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Originally Posted by savdra99  Amendment XIII was ratified in 1865. How was the military draft during the Vietnam war affected by this amendment? I'm trying to understand how it would come into play in the future. (I tried google, but I can't sift through enough of it to get a clear answer with the time & patience I have right now.....) |
It's still very debatable.
This is what I found regarding conscription (draft):
Some groups, such as libertarians, say that the draft constitutes slavery, since it is mandatory work[38]. Under the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, slavery or other involuntary servitude is not allowed unless it is part of punishment for a crime. They therefore see the draft as unconstitutional (at least in the U.S.) and immoral. In 1918, the Supreme Court ruled that the World War I draft did not violate the United States Constitution. Arver v. United States, 245 U.S. 366 (1918)). The Court detailed its conclusion that the limited powers of the federal government included conscription. Its only statement on the Thirteenth Amendment issue reads thus:
Finally, as we are unable to conceive upon what theory the exaction by government from the citizen of the performance of his supreme and noble duty of contributing to the defense of the rights and honor of the nation as the result of a war declared by the great representative body of the people can be said to be the imposition of involuntary servitude in violation of the prohibitions of the Thirteenth Amendment, we are constrained to the conclusion that the contention to that effect is refuted by its mere statement.
This is what I found in Arver v. United States:
Further it is said, the right to provide is not denied by calling for volunteer enlistments, but it does not and [245 U.S. 366, 378] cannot include the power to exact enforced military duty by the citizen. This however but challenges the existence of all power, for a governmental power which has no sanction to it and which therefore can only be exercised provided the citizen consents to its exertion is in no substantial sense a power. It is argued, however, that although this is abstractly true, it is not concretely so because as compelled military service is repugnant to a free government and in conflict with all the great guarantees of the Constitution as to individual liberty, it must be assumed that the authority to raise armies was intended to be limited to the right to call an army into existence counting alone upon the willingness of the citizen to do his duty in time of public need, that is, in time of war. But the premise of this proposition is so devoid of foundation that it leaves not even a shadow of ground upon which to base the conclusion.
So in other words. . .the Constitution gives Congress the right to form armies and if people don't volunteer, then where is the power in government? Makes perfect sense, huh?
