Full Document from Federal Select
Service about the Draft
First My Preface
Rabbi David E. Eidensohn
Women Soon to be Eligible for Draft
in Military?
Women may soon be eligible for
the military draft because the Supreme Court ruled that the only reason women
are not eligible for the draft is because they are not accepted for combat.
Today this has changed and women are active in combat just like men. Thus, we
anticipate a new ruling from the Supreme Court to force women to register for
the draft and to serve when called up. We oppose women in the draft or even to
register for the draft because women in college and the army away from home are
often molested, as we provide the sources from Harvard University and the
Federal Government elsewhere on this blog. Orthodox Jewish Law strongly
condemns women with men anywhere, surely the military, which is known to
produce much sexual abuse for women.
Document
from the Select Service Administration about Women in the Draft
(Some
emphasis added for crucial statements)
Backgrounder: Women
and the Draft
While women officers and enlisted personnel serve with distinction in the U.S. Armed Forces,
women have never been subject to Selective Service registration or a
military draft in America.
Those women who served in the past and those who
serve today in ever increasing numbers all
volunteered for military service.
The U.S. came close to drafting women
during World War II, when there was a shortage of military nurses. However,
there was a surge of volunteerism and a draft of women nurses was not needed.
After America’s draft ended in 1973,
the Selective Service System was maintained in a standby status, just in case a
return to conscription became necessary during a crisis. After March 29, 1975,
men no longer had to register and Selective Service was placed in "deep
standby." But then, in 1980, President Carter reactivated the registration
process for men in response to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and in
reaction to reports that the standby Selective Service System might not meet
wartime requirements for rapid manpower expansion of the active and reserve forces.
Although the specter of a future
draft remained solely the concern of young men, discussions in Congress and the
Administration about registering and conscripting women periodically took
place. Section 811 of the Department of Defense Authorization Act, 1980 (P.L.
96-107, Nov. 9, 1979) required the President to send to the Congress a plan for
reforming the law providing for the registration and induction of persons for
military service. The President sent his recommendations for Selective Service
reform in a report dated Feb. 11, 1980. As noted above, the President requested
reactivation of registration for men. But another recommendation to the
Congress was that the act be amended to provide presidential authority to
register, classify, and examine women for service in the Armed Forces. If
granted, the President would exercise this authority when the Congress
authorized the conscription of men. Although women would become part of the
personnel inventory for the services to draw from, their use would be based on
the needs and missions of the services. Department of Defense (DoD) policy,
which was not to assign women to positions involving close combat, would
continue. In response to these recommendations, the Congress agreed to
reactivate registration, but declined to amend the act to permit the
registration of women. In the legislative history for the Department of Defense
Authorization Act, 1981, the Senate Armed Services Committee report stated that
the primary reason for not expanding registration to include women was DoD’s
policy of not using women in combat. Additional reasons cited in the report
included agreement by both civilian and military leadership that there was no
military need to draft women and congressional concerns about the societal impact
of the registration and possible induction of women.
The exclusion of
women from the registration process was challenged in the courts. A lawsuit
brought by several men resulted in a 1980 U.S. District Court for the Eastern
District of Pennsylvania decision that the MSSA’s gender-based discrimination
violated the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment, and the District Court
enjoined registration under the Act. Upon direct appeal, in the case
of Rostker
v. Goldberg, 453 U.S. 57 (1981), the Supreme Court reversed the
District Court decision and upheld the constitutionality of the exclusion,
ruling that there was no violation of the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment. The Supreme Court based its decision largely on DoD’s policy
that excluded women from combat. The Court
reasoned that since the purpose of registration was to create a pool of
potential inductees for combat, males and females could be treated differently.
The Court also noted its inclination to defer to Congress since draft
registration requirements are enacted by Congress under its constitutional
authority to raise armies and navies, and observed that Congress had in 1980
considered but rejected a proposal to expand registration to women.
In 1992, a
Presidential Commission on the Assignment of Women in the Armed Forces
reexamined the issue of registration and conscription of women. In its November
1992 report, by a vote of 11 to 3, the Commission recommended that women not be
required to register for or be subject to conscription. The Commission cited
the 1981 Supreme Court decision in Rostker v. Goldberg upholding
the exclusion of women from registration as the basis for its recommendation.
