*************
*****************
***         Men and         ***
***                                    ***
****       Women Who       ****
****                                    ****
****          Dare to          ****
****                             ****
*************              Say No              *************
*******                                                           *******
*********                                                 *********

Mennonite Resistance to Draft Registration
1980 - 1985

by

Mark Becker
Bachelor of Arts, Major in History

Bethel College
North Newton, Kansas
July 1985

Table of Contents

PREFACE

Chapter
I. AN OVERVIEW OF CONSCRIPTION IN THE UNITED STATES

The Revolutionary and Civil Wars
The First World War
World War Two
The Korean and Vietnam Wars
Between Vietnam and the 1980s

II. REGISTRATION IN THE 1980s

Resistance to Mass Registrations (1980-1981)
Indictments (1982-1983)
Solomon Legislation (1983-1984)
A New Wave of Resistance? (1985)

III. RESISTANCE AND THE CHURCH

IV. RESISTANCE AND THE SCHOOLS

Bethel College
Goshen College
Eastern Mennonite College
Other Colleges

CONCLUSION

APPENDICES

I. Chronology
II. Selective Service System Warning Letter
III. To the Park View Congregation:
IV. Draft Proposal (Estes Park Statement)
V. Bowling Green Statement
VI. Oral History Interviews
VII. Selective Service System Registration Form

ENDNOTES

BIBLIOGRAPHY

PREFACE

This paper began during the spring of 1984 as a Social Science Seminar research project at Bethel College in North Newton, Kansas. It quickly grew beyond what was needed to meet those course objectives and, after a year and a half of work and numerous drafts, took on this present form. This paper is a revision of (and hopefully an improvement over) the Social Science Seminar paper, which won the Mennonite Contributions Contest and a Thresher Award at Bethel College in May 1985. In preparation for writing this paper, I conducted fifty-seven oral history interviews from April to October of 1984. About half of these interviews took place around Bethel College, but in order to give this project a broader perspective I spent July of 1984 hitchhiking four thousand miles around the eastern United States in pursuit of other information and interviews. These interviews are now a part of the Oral History collection of the Mennonite Library and Archives at Bethel College and are available for the purpose of historical research. In addition to these oral history interviews, I drew on the personal files of numerous people, information in the Mennonite Library and Archives, and my own personal experiences in an attempt to weave a narrative that portrays the experiences of Mennonites who stood against registration during the early 1980s.

I am not a casual observer or a passively interested bystander of the events that I describe in this paper. In 1980, while a student at Freeman Junior College in Freeman, South Dakota, I choose to refuse to register with the Selective Service System. I believe that to register for the draft would be inconsistent with the style of life that I want to lead and a violation of the Judo-Christian ethics that I base my actions on. Although I have dealt extensively with the issues involved in the topic of draft resistance, I have not directly experienced most of the events described in this paper.

This paper deals primarily with Mennonite resistance to registration, not Mennonite responses. A very small number of Mennonites chose to not register. Probably a smaller percentage of Mennonites resisted than what was the national average. But much more research could and should be done on this and related topics. This project concentrated mainly on Bethel College's story; I encourage other scholars to research and record the history of resistance at their particular locality. I am willing to provide whatever assistance I can in the furtherance of study in this field. I will make copies of this paper available to whoever desires one. I can be contacted through my parents (c/o Harold Becker; RR 2 Box 127; Marion, SD; 57043; ph. (605) 648-3760). Except for the cartoons, this material is not copyrighted. Feel free to make and distribute copies of all or parts of this paper as needed. Please identify the author and title of this paper in any and all reproductions. Also, I welcome receiving any and all comments, suggestions, corrections, and critiques regarding this paper.

I should make a note on terminology for those readers who are less familiar with Mennonite institutional structures. There are about forty Mennonite church conferences. This paper concentrates on two of them--the General Conference Mennonite Church (GCMC) and the Mennonite Church (MC), which was formerly referred to as the Old Mennonite Church (OM). There is a distinction between the term Mennonite Church, which is a specific conference; and the Mennonite churches, by which I mean Mennonites in general. The Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) is an umbrella organization involving most Mennonite conferences. In addition, on occasion I use male pronouns to refer to nonregistrants. This is not because I oppose the use of inclusive language but because so far only males have been subject to draft registration.

Several people have been instrumental in helping to bring this paper to its present form. I must make special thanks to my history professor and advisor Dr. James Juhnke, and to my friends Garth Isaak and Sue Flickinger. They took great interest in this project, read and critiqued numerous drafts of this paper, and provided me with many fresh insights and ideas on this topic. Also, Dr. Keith Sprunger and the rest of my Social Science Seminar class gave me invaluable feedback on this paper. Lastly, I must thank Dick Koontz, Bethel College's Director of Financial Aid, and Jim Dunn, the General Conference's Secretary of Higher Education, for their untiring efforts to establish the Student Aid Fund for Nonregistrants. Without their work I would not have been able to attend college and this paper would not be a reality.

Mark Becker
Bethel College
July 31, 1985

CHAPTER I
AN OVERVIEW OF CONSCRIPTION IN THE UNITED STATES

In an essay on the history of Mennonites and military conscription, James Juhnke, a history professor at Bethel College in North Newton, Kansas, defined three major eras of the draft in twentieth-century United States history. These are the First World War, World War Two, and the Cold War from Korea to Vietnam. ⁽¹⁾ The pre-twentieth century conscription experience in the United States can be effectively grouped into one category, which deals mainly with the Revolutionary War and the Civil War. This paper deals primarily with post-Vietnam War developments, but it is important to put this story into its proper context. Even though many draft-age eighteen- to twenty- year-olds are not aware of the historical background of conscription, present developments in the United States' draft laws are built on this legal and political tradition.

The Revolutionary and Civil Wars

During the colonial period and up into the Civil War, raising a militia was the responsibility of the local or state government. The local government raised a militia for a specific battle or war and then disbanded it when its task was completed. There was no such thing as a standing army and no need for a peacetime draft. But there were people opposed to participation in the military. Such resistance can be traced back to the arrival of Quakers in New England in 1635 and of Mennonites in 1683. ⁽²⁾ Since raising a militia was a local problem, dealing with conscientious resisters to military service was also a local problem. Treatment of these people varied from area to area, but most were allowed either to hire a substitute to fight for them or pay a fee to be excluded from the militia. In 1661, Massachusetts was the first colony to make such legal provisions for conscientious objectors. ⁽³⁾ Although some conscientious objectors used the route of hiring substitutes to avoid military service, it was not designed for, nor used exclusively by, them. It became primarily a way for the wealthy elite to avoid military service. ⁽⁴⁾ There was no consensus among Mennonites whether it was alright to use this method to avoid military service. ⁽⁵⁾

On July 18, 1775, at the beginning of the Revolutionary War, the Continental Congress adopted a resolution which recognized that certain people would have religious scruples against fighting but it urged these people to "Contribute Liberally" to the war cause. ⁽⁶⁾ Fourteen years later, the First Congress considered, but did not include, a conscientious objector clause in the United States' Constitution. ⁽⁷⁾

The Civil War was not only the United States' first modern war but it also the first time that the raising of an army was a federal instead of a local or state responsibility. Both the North and the South allowed draftees either to hire a substitute or to pay a fee-three hundred dollars in the North and five hundred dollars in the South-to avoid military conscription. ⁽⁸⁾ A system of forced conscription that allowed the rich to buy their way out while forcing the poor to serve led to draft riots in 1863. ⁽⁹⁾ Mennonites were less prepared to respond to this draft and more Mennonites ended up in the army. ⁽¹⁰⁾

The First World War

Although the United States Army fought the Spanish-American War in 1898, there was never a need for military conscription between the Civil War and the First World War. During the 1870s, eighteen thousand Mennonites came to the United States in an attempt to escape having to perform alternative service in lieu of military service in Russia. But during the First World War these Mennonites faced a universal conscription in the United States with no provisions for exemptions for conscientious objectors. Secretary of War Newton D. Baker attempted to get all of the conscientious objectors to report to the military camps; he would decide later what to do with them. Thus Mennonites ended up in military camps where they were given orders to perform tasks that violated their consciences. When they refused, they could be court martialed and sent to a military prison. ⁽¹¹⁾ Almost thirty percent of conscientious objectors, more than 145 people, court martialed in this manner were Mennonites. ⁽¹²⁾ Two Hutterian Brethern men died as a result of this mistreatment. ⁽¹³⁾ In addition, 4,750 civilians (including many who had refused to register) were convicted by civilian courts for violations of Selective Service law. ⁽¹⁴⁾ Six to eight hundred Mennonites and about one thousand Hutterites emigrated to Canada in order to avoid military conscription. ⁽¹⁵⁾

World War Two

In order to avoid the hassles of the First World War, the historic peace churches (the Mennonites, Quakers, and Brethern) reached a compromise with the United States government over the matter of conscientious objectors. Instead of entering the military such people would be placed in Civilian Public Service (CPS) camps where they would do work in the national interest such as with the park service or in mental hospitals. The churches had administrative control over the CPS camps, including paying almost four million dollars to run them. Nearly 12,000 men received conscientious objector status, including 4665 Mennonites. ⁽¹⁶⁾ Mennonite historian James Juhnke concluded that "The Peace Churches operated a part of the Selective Service program for the government, and they did it, for the most part, to the government's satisfaction." ⁽¹⁷⁾ Many Mennonites seemed to forget that the CPS program was a compromise with the government. For many, performing some sort of alternative service became the preferred, if not the only, option.

