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Do deserters, draft evaders deserve amnesty?
by Thomas M. DeFrank
In the past four years, nearly 360,000 young men
have deserted from the American armed forces. More
than 35,000 of them have never been caught and at
least 2,200 have taken up residence in some foreign
country.
Besides the deserters, untold thousands of
draft-eligible men have illegally evaded the Selective
Service and are at large in the U.S. and
abroad criminals in exile within and without their
native land.
Altogether, perhaps 75,000 men who have broken
the law in order to avoid or escape military service are
still running free many of them probably living
tortured lives in fear of the penalties they face if
caught: anything from a dishonorable discharge to 10
years in jail.
Now that U.S. involvement in the war in Vietnam
is winding down, the fate of these thousands of
deserters and draft dodgers has become a major
source of controversy. And a growing number of
concerned Americans including several congressmen,
church -leaders and private citizens feel the
government should grant a general amnesty to the
escapees.
Their reasons range from a conviction that years of
self-imposed loneliness and hardship are penalty
enough for committing a crime of conscience, to the
more radical postion that the young men should be
praised for taking a position against the war - a
position that much of the country has come to share.
In fact, 71 per cent of the Americans polled for
Newsweek by the Gallup organization favor amnesty;
most of them, though, would require some form of
public service in return.
Aligned against amnesty, and just as impassioned,
are those who believe that to let the young men
escape scot free would erode the moral fiber of the
country, would destroy our traditional system of
respect for law and would be hugely unfair to those
who fought and died in Vietnam despite their antiwar
sentiments. ,
The two sides cannot be. broken down into
convenient stereotypes. It is not a case of the
peaceniks versus the hawks. For each side numbers
among its members antiwar activists, congressmen,
government officials and parents of war casualties.
The question of amnesty, indeed, is already
shaping up as a major political issue for the
Presidential election. Two Democratic candidates
have come out on opposite sides of the controversy.
Sen. George McGovern is for an amnesty because,
as he says, "I think they've paid. They've gone to jail
or into exile. Keeping them out of the country isn't
going to bring back the dead. I believe, with Lincoln,
that this nation's wounds can be healed."
Sen. Henry Jackson disagrees. "After all," he says,
"there were thousands of Americans who served in
the armed forces, and there were those who were
conscientious and who took the rap and went to jail
rather than serve. To say that those who didn't do
either should be granted amnesty, I think, would
definitely be a wrong policy."
President Nixon's position seems to be relaxing.
On Nov. 12 he was asked about the possibility of
amnesty and he said flatly, "No." But on Jan. 2 he
told a nationwide television audience "I, for one,
would be very liberal with regard to amnesty."
The complexity of the amnesty issue is reflected in
the reaction to a bill that has been introduced in both
houses of Congress. Sponsored by Republican Sen.
Robert A. Taft Jr. of Ohio and Democratic Rep.
Edward Koch of New York, the bill would grant
amnesty to all draft evaders who would volunteer to
serve for two or three years in an "alternative service"
such as Volunteers in Service to American (VISTA) or
a Veterans Administration or Public Health Service -Hospital.
The Taft-Koch bill intentionally excludes deserters
from its provisions because Taft and Koch believe
that to grant amnesty to deserters during wartime
would encourage others to jump ship, thus
endangering the lives of their colleagues and posing
serious problems to military morale and discipline.
The bill has been attacked from both sides of the
spectrum. "I am totally opposed to alernative
service," says Charles O. Porter, a former
congressman who heads a group called Amnesty Now.
"It is based on the need to punish, and to my mind
these men have already paid a high price in exile or
hiding. . . No man should be punished for refusal to
participate in an immoral war."
And opponents of amnesty claim that the Taft bill
does nothing but reward treason. "How can the
senator possibly justify rewarding an act of cowardice
with a government job?" asks Joseph L Vicites,
commander-in-chief of the Veterans of Foreign Wars
(VFW). "Especially when Vietnam veterans are
experiencing great difficulty in finding jobs."
The VFW chief said: "If, by chance they (the
deserters and draft dodgers) do return to this
country, they should be judged by men who were
wounded in Vietnam or family members of those
who died there. Those who ran away knew, what they
were doing. Now let them suffer the consequences."
Others take a stiff moral stand against any
concession by the U.S. government. "An amnesty
says, 'Okay, you were wrong, but come home; all is
forgiven,'" says one deserter now living in Canada.
"The hell with that. I'm not the one who was wrong.
It's old Uncle Sam who was wrong. I'm not taking
any favors from him."
As long as even one American is subject to the
dangers of war in Vietnam, though, it is unlikely that
any amnesty bill will get by the U.S. Congress. There
are several immensely powerful congressmen who
view any concessions to deserters with bitter
contempt.
As Rep. F. Edward Hebert, chairman of the
House Armed Services Committee, says, "If it were
humanly possible, I would send them out on a ship
like The Man Without a Country.' "
Still, when the war is finally over, some sort of
amnesty stands a good chance of passage. In fact, a
high Administration official predicts that "after
Vietnam, I'd say some amnesty is inevitable."
Niwwmli Faatur Sarvic.
Were you born to fly?
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TALK TO TIE OFFICER INFORMATION TEAM ON CAMPUS
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Funeral held for retired professor
Funeral services were
Saturday for a retired UNL
professor of Spanish and
literature who had taught on
the Lincoln campus 38 years.
Hilario S. Saenz, 75. joined
the UNL staff in 1931 and
retired in 1S67. He was a
member of the Modern
Language Assn., the American
Association of Teachers of
Spanish, the American
Association of University
Professors, and Phi Sigma lota.
Saenz was born in Logrono,
Spain in 1896 and came to the
United States in 1916. He
received his BA. from the
University of Indiana, his M.A.
from the University of
Chicago, and his Ph.D. from
the University of Illinois at
Urban a.
He is survived by his wife,
Wilhelmine; a son, Pablo F.,
Lincoln; a daughter, Mrs.
Juanita Childs, Parker, Ariz.;
and six grandchildren.
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PAGE 12
THE DAILY NEBRASKAN
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 8, 1972
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