The Commission also discussed enacting existing ground combat specialties
exclusion policies into law to provide an additional barrier to the amendment
of the MSSA to provide for the conscription of women. However, an appendix to
its report suggested that public opinion was divided on the issue. The
appendix, which included the results of a random telephone survey of 1,500 adults,
showed that, in the event of a draft for a national emergency or threat of war
(and assuming an ample pool of young men exists), 52 percent of respondents
indicated women should be drafted, about 39 percent of respondents indicated
women should not be drafted, and 10 percent responded they did not know.
In May 1994,
President Clinton asked the Secretary of Defense to update its
mobilization requirements for the Selective Service System and, as a part of
the effort, "continues to review the arguments for and against continuing
to exclude women from registration now that they can be assigned to combat roles
other than ground combat." In its subsequent report, the DoD position
remained "that the restriction of females from assignments below the
brigade level whose primary mission is to engage in direct combat on the
ground, provides justification from exempting women from registration (and a
draft) as set forth in the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in Rostker
v. Goldberg (1981)." However, the report also recognized the
vastly increased role being played by women in each of the Armed Services who,
in Fiscal Year 1994, comprised 16 percent of recruits. "Because of this
change in the makeup of the Armed Forces," the report observed, "much
of the congressional debate which, in the court’s opinion, provided adequate
congressional scrutiny of the issue...(in 1981) would be inappropriate
today." While maintaining that it was not necessary to register or draft
women, the DoD review concluded "the success of the military will increasingly
depend upon the participation of women."
In 1998, at the
request of U.S. Senator Charles Robb (D-VA), ranking minority member of
the Subcommittee on
Readiness, Senate Armed Services
Committee, the General Accounting Office (GAO)
addressed a variety of questions related to gender equity in the military.
Included was a budget and resource examination of the impact of requiring women
to register with Selective Service. The GAO report* did not address
the pros and cons regarding the exclusion of women from ground combat positions
or from the Selective Service registration requirement, nor did it make any
policy recommendations. Instead, GAO simply described the DoD position that
there is no need to register women as "being consistent with its policy of
restricting women from direct ground combat."
On January 24,
2013, Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta announced the end of the direct ground
combat exclusion rule for female service members, following a unanimous
recommendation by the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Based on the
American Forces Press Service’s news release, “Defense Department Expands
Women’s Combat Role,” dated January 24, 2013, key statements are highlighted
below:
The secretary announced that the
service branches will continue to move forward with a plan to eliminate all
unnecessary gender-based barriers to service. The change is intended to ensure
that the best qualified and most capable service members, regardless of gender,
are available to carry out the mission. Panetta added, “If members of our
military can meet the qualifications for a job, then they should have the right
to serve, regardless of creed, color, gender or sexual orientation.”
The secretary directed the military
services to undertake an evaluation of all occupational performance standards
to ensure they are up to date and gender-neutral. Specialty schools will be
included in the evaluation, a senior defense official said. … the entire
process is to be completed by January 1, 2016.
Once the policy is fully implemented,
military occupations will be closed to women only by exception, and only if
approved by the defense secretary, a senior defense official said.
UPDATE: Defense Secretary Ash
Carter announced on December 3, 2015, the Department of Defense will lift all
gender-based restrictions on military service starting January. In response,
Armed Services Committee Chairmen, Rep. Mac Thornberry (R-TX) and Sen. John
McCain (R-AZ), issued a joint statement on December 3, 2015, saying, “Congress
has a 30-day period to review the implications of today’s decision. … and
receiving the Department’s views on any changes to the Selective Service Act
that may be required as a result of this decision.”
As of December 3, 2015, there has been NO decision to require females to register with Selective Service, or be subject to a future military draft. Selective Service continues to register only men, ages 18 through 25.
As of December 3, 2015, there has been NO decision to require females to register with Selective Service, or be subject to a future military draft. Selective Service continues to register only men, ages 18 through 25.
(Compiled and edited by The Office of
Public and Intergovernmental Affairs, Selective Service System, December 2015.)
*Appendix I of the GAO report is
entitled, "Historical Perspectives on Women and the Draft." It
provides an excellent chronological summary about this issue and nearly all of
it is incorporated, verbatim, in this paper.
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