Stop The Draft

STOP THE DRAFT

As we go to press Wednesday night, the United States of America no longer has a legal draft system. The draft law expired on Wednesday, June 30, and Congress has yet to renew it or pass another one, while it hassles over a proposed amendment to the new law which calls for a total withdrawal from Indochina by all U.S. military personnel within nine months. The amendment, proposed by Senate Majority leader Mike Mansfield, has already passed the Senate, but failed in the House.

In the meantime, no one can be inducted into the Army! Selective Service offices are open for registration, but orders from Washington are to "cease and desist" in forwarding draftees for induction.

All over the country people are taking advantage of this temporary breakdown to confuse the death machine even further than it is already, split up the middle as more and more people wake up (some in the government itself) to the murderous plunder of Vietnam practiced by the Nixon administration and the corporate interests it fronts for. A radio newsman in California went to his local draft board in Marin County and demanded that the clerk turn over all his records and files. Peter Laufer of KSAN-FM and his attorney told the clerk that since there is now no Selective Service law, the SS and his local draft board have no right to keep his files, which he says are personal information. "It's an invasion of privacy," said Laufer.  "These documents deal with my religion, my health, my security clearance -- these are all protected by the Bill of Rights."

Laufer asked the clerk to either turn over the files to him or destroy them. "She called her district headquarters and they said that she was right not to turn them over. This afternoon we are going to write a registered letter to the California director of Selective Service and If he refuses to turn them over to us, then we will file a class action suit against the Federal Government demanding that they show cause why these documents won't be turned over to me. We maintain that the Selective Service office shouldn't have been open this morning - -that they have no authority to even maintain their payroll."

So if this situation continues, use your imagination, visit your local draft board, and make them stick to the law.