The Korean and Vietnam Wars

For the most part, the policies, attitudes and relationship of Mennonites with the government over conscription issues remained constant after World War Two. The Selective Training and Service Act of 1940 expired on March 31, 1947 and for fifteen months there was neither registration nor a draft in the United States. A year later, on March 17, 1948, President Truman introduced his famous Truman Doctrine in response to Soviet moves in Eastern Europe. The Truman Doctrine is best known for beginning the Marshall Plan to reconstruct Europe, but it also included plans to revitalize the Selective Service System. Registration began once again on August 30, 1948 and continued without a break for almost 25 years.

Numerous people (including Mennonites) resisted this return to registration. Several conscientious objectors who had already performed alternative service in World War Two found themselves faced with conscription a second time around. A few men began to question if it would not be better to resist registration itself rather than join what they viewed as a return to another war. By December 1949 (during a time when few people were drafted) the government indicted sixty-two men for not registering. Larry Gara, dean of men at Bluffton College in Bluffton, Ohio, received a eighteen month prison sentence for counseling a nonregistrant, an illegal activity under the new draft law. ⁽¹⁸⁾ But it was not until the Vietnam War that resistance to the draft became more common. Between 1964 and 1973 the Selective Service System reported nearly 200,000 draft violators to the Justice Department and close to a million men refused induction or failed to register. ⁽¹⁹⁾ Over fifty Mennonites refused to cooperate in one form or another with the Vietnam War draft. ⁽²⁰⁾

Between Vietnam and the 1980s

On April 1, 1975, President Gerald Ford terminated the registration program that had been in effect since 1948. The Selective Service System had not issued any draft induction orders since December 1972 and the System was on a standby status. ⁽²¹⁾ Instead of a program of continuing registration, the Selective Service planned for a massive one day registration on March 31, 1976. However, Congress did not allocate the Selective Service System enough funds to carry through with this registration plan. On January 23, 1976, the Selective Service's National Director Bryon Pepitone announced that he was canceling these registration plans. With this decision, the Selective Service moved to a deep standby status. ⁽²²⁾

Although the next four years were quiet years for the Selective Service, they were not years of inactivity. The Selective Service continued to revise its regulations in order to create a more efficient and uniform system of drafting. Slowly, support for a return to a system of draft registration began building in Congress. But Congress could not mandate registration without President Jimmy Carter's cooperation and Carter was resisting pressures to move in this direction.

CHAPTER II
REGISTRATION IN THE 1980s

Resistance to Mass Registration (1980-81)

On December 26, 1979, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. President Jimmy Carter, in an attempt to signal to the Soviets his disapproval of this military action, announced in his State of the Union address on January 23, 1980, his intention to revitalize the Selective Service System. "An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America," Carter stated in his speech, which became known as the Carter Doctrine, "and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force." Carter noted that the volunteer army was adequate to meet the United States' current defense needs, but that he would begin draft registration in order to "meet future mobilization needs rapidly if they arise." ⁽²³⁾

On November 9, 1979, Carter had signed a Department of Defense authorization bill that included a requirement for him to submit to Congress a report on the desirability and feasibility of resuming registration, classification, and/or induction procedures. He was also to report on whether women should be registered, and on the feasibility of "faceless registration" procedures. Faceless registration would be "a method of automatically registering persons . . . through a centralized, automated system using existing records" such as school records. ⁽²⁴⁾ On February 11, 1980, after the Soviet moves in Afghanistan, Carter presented his "Presidential Recommendations for Selective Service Reform" to Congress. He requested authorization for the registration of women and the money to carry out registration procedures. He did not opt for a faceless registration, apparently because of an uncertainty over whether the Selective Service System could access records that would ensure a complete registration of all people in the desired age groups. Rather, the Selective Service would conduct registration at United States Post Offices. Carter did not recommend beginning classification or induction procedures. ⁽²⁵⁾

Although support for registration had been growing in Congress, it was far from unanimous. Representative Patricia Schroeder, a Democrat from Colorado, responded to Carter's report with the statement that, "The tragedy of Vietnam has been all but forgotten or ignored as the President rekindles fires of patriotism. We cannot accept the Carter Administration's premise that people should be registered-his reasons just do not hold water." ⁽²⁶⁾ In addition, numerous groups and religious organizations came out with statements condemning a peacetime draft and/or registration. Thirty thousand people marched in protest against registration and the draft in Washington, D.C. on March 22, 1980. ⁽²⁷⁾ Even the Selective Service itself had, previous to Carter's State of the Union address, declared peacetime registration to be "redundant and unnecessary." ⁽²⁸⁾

The House of Representatives approved funding for registration on April 22, 1980. ⁽²⁹⁾ On June 3 the Senate began its debate over registration appropriations. Senator Mark Hatfield, a Republican from Oregon, led a filibuster on the Senate floor while an anti-draft organization known as CARD (Committee Against Registration and the Draft) held a vigil against registration on the Capitol steps. Hatfield's filibuster ended on June 10 and two days later the Senate also passed legislation that approved funding for the Selective Service System. The Senate's version differed slightly from the House's and, on June 25, the House passed the Senate's version. ⁽³⁰⁾ On July 2, 1980, President Carter issued a Presidential Proclamation that ordered registration procedures to begin once again. All males born in 1960 and 1961 were to register during the two-week period of July 21 to August 2, 1980. Men born in 1962 were to register during the week of January 5 to 10, 1981. Continuous registration was to begin again on January 5, 1981, which meant that starting with those born in 1963, men were required to register within thirty days of their eighteenth birthday. ⁽³¹⁾

Two legal challenges faced Carter's registration plan. The first, and most significant, concerned his proposal to include women in the registration program. In March 1980, the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Military Personnel had "tabled" this proposal. In June, the Senate voted against including women in the registration program. ⁽³²⁾ Conservatives tended to oppose the registration and drafting of women. Phyllis Schlafly saw the registration of women as a waste of taxpayers' money and a threat to family life. "There is no evidence in history that a unisex army is the way to win battles or to defend the country," she said. ⁽³³⁾ Some religious conservatives in the Anabaptist tradition adopted the dualistic position of consenting to the registration of men but remaining adamantly opposed to the registration of women as being in violation of their traditional nonresistance beliefs. ⁽³⁴⁾

Since Congress had not granted the President the authority to induct women, some people saw their registration as impeding, rather then enhancing, national defense. For the most part, though, national defense was not the issue. Carter, in a statement on February 8, 1980, claimed that "There is no distinction possible, on the basis of ability or performance, that would allow me to exclude women from an obligation to register." ⁽³⁵⁾ The Selective Service's National Director, Bernard D. Rostker, claimed that including women was an issue of equality, not preparedness. ⁽³⁶⁾ Some women did see registration as a step toward equality, but many feminists agreed with Representative Schroeder's statement that she did not "think we should divide ourselves on the issue of whether women should be registered or not. We should be saying that we oppose registration for everyone-males and females." ⁽³⁷⁾

In 1971, Robert Goldberg had filed a court case against then Selective Service Director Curtis Tarr, claiming that the Military Selective Service Act (MSSA) was unconstitutional because women were excluded from registration. The draft ended before this case came to a resolution. On July 15, 1980, Goldberg reintroduced this case in a United States District Court in Pennsylvania as Robert L. Goldberg v. Bernard Rostker, the director of the Selective Service. On Friday, July 18, the District Court ruled that a male-only draft was unconstitutional and enjoined the Selective Service from carrying out the registration program that was to begin the following Monday. The next day the Selective Service obtained a stay of this decision from Supreme Court Associate Justice William J. Brennan, Jr. pending a review by the Supreme Court. Hence, the two-week period of registration during the summer of 1980 proceeded as Carter had originally planned it. ⁽³⁸⁾ Almost a year later, on June 25, 1981, the Supreme Court, in a six to three decision, reversed the District Court's ruling on Goldberg. In determining that a male-only draft was constitutional, the court observed that women would not serve in combat and that "the purpose of registration is to develop a pool of potential combat troops." ⁽³⁹⁾ Ironically, Brennan, who had stayed the lower court's decision, dissented from the majority decision.

