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Show Here's A Comprehensive Look At The Draft TIGHTEN CONTROL Just as there will be a tightening of student deferments, defer-ments, medical deferments will also be harder to come by. If a man is called to take his physical, the chances are still better than even that he will be turned down. A report from the Army Surgeon General's Gen-eral's office indicated that during dur-ing 1964 only 47 per cent of the 847,511 draftees were accepted. ac-cepted. Of the 53 per cent that failed to qualify, 22.2 per cent were for medical reasons; 16.2 per cent for mental reasons; 11.4 per cent had "limited training ability"; 1.5 per cent had both medical and mental reasons for being rejected; and 1.7 per cent were found to be "morally unfit." un-fit." "The criteria for medically determining cobat fitness' have obviously changed with the changing techniques of warfare," war-fare," the report said. In some ways, the present standards are more liberal than during World War II. Still medical deferments are going to be harder to get in the coming months. Gen. Hershey compares the situation to shopping for tomatoes. "When you go shopping for tomatoes and discover that there is a limited supply," the general says, "you have to buy some with spots if you're to get as many as you need." LOCAL BOARDS The easiest way to get draf ed still is to be in some sg of trouble with your locc)r. board. The highest draftablo) classification is reserved fcg those who the local board find to be "delinquent" under th.n" Selective Service Act. This mav be a person who doesn't keep the board informed of his ad-dress ad-dress or his status. The law says a registrant must furnish the board information on any change of status within 10 days. Now there is a new way to be in trouble with the board, and the law. President Johnson signed a law August 31 that makes it illegal for anyone to burn or distroy his draft card. Enacted by Congress to counteract stu-t dent demonstrations that in-1 eluded a public burning or tear-j ing up of draft cards as a pro-ff test to the war in Viet Nam, the law provides for a $10,000 fine1 or five years in prison for any- v one who destroys his Selective Service card. By WILLIAM GRANT With the October and November No-vember draft calls the largest since the Korean War, the nation's na-tion's draft boards are set to look at requests for student deferments de-ferments with a more discerning discern-ing eye. The Selective Service System has no intention of abondoning deferments for students in colleges col-leges and universities but, under un-der the tighter policy, draft boards will be picking up some deferred students who are not attending school full time or who are not making satisfactory satisfac-tory progress in their classes. Last January the total nationwide na-tionwide draft call was only 5,400 men. In February, it dropped to 3,000. The Viet Nam crises shot the draft call to 7,900 in March; 13,700 in April; 15,100 in May; 17,000, in June; 17,100 in July; and 16,500 in August. Then, on July 28 President Lyndon Johnson announced that a September call of 27,000 men would be necessary in order to meet the increased commitment in Viet Nam. "DRAFT POOLS" Even at that time most state Selective Service men were quoted as saying they didn't feel the new figures would cause any change in the draft status of most men because "draft pools" were large enough to take care of the increased in-creased demands. In most states, draft officials were quoted, some off the record, as saying that married men with no other dependents still need not fear for the draft. Under a 1963 order by President Kennedy, Ken-nedy, married men with no children were not to be drafted as long as single men were available. But the Defense Department announced an October call of 33,600 and recently announced its November call of 36,450 the two largest calls since the end of the Korean War. And 'n November, for the first time since Korea, the draft will include in-clude men for the Marine Corps. Some states began to backtrack on their previous statements about married men and many conceded that it would be necessary to take married men "sometime in the fall." BOMBSHELL On August 26, President Johnson dropped his well-remembered bombshell and announced an-nounced he had revoked President Presi-dent Kennedy's order and that from now on married men without with-out children would be considered con-sidered the same as single men as far as the draft is concerned. Trying to beat the order's midnight deadline, young couples cou-ples sought out marriage spots like Las Vegas, Nev. Some made it and got married before be-fore midnight. But Lt. Gen. Lewis B. Hershey, national director of the Selective Service System, observed, "I believe these couples cou-ples will find they didn't beat any deadline. We'll get most of them in four or five months." The facts remain that with the increased draft calls, local boards are rapidly running out of single men between the ages of 19 and 26 the present induction in-duction limits and the childless child-less married men are the next to go. The same sort of concern has been registered among college students who fear that continued con-tinued high draft calls will further fur-ther deplete the draft pools and they, after the married men, will be the next to go. ON OWN MERITS To a degree, they're right. As one Selective Service official of-ficial points out, "There is nothing noth-ing automatic about a student being deferred. Each case is considered on its own merits with the student's course of study, its importance to the national interest, and the student's stu-dent's scholastic ability" being used as measuring sticks. The same high official suggested sug-gested that as the quotas rise (or even if they stay at the present high level for some extended ex-tended period of time) and the age of the draftee drops, boards probably will not be able to give deferments for longer than a year. "This would cover a man in his senior year or probably could be extended in order to let a junior finish school, but it probably would not let the 19 or 20 year-old sophomore finish college before being called for military duty," he said. CALL LATER He said any student who received re-ceived an order for induction while in school might be given a I-S classification that would allow him to finish that school year before reporting for duty. The first thing likely to happen hap-pen is that probationary or borderline students will lose their deferments as they did during the Korean War. This means draft boards could require re-quire a student to meet certain academic levels in order to retain re-tain his deferment. The graduate students chances of completing his studies before service vary. The state director of Selective Service Serv-ice for Maryland said in a recent re-cent interview that graduate deferments were considered by local boards but that deferments defer-ments were given after asking if the student's study were serving the national interest, health, or safety. The Maryland director, Brig. Gen. Henry C. Stanwood, said he felt the requirement re-quirement could be interpreted to mean that science, math, and medical students were favored. |