World's War Events Volume II Part 41

[Sidenote: Examination, selection, and mobilization.]

[Sidenote: Representative citizens of each community employed.]

With registration completed there followed the operation of examination, selection, and mobilization. The unit jurisdiction of approximately 30,000 of population was maintained as far as possible, and for each district or division a local board of three members was appointed by the President upon the recommendation of the governor. The board members were residents of the districts they served, and the personnel comprised representative and responsible citizens of the community, including usually a licensed physician. In many cases registration boards were reappointed local boards. Such boards exercised original jurisdiction in all cases except claims for discharge on account of engagement in industry or agriculture.

In every Federal judicial district one or more district boards were organized, consisting usually of five but in some cases of a larger number of members, comprising leading citizens of the community and appointed by the President upon the recommendation of the governor.

District boards exercised appellate jurisdiction over local boards and original jurisdiction in industrial and agricultural claims.

[Sidenote: The order of liability of registrants.]

[Sidenote: Numbered cards.]

[Sidenote: The drawing in Was.h.i.+ngton on July 20, 1917.]

The initial step in the process of examination and selection was to establish the order of liability of each of the 10,000,000 registrants to be called for service. The cards within the jurisdiction of each local board, taken as a unit, had been serially numbered when completed and filed; and duplicates of the cards so numbered were deposited with the governor and with the district boards. The average number of registrants within the jurisdiction of a local board was about 2,500, the highest being 10,319. In order to establish the order of liability of each registrant in relation to the other registrants within the jurisdiction of the same local board, a drawing was held July 20, 1917, in the Public Hearing Room of the Senate Office Building in Was.h.i.+ngton, as a result of which every registrant was given an order number and his liability to be called for examination and selection determined by the order number.

The official lists of the numbers drawn by lot were furnished to every local board and from these lists the boards made up the availability order list of all registrants within their respective jurisdictions.

[Sidenote: Physical examination and elimination.]

The determination of the order of availability left only the process of physical examination and elimination. The War Department, through the Provost Marshal General's Office, had already determined and given notice of the number of men to be furnished by each State, and at the date of the drawing practically every State had ascertained and notified its local boards of the number required to complete their respective quotas for the first draft. The calculations of the War Department and of the States for the quotas were based upon section 2 of the act of May 18.

Immediately upon the completion of the order of call lists, the local boards began to summon for physical examination, beginning with the man who was No. 1 on the list, and continuing in numerical sequence, a sufficient number of registrants to fill their quotas. The average number summoned for the first examination was about twice the number required--i. e., if a board's quota was 105, the first 210 registrants of that jurisdiction were called for physical examination.

[Sidenote: Certain officials and cla.s.ses exempted.]

The Selective Service Law required certain persons to be exempted from military service, including Federal and State legislative, executive, and judicial officers, ministers of religion, students of divinity, persons in the military or naval service of the United States, and certain aliens. The law further authorized the discharge from draft, under such regulations as the President might prescribe, of county and munic.i.p.al officers, customhouse clerks and other persons employed by the United States in certain cla.s.ses of work, pilots and mariners, and, within prescribed limitations, registrants in a status with respect to persons dependent upon them for support, and persons found physically or morally unfit. Exemption from combatant service only was authorized in the case of persons found to be members of any well-recognized religious sect or organization whose existing creed or principles forbid its members to partic.i.p.ate in war in any form, and whose religious convictions are against war or partic.i.p.ation therein.

[Sidenote: Rules governing discharges.]

On June 30, 1917, the President promulgated rules and regulations as authorized by the law prescribing the reasons for and manner of granting discharges, and the procedure of local and district boards.

The selective service system required the 4,557 local boards to conduct the physical examination of registrants within their jurisdictions, and to determine and dispose of claims of exemption and discharge in the first instance, excepting industrial and agricultural claims.

[Sidenote: The power of the district boards.]

The 156 district boards which were established as above stated, proved to be the fulcrum of balance between the local boards and the registrants. In practically every instance their members have been chosen from among the most able and conspicuous representatives of the legal and medical professions, and from the fields of industry, commerce, and labor.

[Sidenote: Appeal agents appointed.]

By regulation the case of every person discharged from the operation of the selective service law by a local board on the ground of dependency was automatically taken to the district board for review, the appeal being noted by Government appeal agents appointed by the Provost Marshal General.

[Sidenote: Dependency cases the most difficult.]