The second legal challenge to the registration law concerned the Selective Service's use of Social Security numbers on the registration forms. On November 24, 1980 the District Court for the District of Columbia in Wolman v. Rostker decided that this use was a violation of the Privacy Act and enjoined the Selective Service from requiring these numbers. The court, in its decision, stated that the Selective Service needed these numbers for "verification of identity" and that Congress should amend the Privacy Act in order to give the Selective Service access to these numbers. ⁽⁴⁰⁾ But unless Congress did so, the Selective Service could not require the numbers and men who had registered during the summer could ask the Selective Service to remove their number from their registration file. ⁽⁴¹⁾ On December 30, six days before the 1981 period of registration was to begin, the District of Columbia's Court of Appeals stayed the District Court's decision and again the Selective Service was able to carry on its registration program as had been previously planned. ⁽⁴²⁾

Almost a year later, on December 1, 1981, President Ronald Reagan approved legislation which gave the Selective Service System the authority to request Social Security numbers from registrants. The Selective Service also gained access to Social Security files for "enforcement purposes." ⁽⁴³⁾ This legislation also required that the Director of Selective Service provide the names and addresses of registrants to the Department of Defense in order to assist them in military recruitment. ⁽⁴⁴⁾ This legislation effectively put an end to Wolman v. United States. On March 25, 1982, the District of Columbia's Court of Appeals sent this case back to the District Court level for further consideration in light of this new legislation. ⁽⁴⁵⁾ The District Court terminated litigation in this case on July 2, 1982. ⁽⁴⁶⁾

Perhaps relatively low compliance rates and the legal decisions that resulted from the ensuing prosecutions were more threatening to Carter's registration plans than these two court cases. A month after the summer of 1980 registration period, the Selective Service System announced that 93 percent of those required to register had complied. In addition, the Selective Service took a random sample that showed that 1.8 percent of those registering had made an indication on the registration form that they were doing so under protest or that they were conscientiously opposed to participation in the military. Approximately 3.5 million men registered during that first two-week period. ⁽⁴⁷⁾ Anti-draft organizations such as CARD were initially skeptical of the Selective Service's relatively high compliance figures. The Boston Globe reported that Selective Service had only achieved a seventy-five percent compliance rate. Barry Lynn, then the head of CARD, called for the U.S. General Accounting Office (GAO) to do an independent audit of the count. The GAO report confirmed the accuracy of the Selective Service's compliance figures. ⁽⁴⁸⁾

During the spring of 1981, the Selective Service System reported that the compliance rate for the January 5 to 10, 1981 registration period was eighty-seven percent, which was down from the summer registration period. ⁽⁴⁹⁾ As shown in Table I, the Selective Service waited for late registrations to come in before releasing the figures. The "on time" registration rate was significantly less. The one-week period of January 5 to 10, 1981 was the last of the massive registration blocks. The continuous registration of men born in 1963 began on January 5, 1981. The Selective Service admitted that these men were registering at a rate "somewhat below" that of the two previous registration periods. ⁽⁵⁰⁾ Attaining a high compliance rate proved to be a continual problem for the Selective Service System.

TABLE I: COMPARATIVE COMPLIANCE RATES ⁽⁵¹⁾

The Selective Service took several steps in an attempt to increase this sagging compliance rate. One was to threaten nonregistrants with prosecution. On June 17, 1981, the Selective Service sent out about 150 letters to suspected nonregistrants, threatening them with such action if they did not register within 15 days. ⁽⁵²⁾ (See Appendix II for the text of this letter.) This constituted the Selective Service's "passive enforcement" system. The Selective Service Law Panel of Los Angeles, a lawyers' anti-draft network, charged that "contrary to public announcements from Selective Service, most of these men informed on themselves by writing to Selective Service and defiantly stating that they had no intention of registering." In an attempt to frighten other nonregistrants into registering, the Selective Service tried to create the impression that friends and neighbors had reported on these men. ⁽⁵³⁾ On July 20, 1981, the Selective Service referred 134 suspected nonregistrants to the Justice Department. The Justice Department then proceeded to turn these names over to local U.S. Attorneys, whose responsibility was to prosecute suspected nonregistrants. ⁽⁵⁴⁾ In the midst of all this activity, Rostker resigned as the National Director of Selective Service System on August 1, 1981. ⁽⁵⁵⁾ President Reagan appointed General Thomas K. Turnage to this position. ⁽⁵⁶⁾

On November 2, 1981, the District Attorney for Northern Iowa sent a letter to Rusty Martin, a public nonregistrant, informing him that he had been "constructively registered." The District Attorney filled out a registration card with information that Martin had included in his letters to the government stating his refusal to register. ⁽⁵⁷⁾ Essentially, this was the type of "faceless registration" that President Carter had decided against using when he reintroduced registration in 1980. The Selective Service canceled this registration when Martin refused to accept it and the Justice Department expressed second thoughts about attaining registrations through this procedure. ⁽⁵⁸⁾

The U.S. Attorney in Minnesota planned to indict Scott Aaseng on December 11, 1981, when he received word from the Justice Department that indictments against nonregistrants were to be temporarily suspended until Reagan decided whether he would continue draft registration. ⁽⁵⁹⁾ Later Aaseng chose to register in order to spend more of his time and energy working on nuclear war issues. He stated that his views against war had not changed, but he was torn between the idea that registration was complicity with war and that it was just a piece of paper. He also noted that pressure from the media was harder to deal with than governmental pressures. ⁽⁶⁰⁾

During his Presidential campaign, Ronald Reagan had claimed that he opposed registration. In a letter to Senator Mark Hatfield, Reagan stated that "the most fundamental objection to draft registration is moral…registration destroys the very values that our society is committed to defending." Libertarian streaks in his philosophy led him to oppose registration except in the case of a "most severe national emergency." ⁽⁶¹⁾ A debate raged within his Republican administration whether or not to continue a peacetime registration program. In the end, Reagan became convinced that dropping registration would send the wrong signal to the Soviets. ⁽⁶²⁾ On January 7, 1982, Reagan publicly announced his intent to retain registration "in order to save critical time in mobilization during an emergency." He referred to a report released by the Presidential Military Manpower Task Force that claimed that registration could save the United States as much as six weeks in mobilizing emergency manpower. ⁽⁶³⁾ Later, it was discovered that peacetime registration only saved two weeks over a postmobilization. Furthermore, the report assumed that there would be no volunteers and ignored the fact that it would take about half a year to train new inductees. ⁽⁶⁴⁾

When Reagan announced his decision to continue registration, he also provided for a "grace period" of thirty to sixty days in which nonregistrants could register without facing the threat of prosecution. On January 20, Selective Service National Director Turnage announced that the grace period would last through February 28. He thought that most of the nonregistrants would register during this time period. ⁽⁶⁵⁾ The legal implications of the grace period were somewhat unclear. The grace period was only a policy decision and not an amendment to the Military Selective Service Act nor a Presidential Proclamation. It did not negate any previous duty to register nor did it create any new duty to register. ⁽⁶⁶⁾

On April 12, after the grace period had expired, the Military Manpower Task Force met to discuss prosecution strategies. Fearing that prosecuting nonregistrants might fire up anti-nuclear groups, they suggested that the first indictments be in more secluded areas of the country. But the Selective Service System could not make decisions like that; it was the Justice Department's job to decide when and where the indictments would come down. ⁽⁶⁷⁾ And they waited with the first indictments until summer when schools were out and organizing protests would be more difficult.

Indictments (1982-1983)

From the beginning of registration during the summer of 1980 the Selective Service System threatened, and many nonregistrants expected, immediate prosecutions for not registering as required by the Military Selective Service Act. At the end of the initial two week registration period, Joan Lamb, public affairs director for the Selective Service System announced their intention to enforce the registration law. "Some people will be used as examples of what could happen if you don't register," she stated. She conceded that it would take several months for the Selective Service to collect information in order to begin prosecutions, but she also stressed that if nonregistrants "get to the Post office very quickly, they won't be in any trouble." ⁽⁶⁸⁾ But the Selective Service was plagued continually by sagging registration rates. They blamed this on a lack of public awareness, contending that most nonregistrants were simply unaware of the registration requirement. "The government's primary goal is registration," the Selective Service claimed, "not prosecution." ⁽⁶⁹⁾ Once the government began prosecution there would be "a big influx of people registering," Selective Service Director Turnage claimed. ⁽⁷⁰⁾

Before the Justice Department could move ahead with prosecutions, legal questions over the constitutionality of a male-only registration and the Selective Service's use of Social Security numbers needed to be settled. It was almost two years after registration had started during the summer of 1980 that the first person, Benjamin Sasway, a political and moral resister from San Diego, California, was indicted for not registering. This was the beginning of a series of prosecutions. Within one month four other nonregistrants had been indicted, and a total of thirteen received indictments by the end of the year. Thereafter, prosecutions fell off drastically. Three people were indicted during 1983 for not registering, and only two were indicted during 1984. Eighteen people faced charges of not registering for a draft that did not yet even exist. As of July 1985, twelve of these cases resulted in convictions and two are still awaiting trial. Seven resisters spent time in prison and two performed some sort of alternative service work as their sentence. Although the maximum penalty for refusing to register was a $10,000 fine and/or five years in prison, only one convicted nonregistrant (Rusty Martin) received the maximum $10,000 fine and Paul Jacob was the only one sentenced to a full five year prison sentence, although four and a half years were suspended. (See Table II for a list of, and information on, indicted nonregistrants; Table III for a statistical summary of prosecutions.)

