessary occupations. With one multiplied upon another, there would be innumerable degrees of draftability.

No one could master such higher mathematics. But this week Selective Service Headquarters issued a new, long-awaited directive which should make the job simpler. Degrees of draftability were boiled down to seven rule-of-thumb classes replacing old classifications. In order of draftability they are: 1) single men without dependents; 2) single men with dependents but not contributing to the war effort; 3) single men with dependents, contributing to the war effort; 4) married men, living with their wives, but not contributing to the war effort; 5) married men, living with their wives, contributing to the war effort; 6) married men, living with wife & children or children only, not contributing to the war effort; 7) married men, living with wife & children or children only, contributing to the war effort.

Quotas and Human Nature. In the past even though guided by a 150-page book of regulations and countless mimeographed releases from headquarters, the 6,443 local draft boards have interpreted the law 6,443 different ways. This week's directive still left much to the discretion of draft boards, and inequalities are still bound to crop up.

Reasons for unequal drafting are as complicated as a bird's nest.

> Army quotas (demands on boards for a certain number of men) have often exceeded 1-As available for three reasons:

1) quotas are supposed to be (but are not always) based on rough estimates of 1-As;

2) in making up quotas, the latest available local board reports are used, and these are usually from 30 to 60 days late in reaching Washington;

3) Army "over-calls" for men from some particular region often throw quotas temporarily out of whack.

> When a board receives its quota, it may not have finished classifying its latest registrants. It has to pick from men already classified. Thus, before the new family-relationship deferment went into effect many a married man was sent to war, simply because his hard-pressed board decided his family could get along without his salary, while that very same board still had some single registrants without dependents. The classification delay is understandable; board members are volunteers, usually part-time; their assistants are few and underpaid.

> Draft boards vary from tough to easy. The number of men actually put in 1-A by boards has varied widely, from 3% to 24%. And since quotas depend on the number of 1-As, a tough board will be asked for more men than an easy one.

> Another cause of variation from board to board is that regulations and releases from headquarters are long, are phrased in legalese, or are issued not as orders but as advice (e.g., boards were asked to give "serious consideration" to deferment of FBI men).

How Many Men? Best guesswork figures on U.S. manpower from 20 to 45, grouped roughly in order of liability to serve :

Single, no dependents . 9.5 million

Single, dependents. . . .1.5 " "

Married, no children. . .5.5 " "

Married, children. . . . .11.0 " "

Total. . . . . . . . . . . . . .27.5" "

According to these figures, even if the U.S. takes only down to the 20-year-olds, no men married before Pearl Harbor (when induction was imminent) need be drafted for quite a while yet. The new allotments for soldiers' dependents may make one million single men, now deferred for dependency, available for service when the boards get around to reclassifying them. Some 10.5 single million men would then be available in all. Of these, perhaps 370,000 may have special occupational deferments, leaving about 10 million. But, about 50% won't meet the Army's physical, mental and moral requirements. Yet if the Army sticks to its announced 4.8 million for 1942, the five million left should suffice until then.

If the army takes in many former 1-Bs, men slated for "limited service" because of slight physical defects (TIME, July 13), that 10 million will last even longer. And if Congress, free from election fears, later allows drafting of 18-19-year-olds, there will be 2.5 million more men to draw on before married men need be touched. But National Headquarters is still afraid to exempt married men in a blanket order until reclassification of single men is complete, lest flow of men into the Army be seriously interrupted.

Exact figures are military secrets, but unless the war should end in 1942 the Army may need 2,500,000 more men in 1943, 2,000,000 more in 1944.

Senator Taft has four main suggestions for taking the confusion out of the draft:

> Orders from headquarters should be definite. Draft boards should have some leeway in interpreting the law, but right now they have too much (e. g., differences in interpreting concepts like dependency).

> As "nobody has taken any constructive steps toward evaluating our manpower, I think Selective Service should do it under general direction of the War Manpower Commission".

> Quotas should be abolished. Drafting should be by the new classes, and when a new class is tapped, all boards should do it at approximately the same time.

> If men over 30 with wives and families need never be called, "it is wise to tell them now that their proper work is at home, and that they should devote themselves wholeheartedly to the support of the war through civilian activities." No one is yet able to tell them.

* There are a few other special occupational deferments: for ministers of the gospel, public officials, etc.

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