Mandatory national service would strengthen America
America in general and Hawaii in particular need a new national service requirement in which every able-bodied young man and woman is required to commit one or two years of time to a cause larger than themselves. We have had this before in the face of external threats. Today the threats are internal. We need citizens to have more skin in the game.
Why? Citizenship may appear to expand with every new law but ironically, it is shrinking. Everyone is focused on the cult of “Where’s mine!” Interconnectivity has many advantages but it also seems to increase political pessimism. Our sense of community is reduced to laws to be obeyed, votes to be harvested, and taxes to be paid.
Is there a cure? A new social contract with tangible expectations and opportunities could be a start. Having ourselves volunteered during a different era of American politics, we can see how those experiences shaped new disciplines and habits. Even though we come from different traditions, one military and the other civilian, it created a shared civic experience.
Here is a better example.
In 1939, a law passed by Congress and Franklin Roosevelt changed the temperament of America. It created what would soon become the Works Projects Administration, an ambitious service program that put millions of men and women to work to carry out projects that included the construction of parks, roads, bridges and buildings.
Many of those constructions endure today, but there were other, maybe even more important legacies: life-changing odysseys for young people; tangible work that got done with pride; and the direct involvement in what politicians now call “The American Dream.”
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Congress also passed the Selective Training and Service Act, the first peacetime conscription in U.S. history. Selective Service required men between 21 and 35 to register with local draft boards and be ready for call-up. Two decades later the original architects of Kennedy’s Peace Corps program envisioned the same. A Peace Corps draft.
Today, we need an experience of direct citizenship to help counter the loss of faith in our institutions. Citizenship without meaningful participation makes us lazy. It becomes a constant assertion of “rights” devoid of “responsibilities.”
There is much that needs to be done. Our state and national infrastructures are in dire need of maintenance. Schools need additional teachers. Poorer communities could use assistance from young lawyers, MBAs and social workers. Parks and trails need to be fixed and start-up minority businesses and social service agencies need entrepreneurial help.
To stay healthy, we need fresh imagination and political willpower and a focus on “doing” rather than talking. There are plenty of options available: any branch of the military, Teacher Corps, Vista, AmeriCorps, Peace Corps, and YouthBuild. More can be invented.
Hawaii with its general civic apathy could especially benefit from programs that motivate 18- to 25-year-olds to do something for the community. We can also create “carrots” — college debt relief; post-volunteer career or college scholarships; hiring preferences; re-adjustment allowances after volunteered time.
The long-term payoff could be profound. “The best way to find yourself,” said Gandhi, “is to lose yourself in the service of others.” Much of this comes down to inspired and brave leaders who will insist on a service requirement and deliver up projects and programs that people can touch.
In the late 1960s, Victor Craft was an Air Force enlisted staff sergeant in Vietnam fixing aircraft that had been shot up, while Peter Adler was in India with the Peace Corps raising chickens, building schools and killing rats.
17 responses to “Mandatory national service would strengthen America”
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Kennedy’s “Don’t ask” speech has as much application as it did in the ’60s.—– Don’t ask what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.
Yes, a national service requirement would strengthen our country. Most young adults today (outside of the military or volunteer organizations) have no real connection with their country. It seems that there’s no real sense of community or nationalism.
It’s a great idea and for more reasons than the authors indicate. I have always employed ex-military people–they know how to dress, are on time, and can work with others. A draft would also keep people a heck of a lot more involved in foreign politics and policy since their sons and daughters might just be called into the mix. The WPA was a great boost and should have been started in Obama’s first year with the recession–but now we have Unions and free labor would–in their mind take away union jobs and DUES. Of course, all this rhetoric is just that–it’s too politically sensitive to bring up–just like the unfairness of the Jones Act.
The worse and best times in my life when I enlisted in the US Army! Would I do it again? In a heart beat!
Let’s go beyond national service and institute universal military draft. No deferments for the wealthy, as has been the case from the Revolutionary War through the Vietnam Conflict. Instituting a draft would provide two major benefits. Fist, the American public would pay attention to the endless (and fruitless) conflicts we are in. (As one U.S. Army general remarked a few years ago, “The U.S. is not at war; the Army is at war.”) A second benefit of a draft would result in our armed forces better reflecting the demographics of the nation rather than a professional officer corps and too many enlisted personnel from the struggling ranks of the country, all of whom have limited contact with civilian society since they work, live, shop, and recreate on military facilities. Let’s keep in mind that a professional, isolated military will ultimately pose a danger to our democracy.
Better yet, the concept put forth by Robert Heinlein (‘Starship Troopers”) that a person must choose at age 18 whether or not to serve.
If the answer is YES, than a place MUST be found for that person to serve regardless of physical condition/disability. At the end of two years, that person is declared to be a CITIZEN with voting and other citizenship rights.
If the answer is NO, that person becomes a ward of the state with almost none of the rights enjoyed by CITIZENS – – certainly will have no say in who serves in any government office.