Table II: Indicted Nonregistrants

The eighteen resisters approached their prosecutions in various manners, often determined by what their philosophy of resistance was. Religious resisters usually received probation and/or an alternative service term as their sentencing; Sam Matthews was the only one of the seven resisters who spent time in prison who approached the issue from religious point of view. Enten Eller, a religious resister from the Church of the Brethern, did not want to make his stand against the government but simply wanted to follow faithfully his personal conscience. Eller stated that he was "not interested in fighting a big legal battle…that clouds the real issue" as to why he did not register. ⁽⁷¹⁾ I have not registered simply because the U.S. Government has asked be to do something God would not have me do," Eller wrote in a statement describing his position on this issue. Yet he viewed his nonregistration "as constructive and positive, demonstrating in the best way I know the love and peace of God for everyone, even those threatening me with imprisonment. For this reason," he continued, "I have chosen to be open and to cooperate with the Government and the U.S. Attorney as much as I conscientiously can, for I do not have hatred of authority." ⁽⁷²⁾

TABLE III: PROSECUTION STATISTICAL SUMMARY ⁽⁷³⁾

18 Indicted:

12 Convicted (Eller, Sasway, Schmucker, Eklund, Hasbrouck, Ford, Matthews, Warkentine, Martin, Mager, Wayte, Jacob)
1 Plead guilty and registered as a conscientious objector after conviction (Warkentine)
1 On appeal by defendant (Schmucker)
1 Dismissed on pre-trial motion (Kerley) (Appeal by Gov't)
1 Awaiting trial, pre-trial motions denied (Rutt)

3 Registered before trial, entered pre-trial diversion program (McMillan, Maokhamphion, Schlossberg)

1 Gov't withdrew charges during trial (Epp)

Similarly, Kendal Warkentine, a Mennonite resister from North Newton, Kansas, stated that "for me to register would have necessitated my compliance with a system I felt was in direct conflict with what God wants for mankind." Warkentine concluded, "In such a conflict (like registration) the Christian has no choice but to obey God and disobey man." ⁽⁷⁴⁾ In an attempt to be nonresistant to what the government would do to him, he stood mute at his arraignment, refusing to enter a plea to the charge of registering. The judge would not accept this plea, nor one of "nolo contendere," which means "I do not contest the charge." Eventually the judge entered a plea of guilty for Warkentine and he became the first indicted nonregistrant to have such a plea. Part of Warkentine's sentencing was to register on a special form that allowed him to claim his conscientious objector status. ⁽⁷⁵⁾ This increased pressure on the government to include a "CO check-off box" on the registration form, a provision which would allow conscientious objectors to affirm their objection at the time of registration.

Others, such as Gillam Kerley from Madison, Wisconsin, used a political and legal defense. He pled "not guilty by reason of sanity" and filed about thirty pre-trial motions including one to dismiss the case on the grounds that everybody's time could be better spent working to prevent nuclear war. Kerley also moved that the judge declare the courtroom a nuclear free zone. ⁽⁷⁶⁾ Edward Hasbrouck, a convicted nonregistrant who worked closely with Massachusetts Open Resistance, had more philosophical reasons for resisting, once describing his resistance as being "anarchist, pacifist, nonviolent, and revolutionary." ⁽⁷⁷⁾ Paul Jacob, a former state chairperson of the Arkansas Libertarian Party, went underground after his indictment on September 23, 1982. In a "statement from the underground," Jacob claimed that the draft is slavery and that by resisting he remained free. ⁽⁷⁸⁾ Posters stating "Paul Jacob Is Free" became a symbol among segments of the anti-registration movement. So far, Jacob is the only indicted nonregistrant to go underground. Over two years after his indictment, Jacob was arrested at his home in Little Rock, Arkansas where he had been living openly for a year. ⁽⁷⁹⁾

These resisters used several defenses with varying degrees of success. The argument in selective, or discriminatory, prosecution, the defense most commonly employed, was not simply that the government prosecuted one nonregistrant while ignoring more than 800,000 other nonregistrants, but that the government's prosecution of one particular nonregistrant was politically motivated. The government has broad discretion over choosing who to prosecute, but it is a violation of a nonregistrant's First Amendment right to free speech if the government chose to prosecute that person in order to silence his vocal opposition to draft registration. ⁽⁸⁰⁾

Several indicted nonregistrants raised this issue in pretrial hearings, but in most cases the trial judge ruled against this defense. In a significant decision, District Court Judge Terry J. Hatter of Los Angeles, California dismissed David Wayte's indictment because of both selective prosecution and illegal promulgation of regulations. Hatter had established Wayte's right to a full hearing on the selective prosecution issue, but the government, claiming "executive privilege,'' supposedly in order to protect the Reagan Administration's internal deliberations on this issue, refused to let White House Counselor Edwin Meese testify or to turn over White House, Selective Service, and Department of Defense documents that Hatter had determined were important for Wayte to build his case. Thus the issue became the right of the government to hold back internal documents pertaining to their prosecution policies, rather than the issue of selective prosecution itself. ⁽⁸¹⁾

The government appealed Hatter's decision to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. In a two to one decision, the Appeals Court reinstated Wayte's indictment, ruling that the government's "passive enforcement" prosecution policy which resulted in the indictment of only those individuals who identified themselves to the government was not unconstitutional. Furthermore, the Appeals Court ruled that Wayte had not sufficiently proven that the government had intentionally selected him out for prosecution because of his vocal resistance to registration. ⁽⁸²⁾ Wayte petitioned for an "en banc" rehearing of his case by the entire panel of judges on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, but this was denied. However, the Supreme Court agreed to rule on the selective prosecution issue. On March 19, 1985 in a seven to two decision the Court upheld the Appeals Court ruling against Wayte. In the majority decision, Justice Lewis Powell pointed to the government's "beg policy" of giving resisters a final chance to register before proceeding with a prosecution as evidence that the prosecution was based on a failure to register and not a resister's activities. In the dissenting opinion, Justice Thurgood Marshall stated the court should not have decided the issue, but rather have given Wayte more evidence from the government for his pre-trial hearing. The Supreme Court did not decide if the government was justified in invoking executive privilege when faced with the requirement of turning over internal documents relating to his selective prosecution defense. Since this decision dealt with a pre-trial defense, Wayte's case returned to the District Court level for his trial. ⁽⁸³⁾

Shortly after their decision in Wayte, the Supreme Court refused to hear appeals from Ben Sasway and Gary Eklund on the selective prosecution issue. The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals had previously decided that Mark Schmucker was entitled to a full evidentiary hearing on the selective prosecution issue. The government appealed this ruling to the Supreme Court. After its decision in Wayte, the Supreme Court remanded this case to the Sixth Circuit to be reconsidered in light of its ruling in Wayte. Activity on a pre-trial motion relating to the selective prosecution defense in Dan Rutt's case was also postponed pending resolution of the Wayte case. Similar to Judge Hatter's decision in Wayte, District Court Judge James Doyle in Madison, Wisconsin dismissed charges against Gillam Kerley when the government "respectfully declined" to release documents important to his selective prosecution defense. The government appealed this decision. ⁽⁸⁴⁾

A variation of this defense was the argument that a person's deeply held religious beliefs prevented him from registering. For the government to force such a person to register would be a violation of his First Amendment right to freedom of religion. ⁽⁸⁵⁾ Nonregistrants have had minimal amounts of success in arguing this defense in court.

Another commonly used defense dealt with whether or not a person had a continuing duty to register. According to Carter's Proclamation that began registration, men born in 1960 through 1962 were to register during assigned one-week periods, and men born in 1963 and thereafter were to register within thirty days of their eighteenth birthday. There were no provisions for a person to register after this time period. Thus, the government's indictments which often followed the pattern of

"Beginning on or about July 22, 1980 and continuing to at least May 28, 1982, John Doe did knowingly and willfully fail, evade and refuse to present himself for and submit to registration."

would be invalid because of the error in the date that the nonregistrant committed the "crime" of not registering. ⁽⁸⁶⁾

Several indicted nonregistrants sought to raise this issue in pre-trial motions, but only Rusty Martin was successful in his attempt. Edward McManus, the Federal Judge for the Northern District of Iowa, ruled that in order to convict a nonregistrant the government must prove that he "knowingly and willfully" refused to register during the specific time period in which he was to have registered. The government immediately appealed this ruling to the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals. ⁽⁸⁷⁾ Meanwhile, Gary Eklund also appealed to the Eighth Circuit his trial judge's decision that there was a continuing duty to register.

Normally the statute of limitations (the time period in which a person can be prosecuted for committing a crime) for not registering would expire in five years. If there were no continuing duty to register, it would mean that men who were to have registered in 1980 could no longer be indicted for not registering after the summer of 1985. Unfortunately, in 1971 Congress raised the statute of limitations for this offense to age 31, but they did not specifically state that there was a continuing duty to register. ⁽⁸⁸⁾ In a five to four decision the Eighth Circuit Appeals Court decided that although the law was somewhat unclear, raising the statute of limitations did create a continuing duty to register. The dissent pointed out that although the Military Selective Service Act gave the President the authority to require the registration of eighteen to twenty-six year old men, Carter's Proclamation ordering registration listed only specific times in which men were to register and therefore did not create a continuing duty to register. The Supreme Court refused to hear Eklund and Martin's appeal of this decision. Only the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals (which covers Arkansas, Iowa, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, and South Dakota) has ruled on the continuing duty defense, and it could be decided otherwise in courts outside of the Eighth Circuit. ⁽⁸⁹⁾