Registrants whose claims were disallowed by local boards appealed in large numbers to district boards. Thus was obtained a high degree of uniformity of decisions in dependency cases, which were by far the most difficult of determination and disposition, as well as the most numerous, of the cla.s.ses of cases throughout the first draft.

Cases involving claims for discharge on agricultural and industrial grounds, of which district boards have original jurisdiction, are appealable to the President, and to date approximately 20,000 of these have been received and indexed, of which about 80 per cent are claims for discharge based on agricultural grounds and 20 per cent on industrial grounds. Of cases already disposed of on appeal from the district boards less than 7 per cent have been reversed. The pending of an appeal to the President does not operate as a stay of induction into military service except where the district board has expressly so directed, and the number of such stays is negligible.

[Sidenote: The total cost of the draft.]

The total cost of the draft can not be estimated accurately at this time, but, based upon the data at hand, the total registration and selection of the first 687,000 men has amounted to an approximate expenditure of $5,600,000, or about $8.11 unit cost.

[Sidenote: Universal willingness to serve.]

[Sidenote: High quality of men obtained.]

The unprecedented character of this undertaking is a matter of common knowledge. Congress, in the consideration of the act which authorized it, entertained grave doubts as to whether a plan could be devised which would apply so new a principle of selection for national service without much misunderstanding and unhappiness. But the results have been of a most inspiring kind and have demonstrated the universal willingness of our people to serve in the defense of our liberties and to commit the selection of the Nation's defenders to the Nation itself. The men selected have reported to the camps and are in course of training. They const.i.tute as fine a body of raw material as were ever trained in military science. They are already acquiring the smartness and soldierly bearing characteristic of American troops, and those who once thought that the volunteer spirit was necessary to insure contentment and zeal in soldiers now freely admit that the men selected under this act have these qualities in high degree and that it proceeds out of a patriotic willingness on the part of the men to bear their part of the national burden and to do their duty at the Nation's call.

[Sidenote: Ability of Provost Marshal General.]

[Sidenote: This mode of selection made necessary by conditions of modern war.]

[Sidenote: The democratic fairness of the plan.]

The success of this great undertaking is, of course, primarily due to the painstaking forethought and the statesmanlike breadth of view with which the Provost Marshal General and his a.s.sociates organized the machinery for its execution. But other elements have contributed to its success, and first among these was the determination to rely upon the cooperation of the governors of States and State agencies in the a.s.sembling of the registration and exemption boards. By reason of this a.s.sociation of State and local agencies with the National Government the law came as no outside mandate enforced by soldiers, but as a working of the home inst.i.tutions in the hands of neighbors and acquaintances pursuing a clear process of selection, and resulting in a gift by the States to the Nation of a body of men to be trained. The press of the country cooperated in a most helpful way, drawing the obvious distinctions between this mode of selection and those punitive drafts which have sometimes been resorted to after the failure of volunteering, and pointing out the young men of the country that the changed conditions of warfare made necessary a mode of selection which would preserve the industrial life of the Nation as a foundation for successful military operations. Indeed, the country seemed generally to have caught enough of the lessons of the European war to have realized the necessity of this procedure, and from the very beginning criticism was silenced and doubt answered by the obvious wisdom of the law.

Moreover, the unquestioned fairness of the arrangements, the absence of all power of subst.i.tution, the fact that the processes of the law were worked out publicly, all cooperated to surround the draft with a.s.surances of fairness and equality, so that throughout the whole country the att.i.tude of the people toward the law was one of approval and confidence, and I feel very sure that those who at the beginning had any doubts would now with one accord agree that the selective service act provides not only a necessary mode of selecting the great armies needed under modern conditions, but that it provides a better and more democratic and a fairer method of distributing the burden of national defense than any other system as yet suggested.

[Sidenote: Fundamental questions settled.]

[Sidenote: Unity of spirit of American people.]

This does not mean, of course, that the law is perfect either in its language or in its execution, nor does it mean that improvements may not be made as our experience grows and as the need for more intense national efforts increases; but such amendments as may hereafter be required will proceed with the fundamental questions settled and we have now only to consider changes which may be required to a better ordering of our military strength and a more efficient maintenance of our industrial and agricultural life during the stress of war. The pa.s.sage and execution of this law may be regarded as a milestone in our progress toward self-consciousness and national strength. Its acceptance shows the unity of spirit of our people, and its operation shows that a democracy has in its inst.i.tutions the concentrated energy necessary to great national activities however much they may be scattered and dispersed, in the interest of the preservation of individual liberty, in time of peace.