In this way VOTERS would be those guaranteed to have skin in the game.
A mandatory military draft, would be an interesting and cheap method of citizenship loyalty. Would there be an Amnesty Program for political protesters ?
This is an excellent idea. I authored a similar idealistic commentary in a newspaper about 50 years ago.
But there are downsides. People drafted into “national service” might feel like they are being punished even though they committed no crime — “community service” is now a routine part of sentences handed down by judges for violating the law.
Libertarians would dislike the concept of depriving young people of their freedom to choose how they want to spend a long period of their lives. After all, those liberals who support the concept of mandatory national service are the same liberals who say a woman has a right to choose what to do with her own body (abortion) — seems self-contradictory, doesn’t it? Does the government own us, even to the extent of enslaving us (MANDATORY service)? Or do we own our government and our own lives?
Yes and no. Yes, the original idea put forward by Craft and Adler is an excellent one, and Mr. Conklin seems to agree, especially considering his support of the idea 50 years ago. But then he falls victim to the either-or thinking that has caused so much conflict in our lives, by questioning whether the government owns us (even “enslaving us”) or we “own our government.” Neither is the case. As citizens we face a complex system of responsibilities and freedoms that requires us to understand, for example, the difference between slavery and mandatory service to our country. As humans we should be able to recognize the limitations of language and at the same time understand our dependence on it.
The way the world is now, a draft may be necessary in the future.
You could wait to be drafted into the army… or choose an enlistment into another military service… or the Peace Corps. Worked for me 50 years ago… should work today.
Especially with other options available… like attend a free trade school and then be required to “serve” for 2 years putting your new skills to work in public service.
We have now generations of people dependent on government hand outs–getting everything for doing nothhing has destroyed the drive for many to do something bigger than themselves. Kennedy’s speech has changed from ask not what your country can do for you but ask what you can do for your country to one that is ask what your fellow countrymen can give you for doing nothing and sit back as your fellowmen toil away to give those that you asked.
National service for two years should be mandatory for all high school graduates/18-year-olds, with a few exceptions (e.g., those with genius-level IQs, incapacitating disabilities). I would expand the authors’ list to include national-level organizations such as the National Park Service, Customs, and the Transportation Security and Drug Enforcement administrations. Military service would only be for volunteers; otherwise, choices can be made based on, for example, high school standing (meaning some would be “drafted” where vacancies need to be filled).
“Starvation” wages (below federal minimum wage) would be paid but all draftees would be fed, clothed, and housed. Even military draftees would be paid less than the equivalent E-1 pay, with a slight increase (and a stripe) at the one-year point, but kept away from combat zones. Those opting to stay in the military enlisted ranks after two years would be raised to fully-paid E-3/4 ranks. Completion of the two years of mandatory service would then entitle the individual to free tuition, room, and board at any state- or city-operated four-year college or university. Those opting for tuition-free ROTC would be given a stipend equivalent to partial tuition. During their two years of mandatory service, the draftees would undertake aptitude and interest tests and receive career counseling. “Graduates” would have gained maturity, “backbone,” and perhaps even some idea of what they want to do in life, secure in the knowledge that they have, in fact, done something for their nation.
When someone is given a resource for “free”–particularly when the resource is guaranteed for a long time, then that resource will be squandered. If your plan guarantees a steady flow of essentially free labor to all these organizations, then no matter how noble the organization may be at the start, it will quickly degrade to the lowest possible level of effectiveness once it has this free source of labor. Never overlook human nature when coming up with “new” laws and ways to “help society”.
I’ve been saying this for years! But extend the time to two to four years. Service could be either civilian like the CCC for 2 years or an armed service for 4 to 6 years. Educational benefits would be commensurate with the time served. Furthermore, people would have to leave their home community; the would enhance one’s appreciation for one’s home, as well as expand horizons, experiences and friends. Many countries have mandatory service upon high school graduation and with few jobs available for 18-22 year olds and subsequent consequences of boredom, people in the this vulnerable demographic would be occupied, employed and learning skills that would benefit their community, their nation and themselves.
It all sounds great, it worked for Roosevelt (people did NOT have the free social services that are rampant today so it was a way out of crushing poverty)…and it was necessary in order to give the politicians the cannon fodder to deal with Communism in the 50’s-70’s, but what do you do with the people today who get everything for free, with no responsibility, no education and no desire to do anything for anyone, who refuse the Universal Service requirement?
Not just contentious objectors, but just lazy?
In the 60’s you got sent to jail.
They never should have ended the draft. The voluntary military is shorthanded and that is why many soldiers serve multiple tours in Iraq and Afghanistan and end up with PTSD. The voluntary military also is too expensive with higher salaries, more wasteful benefits (big housing allowances, free shipping of automobiles, transportation and allowances for families), and the need for more civilian support (KP, base work, guard duty,etc.).