Several indicted nonregistrants have sought to employ more technical defenses in an attempt to render the draft law itself invalid. Most commonly, this type of defense dealt with the issue of illegal promulgation of regulations. Federal agencies must publish proposed regulations in the Federal Register for a thirty-day comment period before they can become law. On June 16, 1980, the Selective Service issued its proposed regulations for the administration of registration. Just over a month later, on July 18, the Selective Service published these regulations in their final form, claiming an immediate effective date. However, the final form contained three changes from the previously published proposed form, changes for which the Selective Service did not allow a public comment period. Three days later registration began. ⁽⁹⁰⁾ In addition, under the Military Selective Service Act Carter's Presidential Proclamation 4771 of July 2, 1980, which ordered the resumption of registration procedures was subject to a similar thirty-day public comment period. Registration began only nineteen days after Carter's Proclamation. ⁽⁹¹⁾

On November 15, 1982, Judge Hatter dismissed the indictment against David Wayte on the basis of selective prosecution and the invalidity of Carter's Proclamation, but he ruled against a defense motion that the Selective Service had also illegally promulgated its regulations, which provided for the resumption of registration. In an appeal to the Ninth District Court of Appeals, the government successfully argued that there is a distinction between a Presidential Proclamation and a regulation and that Carter's Proclamation was not subject to the same thirty-day comment period as were other regulations issued under the Military Selective Service Act. Had Wayte won this issue, it would had rendered Carter's Proclamation invalid and essentially terminated registration until a President properly issued a Proclamation beginning registration. Several other indicted nonregistrants have unsuccessfully raised this defense in pre-trial hearings. Only in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals (which has jurisdiction over California, Oregon, Washington, Nevada, Hawaii, Arizona, Guam, Alaska, Idaho, and Montana) is there a ruling on this issue and it possibly could be successfully argued elsewhere. ⁽⁹²⁾

In the Federal District Court in Wichita, Kansas, Chuck Epp argued that from letters he had written stating his refusal to register the government already had the information it requested on the registration form. By demanding that he sign such a form, Epp argued, the government was not demanding information but his symbolic obedience to a registration he disagreed with. Trial Judge Frank Theis pressured the government into dropping charges against Epp in exchange for considering him "constructively registered." ⁽⁹³⁾ After waiting several months, Epp had still not received an acknowledgement letter from the Selective Service System for this "registration," and it was unclear as to what the Selective Service had done with it. ⁽⁹⁴⁾

Vietnam War-era resisters occasionally used a similar defense, arguing that if a local draft board had all the information about a person that it needed that person could be considered constructively registered and not in violation of the draft law. ⁽⁹⁵⁾ Anti-draft organizations noted that if the Selective Service had enough information to mail a nonregistrant a letter, then they probably had enough information to register that person. ⁽⁹⁶⁾ Rusty Martin, a nonregistrant who wanted to use his trial to promote draft resistance, resisted such an attempt by the government to register him. Martin persuaded the Selective Service to cancel this "constructive registration." Other nonregistrants have not been successful in using this defense in their trials. ⁽⁹⁷⁾

Courts have consistently ruled against other possible defenses which would seem to have legal merit. These include arguments that draft registration is unconstitutional because conscription is involuntary servitude, a violation of the Thirteenth Amendment's abolishment of slavery; and that since females and people outside of a specific age group are not subject to registration it is discrimination against young males. ⁽⁹⁸⁾

Solomon Legislation (1983-1984)

Even the threat of legal prosecution was not enough to force most resisters into registering. Early in 1982 a Republican Representative from New York, Gerald Solomon, decided that it was time to "get tough" on nonregistrants. He began proposing legislation that would prohibit nonregistrants from receiving federal governmental assistance, federal jobs, or from participating in other federal programs. On February 2, 1982, he introduced a House Concurrent Resolution that urged Reagan to take such action, but it did not have the force of law. ⁽⁹⁹⁾ On May 6, a similar bill was introduced in the Senate as an amendment to the Department of Defense's 1983 Authorization bill. ⁽¹⁰⁰⁾ On July 28, 1982, the House of Representatives passed Solomon's amendment. A conference committee worked out the differences between the House's version and the one that the Senate had passed, ⁽¹⁰¹⁾ and, on September 8, 1982, Reagan signed the Department of Defense Authorization bill into effect with the Solomon Amendment attached. This legislation went into effect on October 1, 1983. ⁽¹⁰²⁾

Solomon threatened to amend every piece of federal assistance legislation in order to make it illegal for nonregistrants to receive any federal aid. On August 5, 1982, such an amendment attached to the Job Training Program Act (JTPA) passed Congress. ⁽¹⁰³⁾ The JPTA was designed to provide job training services for disadvantaged youth, many of those being poor black males-a group with one of the highest nonregistration rates. The stipulation of registration for participation in the JPTA became the Selective Service's main tool in forcing low-income youth to register for the draft. Unlike many middle class college students who could find alternative sources of aid, most people dependent on the JPTA had few alternatives but to register. ⁽¹⁰⁴⁾

On November 24, 1982 the Minnesota Public Interest Research Group (MPIRG) filed a court case that challenged the new law on the basis that it was a bill of attainder (punishment without the protection of a trial); that it violated a nonregistrant's Fifth Amendment protections from self-incrimination; and that it discriminated against poor, young males. ⁽¹⁰⁵⁾ In a preliminary ruling of March 9, 1983 (which he upheld on June 17), Minnesota District Judge Donald D. Alsop decided that the Solomon Amendment was unconstitutional. On June 29, the Supreme Court stayed this injunction pending its review. ⁽¹⁰⁶⁾ In a six to two decision on July 5, 1984, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of this amendment, deciding that it was not a bill of attainder and that it did not violate a nonregistrant's Fifth Amendment rights. They agreed with the District Court that it did not provide the protection of a trial, but they also pointed out that a nonregistrant could still register and receive aid. The Solomon Amendment was intended, the court noted, to increase compliance with the registration program, not to punish those who failed to register. ⁽¹⁰⁷⁾

Solomon continued to propose legislation to prevent nonregistrants from obtaining financial aid, but none of his other amendments have passed. The educational community was becoming more hostile to the administrative burden that such legislation created. One aid privately predicted that there would be no more Solomon Amendments. ⁽¹⁰⁸⁾

While Solomon attempted to improve the compliance figures for the Selective Service's registration program, Les Aspin, a Democratic Representative from Wisconsin, introduced legislation to reduce the penalty for failure to register for a peacetime draft from felony to a misdemeanor. ⁽¹⁰⁹⁾ Although Aspin has introduced several versions of this legislation, to date none of them have succeeded. Other Representatives saw the registration program itself as being faulted and took steps to bring it to an end. The Sabo-Green bill was the best example of Representatives trying to do this.

On January 27, 1983, Representatives Martin Sabo (D-MN) and Bill Green (R-NY) proposed a bill that would rescind funds for the Selective Service's draft registration program. This action would, in effect, put an end to the draft registration program. ⁽¹¹⁰⁾ In the House, this bill had fifty sponsors. Mark Hatfield introduced similar legislation in the Senate. ⁽¹¹¹⁾ Sabo and Green argued for an end to registration from a pragmatic standpoint, rather than an ideological or philosophical one. They pointed to a U.S. General Accounting Office report that showed that a high percentage of registrant addresses were outdated because the registrants had moved and not informed the Selective Service of their change of address. ⁽¹¹²⁾ Noting the high number of nonregistrants, they concluded that "the level of compliance is inadequate for a fair conscription system should the need occur." Lastly, they wondered if a post-mobilization registration would not be a preferred, and perhaps more efficient, alternative to a peacetime registration. ⁽¹¹³⁾

The House Appropriations Subcommittee for HUD-Independent Agencies (which controls the funding for the Selective Service) held hearings on the Sabo-Green bill on February 24, 1985. ⁽¹¹⁴⁾ In addition to the American Civil Liberties Union and Draft Action, Robert Kreider testified for the National Inter-religious Service Board for Conscientious Objectors in favor of the Sabo-Green bill. Kreider, a Mennonite historian and head of the Peace Studies Department at Bethel College, went beyond the pragmatic arguments against registration and noted that "many nonregistrants refuse to register because they deeply believe this requirement violates their fundamental religious, moral or ethical convictions." Kreider pointed out that most conscientious objectors resist identification with the military and that registration "represents a blank endorsement of all future foreign and military policy." ⁽¹¹⁵⁾

Many informed people thought that this legislation had a good chance of passing due to the popularity of budget cuts, but the Sabo-Green bill never made it out of the House Appropriations Subcommittee. Just hours before the subcommittee vote on May 4, 1983, registration opponents had the verbal support of a majority of subcommittee members. Unfortunately, it was defeated by a six to four margin when one supporter failed to show up for the vote and another voted against the bill. For all practical purposes, this was the end of attempting to use budgetary restrictions to end registration. ⁽¹¹⁶⁾

A New Wave of Resistance? (1985)

On February 23, 1985, President Reagan's appointment of Edwin Meese as Attorney General gained congressional approval. This appointment signaled the beginning of a new and harder line policy against those who refused to register for the draft. Already the Justice Department had been moving in new directions with prosecutions against resisters. On December 13, 1984 the government indicted Phetsamay Maokhamphio, a Laotian refugee and a conscientious resister. This was the first indictment of the government's "active enforcement" program which sought out private, or quiet, nonregistrants instead of only prosecuting those who had made their resistance known to the government. The government sought to use this case as an example of the fairness of its prosecution policy, but it went unnoticed until three months later when the New York Times printed his name in a list of indicted nonregistrants. Because of Maokhamphio's poor knowledge of English, he thought he would be drafted as soon as he registered. Once he understood the law better, he registered, but the government refused to dismiss the case. When Maokhamphio moved from Nashville, Tennessee to Lafayette, Louisiana the new District Attorney agreed to a pre-trial diversion program whereby he was given a year's probation. ⁽¹¹⁷⁾

Several court cases had been on hold for almost a year, their outcome pending the Supreme Court's decision on the selective prosecution issue in the Wayte case. When the Court handed down their decision against Wayte on March 19, 1985, it opened up the way for the resolution of numerous other cases. In the following months, six nonregistrants were either convicted or had reached the end of their appeals process and began serving a sentence.