[Sidenote: The Officer's Reserve Corps.]

[Sidenote: Physicians commissioned in the Medical Department.]

[Sidenote: Men from the Plattsburg training camps.]

The problem presented involved not merely the selection of forces to be trained into armies but officers to do the training. By the provisions of the national defense act of June 3, 1916, Officers' Reserve Corps had been authorized. Rules and regulations for their organization were promulgated in July, 1916, and amended in March, 1917. Immediately upon the pa.s.sage of the act, the building up of lists of reserve officers in the various sections of the Military Establishment was undertaken, with the result that at the end of the fiscal year some of the branches of the service had substantial lists of men available for duty in the event of call. The largest number of commissions were issued in the technical services, for which professional nonmilitary training was the princ.i.p.al requisite. The largest reserve corps was that in the Medical Department, in which more than 12,000 physicians were commissioned. The expansion of these technical services proceeded easily upon the basis of the reserve corps beginning, but the number of applicants for commissions in the strictly military or combatant branches of the service was relatively small. They consisted of men who had had military experience either in the Regular Army or the National Guard, and men who were graduates of schools and colleges affording military training, and of the training camps which for several years had been maintained at Plattsburg and throughout the country. Their number, however, was wholly inadequate, and their experience, while it had afforded the elements of military discipline, had not been such as was plainly required to train men for partic.i.p.ation in the European war with its changed methods and conditions. The virtue of the law authorizing the Officers' Reserve Corps, however, became instantly apparent upon the declaration of war, as it enabled the department to establish officers' training camps for the rapid production of officers.

[Sidenote: A series of officers training camps.]

[Sidenote: Officers commissioned.]

Accepting the Plattsburg experiment as the basis and using funds appropriated by Congress for an enlargement of the Plattsburg system of training, the department established a series of training camps, sixteen in number, which were opened on the 15th of May, 1917. The camps were scattered throughout the United States so as to afford the opportunity of entrance and training with the least inconvenience and expense of travel to prepare throughout the entire country. Officers previously commissioned in the reserve corps were required to attend the camps, and, in addition, approximately 30,000 selected candidates were accepted from among the much greater number who applied for admission. These camps were organized and conducted under the supervision of department commanders; applicants were required to state their qualifications and a rough apportionment was attempted among the candidates to the several States. At the conclusion of the camp, 27,341 officers were commissioned and directed to report at the places selected for the training of the new army. By this process, we supplied not only the officers needed for the National Army but filled the roster of the Regular Army, to which substantial additions were necessary by reason of the addition of the full number of increments provided by the National Defense Act of 1916.

[Sidenote: The second series of officers' training camps.]

[Sidenote: Officers needed also for staff duties.]

[Sidenote: Constant experimentation necessary.]

[Sidenote: Victory rests on science as much as on soldiers.]

The results of the first series of camps were most satisfactory and, antic.i.p.ating the calling of further increments of the National Army, a second series of camps was authorized, to begin August 27, 1917, under rules for the selection of candidates and their apportionment throughout the country which were much more searching and embodied those improvements which are always possible in the light of experience.

Approximately 20,000 candidates are now attending this second series of camps, and those found qualified will shortly be commissioned and absorbed into the Army for the performance of the expanding volume of duties which the progress of preparation daily brings about. It is to be remembered that the need for officers exists not only in connection with the actual training of troops in camp and the leaders.h.i.+p of troops in the field, but a vast number of officers must constantly be employed in staff duties, and great numbers must as constantly be engaged in military research and in specialized forms of training a.s.sociated with the use of newly developed arms and appliances. In other words, we must maintain not merely the special-service schools which are required to perfect the training of officers in the special arms of the service, but we must constantly experiment with new devices and reduce to practical use the discoveries of science and the new applications of mechanical and scientific arts, both for offensive and defensive purposes. It would be out of place here to enumerate or describe in any detail the service of science in this war, but when the history of the struggle comes to be written it will be found that the masters of the chemical and physical sciences have thrown their talents and their ingenuity into the service, that their researches have been at the very basis of military progress, and that the victory rests as much upon a nation's supremacy in the researches and adaptations of science as it does upon the number and valor of its soldiers. Indeed, this is but one of the many evidences of the fact that modern war engages all of the resources of nations and that that nation will emerge victorious which has most completely used and coordinated all the intellectual, moral, and physical forces of its people.

[Sidenote: Fundamentals of military discipline do not change.]