Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 144, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 July 1917 — Draft System One Equal And Fair, Says President. [ARTICLE]

Draft System One Equal And Fair, Says President.

The draft system is one of equality and fairness, President Wilson explained in a proclamation accompanying exemptions and draft regulations. His proclamation said: “The regulations which I am today causing to be promulgated, pursuant to the direction of the selective service law, cover the remaining steps of the plan for calling into service “of the United States qualified men from those who have registered; those elected as the result of this process to constitute with the regular army, the national guard and the navy, the fighting forces of the nation, all of which forces are,-under the terms of the law, placed in a position of equal right, dignity and responsibility with the members of all other military forces. “The regulations have been drawn with a view to the needs and circumstances of the whole country and provide a system which it is expected -will work at least in equality and without personal hardships. Any system for selecting men for military service, whether voluntary or involuntary in its operation, necessarily selects some men to bear the burden of danger and sacrifice for the whole nation. The system here provided places all men of military age upon an even plane and then by selection, which neither favors the one nor penalizes the other, calls out the requisite number for service. “The successful carrying out of these regulations depends necessarily upon the loyalty, patriotism and justice of the members of the boards to whom its operation is committed, and I admonish very member of every local board and of each district board of review that their duty to their country requires an impartial and fearless performance of the delicate and difficult duties intrusted to them and that they are called upon to adjudicate the most sacred rights of the individual and to preserve untarnished the honor of the nation. “Our armies at the front will be strengthened and sustained if they be composed of men free from any sense of injustice in their mode of selection, and they will be inspired to loftier efforts in behalf of a country in which the citizens called upon to perform high public functions perform them with justice, fearlessness and impartiality.”