As part of the reform of the Federal Criminal Law, on January 1, 1985, the maximum fine for refusal to register rose from $10,000 to $250,000. In November 1986, the U.S. Sentencing Commission will review a proposal to raise the maximum prison sentence for draft violations from five to six years. The practical effect of this penalty change could be minimal because it is uncommon for judges to give nonregistrants the maximum allowable sentence. In addition, on October 12, 1984 Congress repealed the Youth Corrections Act. Formerly a nonregistrant sentenced under this Act could have his felony conviction for not registering expunged from his record upon completion of his sentence. ⁽¹¹⁸⁾

In 1982 the Selective Service began extensive crosschecking of its registration records with other governmental records in an attempt to locate possible nonregistrants. The Selective Service then sent a series of letters to these nonregistrants threatening them with prosecution if they did not comply with the registration law. As of July 1985 only two indictments resulted from this action, those being Maokhamphio and Schlossberg (who had responded to such a warning letter). On May 25, 1985 the Selective Service sent out a mass mailing of 158,000 warning letters informing nonregistrants that their names had been sent to the Department of Justice. ⁽¹¹⁹⁾ While it is impossible for the government to prosecute all of these nonregistrants, this mailing may signal a new round of prosecutions similar to what occurred in 1982.

CHAPTER III
RESISTANCE AND THE CHURCH

The Mennonite Central Committee's U.S. Peace Section had already realized several months before Carter's State of the Union Address that a return of registration was not far in the future. Hence they had been planning an Assembly on the Draft and National Service for the spring of 1980. Carter's action suddenly made this issue much more relevant and pressing.

On March 27-29, 1980 a group of about four hundred students, parents, pastors, church leaders, and others met at Goshen, Indiana for this Assembly. Several people had prepared papers on different aspects of Mennonites and conscription. A series of five papers laid out five options for young Mennonites to choose from. These options were:

• Selective Participation in Military Service
• Noncombatant Military Service
• Alternative Service
• Conscientious Resistance
• Emigration

Generally, the first two options, selective participation in military service and noncombatant military service, have not received official church sanction from the Mennonites. Most Mennonites have chosen the third option, registering with the Selective Service with the intent of gaining a conscientious objector status and performing some sort of alternative service.

During this time period there was some discussion of the last option, emigration. During the Vietnam War a number of people had chosen to resist the draft by leaving the United States. Most of them had gone to Canada, but in 1973 Canada changed its immigration laws, making emigration to that country more difficult. However, the Canadian government has stated that an applicant's draft status in another country is irrelevant to his or her eligibility for immigration to Canada. ⁽¹²⁰⁾ During the past five years, few people have chosen emigration as a response to registration. Once this step is taken, a person may be barred from ever returning to the United States. For some resisters, this option was too costly. Others believed that they needed to remain in the United States and fight militarism here. Richard Moore, of the Committee to Aid War Objectors in Vancouver, British Columbia, has perhaps done more then anyone else in raising emigration as a possible option. Moore himself emigrated to Canada in 1971 after deserting the U.S. Air Force in Vietnam. He edits the DRC-NEWS (Draft Resistance in Canada News). ⁽¹²¹⁾

But it was the fourth option, conscientious resistance, that left the largest impact on the Goshen conference. Dennis Koehn, a Vietnam-era nonregistrant, presented a paper on this option. Many people at this conference did not question the government's demand of registration, but were rather concerned with working out a Mennonite response if the Selective Service should resume inductions. But for many young people at the conference, the ones who would be most directly affected with registration, registration, not alternative service proposals, was the issue. A dramatic turning point at the conference occurred when a participant became frustrated with the refusal of certain elements of the conference to acknowledge that many people were dealing with issue of whether or not they should register. He asked all of those who were possibly facing registration and were considering not registering, to stand up. Many of the young people present stood up. ⁽¹²²⁾ For many young Mennonites, resistance had become a legitimate option. Nonregistration was an issue that the Mennonite churches would have to deal with.

For many of the students who stood up at this conference, much of their processing and development of the issue came from late night discussions in dorm rooms. But the Mennonite churches dealt with this issue of nonregistration in a much more formal setting, often with selected delegates and approved agendas. The MCC conference at Goshen was only one of these, albeit the most significant in defining how Mennonites would respond to registration. The Mennonite Central Committee (MCC), in addition to various Mennonite conferences (especially the General Conference Mennonite Church and the Mennonite Church), continued to set up committees and call meetings to discuss different aspects of registration and the draft. They spent much of their time responding to alternative service proposals. Nonregistration was only one, although the most visible, of several agenda items for the Mennonite churches.

The Mennonites did not deal with conscription issues only when there was registration or a draft. After the Vietnam War, the Mennonite Central Committee's U.S. Peace Section had continued to watch the Selective Service System and had remained active in opposing moves toward conscription. When it appeared that the Selective Service System would resume registration in 1976, the Peace Section responded with a strongly worded statement that read, "We continue to view the draft as inherently evil and as an essential element in the militarization of American society." ⁽¹²³⁾ At a conference similar to the one held at Goshen in March of 1980, seventy-five people met in Kansas City, Missouri on November 11 and 12, 1977. These people released a consensus statement in which they stated their opposition to military conscription. But in case of a return to military conscription, they viewed alternative service, nonregistration, and emigration as all being "faithful responses." ⁽¹²⁴⁾

The conference in Goshen had several concrete results. One was the creation of a "Draft Resisters' Fund." ⁽¹²⁵⁾ The MCC U.S. Peace Section set up this fund, but the General Conference Mennonite Church and other Mennonite groups also set up legal defense funds. These were often "last resort" funds, with the intention that if a nonregistrant needed financial assistance he would first seek help closer to home. In several cases, attorneys assisted Mennonite resisters for little or no expense. Often law schools or the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) took on such cases for only a small fee. MCC also established a network of Mennonite lawyers who would be willing to provide legal aid to conscientious objectors to war. ⁽¹²⁶⁾ This network was not extensively used, probably mainly due to the fact that most lawyers are not well versed in the technicalities of Selective Service law.

Another result of the Goshen conference was the establishment of a newsletter that would provide a support network and communication link among Mennonite draft resisters. Fred Loganbill, an MCC volunteer with the National Inter-religious Service Board for Conscientious Objectors (NISBCO), and Phil Shenk, from Sojourners, both lived in Washington, DC and put out the first issue of the Mennonite Non-Cooperators' Newsletter in April of 1980. They intended for the newsletter to be "a newsletter written by and for.... young Mennonites (who are) giving serious thought to resisting the military conscription process in some way or another as an expression of (their) conscientious objection to war and war preparations." ⁽¹²⁷⁾ After this issue, two nonregistrants from Harrisonburg, Virginia, André Gingerich and Luke Hurst, agreed to carry on this responsibility.

Gingerich and Hurst had a major impact on the formation of Mennonites' responses to registration. Prior to the MCC conference at Goshen they had already begun to process the issue of registration with their home congregation in Harrisonburg, Virginia, the Park View Mennonite Church. In a letter addressed to the Park View Congregation they stated that found "it increasingly difficult to see the process of registering and then applying for CO (Conscientious Objector) status as the only option or as the most faithful one." Pointing to the lack of a clear distinction between registration and a draft and war, and the legitimacy that registering and claiming a CO status would lend to a system that drafted others, they concluded that it made most sense to not register. (See Appendix III for the complete text of the letter.)

On Sunday morning, April 13, Gingerich and Hurst met with the Park View congregation in order to discuss this issue. A support and advocacy group called the Support and Liaison Committee grew out of this discussion. ⁽¹²⁸⁾ This was followed up by a business meeting on Sunday evening, June 30 in which the congregation further discussed Hurst and Gingerich's action of not registering. In the end, the congregation drafted a statement which expressed its support in terms of legal assistance, financial aid, prayer, and spiritual counsel for those of its congregation who could not, in conscience, register for the military draft. ⁽¹²⁹⁾ "There was a lot of hostility, especially among men who had done CPS (Civilian Public Service) service in World War Two," Gingerich reported. "They thought we were negating their experience. ⁽¹³⁰⁾ "But for the most part, this discussion had positive and encouraging results, rather than creating a defensive or antagonistic atmosphere. Unfortunately, this was not always possible. Because of the immediacy of the registration issue for them, many young Mennonites had spent many more hours carefully deliberating this issue than had their pastor or congregation. It was difficult and frustrating to be "counseled" by people who had not seriously dealt with this issue.

Just prior to the two-week period of registration during the summer of 1980, the General Conference Mennonite Church (GCMC) held its tri-annual conference in Estes Park, Colorado. The issue of registration hung heavy over many people during that conference. At one session, six men who were facing registration in the next several weeks stood up and said that because of their beliefs they could not "in good conscience register with the Selective Service." They appealed to the Anabaptist tradition of refusal to carry the sword and to the GCMC's 1971 statement The Way of Peace, which pledged the Church's resources to those who chose a costly road of discipleship in responding to registration. (See Appendix IV for the content of the statement.) The members of the GCMC meeting at this conference responded to these men by passing, by an overwhelming majority, a resolution which declared their personal, spiritual, and financial support for them. ⁽¹³¹⁾

A year later, the Mennonite Church (MC) held its biannual General Assembly at Bowling Green State University in Ohio. Here, four men also brought before the conference their decision to resist registration. They noted the close connection between registration and war and wondered if, by accepting a conscientious objector status, Mennonites inadvertently furthered the aims of military conscription by taking friction out of the war machine and by granting the conscription system the legitimacy to draft others for war. (See Appendix V for the entire content of this statement.) The delegates to this assembly responded to this statement with a standing ovation. Several of the nonregistrants, who found such a response "somewhat disorienting" but "certainly gratifying," were left wondering how committed the church actually was to peace when a few minutes later the delegates responded silently to a call to resist paying war taxes. ⁽¹³²⁾

During the summer of 1980 with registration recently reinstated and no one knowing how far in the future a draft was, the Mennonite Central Committee's U.S. Peace Section decided to hire a person to train draft counselors. This person was Jim Amstutz, a 1976 Bluffton College graduate who had already spent several years working with peace issues in the Mennonite church. Amstutz spent the first several months of his time at MCC putting together a draft counselor's manual, starting Draft Counselor's Update, a monthly newsletter for draft counselors, and developing weekend training sessions for draft counselors. For the following several years he spent a lot of time traveling and doing draft counselor training seminars. There was a conservative element in the Mennonite churches that criticized Amstutz and the MCC U.S. Peace Section for spending too much time with nonregistrants and the whole issue of nonregistration. Amstutz defended his work, saying that this was a misperception because his work with nonregistration was just more visible then his other activities. The Peace Section also spent a lot of time monitoring and interpreting the alternative service proposals and negotiating with the Selective Service. ⁽¹³³⁾

During January 1-3, 1982, Amstutz led a New Years retreat at the Laurelville Mennonite Church Center in Pennsylvania on "The Draft: To Register or Not to Register." Amstutz had intended for the retreat to be for young men facing registration deadlines, for their parents, and for others who were looking for a dialogue about options and support for their convictions. As it turned out, many of the twenty-five participants had already decided to resist registration. Melvin Hess, a Lancaster, Pennsylvania attorney, provided information on the legal process that a nonregistrant would go through if he was prosecuted. John Stoner of the Peace Section provided input on church-state relations. The participants left this weekend retreat "with a strong sense of unity and with the hope that (they) might meet again soon." ⁽¹³⁴⁾

Early in 1983, Greg Smucker (who was in Voluntary Service in Washington, DC) and André Gingerich (who was studying at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania) formed a proposal to create a "Mennonite Nonregistrants Coordinating Committee." They saw a need to strengthen support links between Mennonite nonregistrants, and a need to generate dialogue with the wider Mennonite church on issues of militarism. Initial agenda items dealt with preparing for the upcoming Bethlehem '83 conference of the Mennonite Church and the General Conference Mennonite Church, and encouraging the church to oppose the Solomon Aid Amendment, which would cut off financial aid to students who had not registered. ⁽¹³⁵⁾

Nine people joined the Mennonite Nonregistrants Coordinating Committee (MNCC): Dave Boshart and Jon Nafzinger of Goshen College; André Gingerich of Swarthmore; Eldon Mast and Juanita Shirk of Eastern Mennonite College; Mike Hurst, Dave Leaman and Greg Smucker of Washington; and Dave Lohrentz of Bethel College. The committee had a representation from all of the areas where Mennonite groups were actively opposing registration. Unfortunately, distance and high travel costs prevented more Bethel students from attending. Gingerich and Smucker had intended to maintain a proper male-female ratio in the make-up of the committee, but Shirk was the only woman on it. "Women can't choose not to register, of course, but that doesn't mean they can't be involved," Shirk said, reflecting on her role with the MNCC. "I was glad I was there (at the MNCC meeting)." ⁽¹³⁶⁾

The Mennonite Nonregistrants Coordinating Committee (MNCC) had its initial meeting on February 12-13, 1983 in Washington, D.C. A large portion of the time at this meeting was spent brainstorming for ideas for the upcoming Bethlehem '83 conference. Another item of discussion dealt with the future of the Mennonite Conscientious Resisters' Newsletter. They decided to bring the newsletter under the supervision of the committee. The nonregistrants at Goshen College had edited it for almost a year and thought that it was time for someone else to take that responsibility. The three nonregistrants from Washington (Greg Smucker, Dave Leaman, and Mike Hurst) agreed to take on the editorship. ⁽¹³⁷⁾

The Mennonite Nonregistrant's Coordinating Committee held its second meeting at Goshen College on May 27-29, 1983. Again, a lot of discussion centered around the upcoming Bethlehem '83 gathering. It was becoming more and more of a problem to find funding and editors for the newsletter. The committee considered the possibility of having the church's "Peace Bureaucrats" (people such as Bob Hull, the General Conference's Peace and Justice Secretary, and Edgar Metzler, the Mennonite Church's Director of Peace and Social Concerns, who dealt with draft and registration issues as a part of their portfolios) take over the responsibility of it. ⁽¹³⁸⁾ This idea was dropped because the newsletter was intended to be "written by and for" Mennonite nonregistrants.

About fifteen conscientious resisters showed up at the Moyers Lake Campground the weekend before the Bethlehem '83 conference began. This was the weeklong residence for many of the resisters at the conference. These people concentrated on seminars on draft registration that they had planned, and on improving the dialogue with the Church. But for the most part, most of the issues of great significance had already been settled at the Estes Park conference in 1980 and at Bowling Green in 1981. Both the General Conference and the Mennonite Church had taken the position of supporting both registrants and nonregistrants. The church leaders were hesitant to push the issue any further, and the nonregistrants were becoming frustrated by this attitude. ⁽¹³⁹⁾

During the summer of 1983, the United States Department of Education implemented the Solomon Amendment that cut off federal financial aid for nonregistrants. This new regulation caught the schools and their financial aid offices in a bind; the Department of Education was requiring them to obtain registration complicity statements from all of the students that received federal financial aid. Several conscientious resisters inquired into the possibility of the schools simply ignoring this requirement. But if a school took such a step the government could retaliate by cutting off all financial assistance to that school, meaning a loss of millions of dollars. "EMC's financial dependence on the government makes such an action unthinkable," Al Keim, Dean of Eastern Mennonite College, said commenting on the cold reality of the situation. Keim, who was very supportive of the nonregistration stance, continued, "this institution is not willing to destroy itself for the sake of a few male students." ⁽¹⁴⁰⁾

Obviously that option was not practical. The conscientious resisters began looking for alternative sources of funding for nonregistrants who were losing aid. When colleges began to discuss setting up special funds to replace the lost aid, Representative Solomon introduced an amendment that would make such funds illegal. Solomon dropped this amendment because of increased hostility from the educational community over the administrative burden such legislation created. ⁽¹⁴¹⁾ Eventually, several colleges set up such funds. André Gingerich worked hard at Swarthmore College to make sure that the funds would be replaced. Earlham College, Yale University, and Princeton University all made similar provisions. ⁽¹⁴²⁾

At Bethel College, Dick Koontz, the Director of Financial Aid, worked hard from the beginning to assure that nonregistrants received the aid necessary for them to go to school. In February of 1983 the Bethel Board of Directors passed a proposal for a "Special Fund" that would replace money that nonregistrant students were deprived of. Because Bethel's Administration chose not to support nonregistration, Harold Schultz, the President of Bethel, did not want this fund widely publicized. Rather, Bethel would solicit contributions for this fund from "friendly sources." ⁽¹⁴³⁾

In an effort to make the administration of such alternative aid funds as uniform as possible, the General Conference Mennonite Church and the Mennonite Church agreed to work together to develop a "Student Aid Fund for Nonregistrants." The guidelines for the fund stated that, "students eligible to participate are nonregistrants at Mennonite schools and nonregistrant Mennonite students at other schools who have taken this position by reason of Christian calling and commitment." ⁽¹⁴⁴⁾ In the General Conference office in Newton, Kansas, Fred Loganbill and Jim Dunn worked hard to set up this fund. In a press release requesting money for this special fund, they defended the nonregistration position by pointing to official church documents such as the 1971 "Way of Peace" statement that expressed the conference's support for nonregistrants. They drew a parallel between the need for funds now and the fact that the Mennonite churches contributed almost $3.4 million for the administration of Civilian Public Service camps during 1941 to 1947. ⁽¹⁴⁵⁾ During the 1983-84 school year (the first school year that the Solomon Amendment deprived nonregistrants of aid), about twenty nonregistrants (all of them attending Bethel, Goshen, or Eastern Mennonite College) needed approximately seventy thousand dollars. The need was about the same for the 1984-85 school year. The conferences had some difficulty in raising this money, but were able to meet all of the students' needs. ⁽¹⁴⁶⁾

CHAPTER IV
RESISTANCE AND THE SCHOOLS

For the most part, resistance to draft registration is a story that takes place in the schools. At the retreat on registration at the Laurelville Mennonite Church Center in January, 1982, a group of nonregistrants counted all of the Mennonite nonregistrants that they were aware of. Of the sixty to eighty nonregistrants that they knew of, twenty attended Bethel College in North Newton, Kansas; ten were at Eastern Mennonite College (EMC) in Harrisonburg, Virginia; ten at Goshen College in Goshen, Indiana; and four at Hesston College in Hesston, Kansas. ⁽¹⁴⁷⁾ The numbers of nonregistrants changed from year to year, but undoubtedly many more Mennonites resisted registration. An unknown number of people kept very quiet about their resistance, some not even telling their closest friends. Others, often due to governmental or family pressures, registered but remained adamantly opposed to registration. And many women, though not directly affected by the registration requirement, actively opposed registration.

Most nonregistrants from the 1980s were too young for the Vietnam war protests to have directly influenced them. When President Carter reintroduced registration in 1980 many eighteen and nineteen year-olds were unprepared for it. One resister from Bethel College stated the registration was "a foreign concept" and its reintroduction "quite a bit of a surprise" for the students. ⁽¹⁴⁸⁾ Others had been carefully watching developments in Washington, D.C. and realized that it was only a matter of time before registration and the draft were resumed. During October 1979, before Carter announced his plans to resume registration, Goshen College's campus ministries held a forum on conscientious objection. Five students presented varying views on registration, from noncooperation to pro-military. ⁽¹⁴⁹⁾ Once Carter announced his plans to reinstate registration such forums flourished, often attracting hundreds of people. They provided background information on registration and recent political developments, discussion on various possible responses to conscription, and a chance for people to test their beliefs in front of a mock draft board. ⁽¹⁵⁰⁾ In addition, many informal meetings and late night rap sessions in college dormitories helped those faced with registration work out how they would respond.

Mennonite draft resisters came from all over the United States, but most of their activity was centered on the campuses of Bethel College; Eastern Mennonite College; and Goshen College. Each Mennonite college took on an identity of its own that seemed to determine the amount and style of resistance to registration on each particular campus. ⁽¹⁵¹⁾ Bethel College has a reputation of being a liberal General Conference Mennonite school with a long tradition of a President and faculty that are willing to take more radical stances on social issues than are people at other Mennonite schools. Hence, nonregistrants at Bethel tend to be more plentiful, political, and perhaps more secular than other places. Bluffton College in Bluffton, Ohio, another General Conference Mennonite school, has a student population that is only twenty percent Mennonite. Instead Bluffton draws on a population that has less concern for traditional Mennonite ethics and social concerns. Accordingly, that college has fewer students involved in the draft resistance issue. A third, and by far the smallest, General Conference college is Freeman Junior College in Freeman, South Dakota. Although Freeman is perhaps the most conservative General Conference Mennonite college, a relatively large number of nonregistrants come from there. Much of their activity takes place elsewhere though.

The Mennonite Church has three colleges in the United States. A different organizational structure affects the "flavor" of these schools. Goshen College, Eastern Mennonite College, and Hesston College are all owned and operated by the Mennonite Church, while Bethel, Bluffton, and Freeman, although affiliated with the General Conference Mennonite Church are organized as separate corporate identities with a higher degree of autonomy. Being a part of the church's organizational structure tends to make Goshen, EMC, and Hesston religiously more conservative than the General Conference affiliated schools. This contributes to creating schools that are more aware of their Mennonite/Anabaptist heritage. Being under the organizational umbrella of the church has given the administrations of those colleges the opportunity to be more progressive in their support of nonregistrants. The self-identity of these colleges results in nonregistrants whose political and social actions tend to have more of a religious and Mennonite flavor.

Mennonite Brethern colleges (Tabor College in Hillsboro, Kansas and Fresno Pacific College in Fresno, California) come from a more evangelical tradition. There is less of an emphasis on social or political action at them which has resulted in a minimal amount of anti-registration activity.

Bethel College

During the spring of 1980 when an appropriations bill for registration came up for a vote in Congress, a group of concerned students held a letter writing session to express their opposition to registration. About sixty-five to seventy people signed a statement protesting registration, with several students noting their intent to not comply with any registration program. The following fall, a group of these resisters on the Bethel campus formed a nonregistrant support group which they entitled "Conscientious Resisters at Bethel," or CRAB. This group was once described as "an island of radicalism in an ocean of conservatism." ⁽¹⁵²⁾ Initially, this group met off campus and included as many women as men. CRAB's activity increased when the Mennonite Conscientious Resister's Newsletter came to Bethel, but the height of its activity occurred during the fall of 1982 when two nonregistrants at Bethel were indicted. CRAB applied for and received club funding from the Student Senate, using this money to help organize activities around the court cases. ⁽¹⁵³⁾

On February 19-21, 1981, the Bethel College Peace Fellowship hosted a conference entitled "Conscience and Registration: An Active Response." About eighty people attended this conference, which brought people from around the country together to discuss the issue of registration. ⁽¹⁵⁴⁾ The conference had a variety of resource people including Robert Kreider, a historian at Bethel who gave an historical overview of conscription in the United States; Delton Franz, director of the Washington, D.C. MCC U.S. Peace Section Office, who described three hot spots most likely to experience U.S. military intervention (Central America, the Persian Gulf, and Poland); and Tom Graff, a Vietnam era resister who emigrated to Canada, spoke on immigration options.

Another resource person, Christine Hamilton (from the Arvada, Colorado, Mennonite Church), addressed the issue of women and registration. During this conference a group of women from Bethel gathered together to discuss how they could join in the struggle against conscription and militarism. Several women at Bethel first began seriously dealing with the issue of registration during the spring of 1980 when it appeared that they would also be required to register, a proposal that was later defeated. During the fall of 1980 a group of students, including some of these women, went to a conference on civil disobedience in Denver, Colorado. This led a group of women to work on a statement expressing their support for male nonregistrants. It was a difficult statement to write because they not only wanted to support the nonregistrants, but to incriminate themselves along with them. ⁽¹⁵⁵⁾ Eventually five women signed this statement which expressed their support for nonregistrants on an interpersonal level and during any prosecutions, and stated their intent to work at building public awareness of draft related issues. ⁽¹⁵⁶⁾

The readership of the Mennonite Non-Cooperators' Newsletter had grown from a list of 40 names when it was started in April of 1980, to over 250 subscribers by the time of the conference at Bethel. After editing the newsletter for almost a year, Gingerich and Hurst decided that it was time for the editorship to move on to new people and a new place. ⁽¹⁵⁷⁾ Three Bethel students, Sue Flickinger, Jennifer Hiebert, and Joe Smucker, agreed to take on this responsibility. Along with the change in editorship came a change in the name to the Mennonite Conscientious Resisters' Newsletter (MCRN). As editors of the Mennonite Non-Cooperators' Newsletter, Gingerich and Hurst had received negative feedback on the name of the newsletter due to its negative connotations. (They once editorialized that "cooperation with one set of values always implies non-cooperation with another" set. ⁽¹⁵⁸⁾) The resisters at Bethel chose the name Mennonite Conscientious Resisters' Newsletter over Mennonite Nonregistrants Newsletter in order to incorporate those who were conscientious resisters without having committed a felony. ⁽¹⁵⁹⁾

Several Bethel students wrote to the Selective Service System informing them that they had not registered and why they were taking this action. During June of 1981, two of these, Chuck Epp from Henderson, Nebraska, and Scott Jost from North Newton, Kansas, received warning letters threatening prosecution if they did not register. ⁽¹⁶⁰⁾ With the possibility of prosecutions and prison sentences coming much closer, CRAB began working on ideas of how to respond if and when a Bethel student was arrested for not registering. They drew up and signed a statement advocating conscientious nonregistration. ⁽¹⁶¹⁾ Later that fall, Jost and Kendal Warkentine (also from North Newton) received warning letters from the District Attorney's office in Wichita urging them to register. ⁽¹⁶²⁾ Richard Gross, head of the Wichita FBI office, indicated that he had the names of three Bethel students to investigate. These were probably Jost, Warkentine, and Epp. ⁽¹⁶³⁾

For Scott Jost, the pressures of prosecution became too great. He had not become any less idealistic, but realistically he had trouble believing that spending several years in prison would be worth the satisfaction of knowing that he was right. In March 1982, he finally gave in and registered, thoroughly defacing the registration card in the process. "Registration is the hardest thing I have ever done," Jost said. ⁽¹⁶⁴⁾ "If I had to do it over again I would not register and not tell anyone," Jost said, reflecting back on his experiences with the Selective Service System. "I still believe registration is very wrong and very evil. I wish more than anything that they didn't have my name." ⁽¹⁶⁵⁾

From mid-June through mid-August of 1982, four Bethel College students (Chuck Epp, Sue Flickinger, Mark Friesen, and Stephanie Hiebert) traveled among Mennonite churches in the Midwest and West presenting educational programs on peace issues. The General Conference Mennonite Voluntary Service program and the Peace and Social Concerns Committees of the Northern and Western District Conferences sponsored this traveling Peace Team, which spoke about the draft and registration in addition to broader military spending and intervention issues. ⁽¹⁶⁶⁾

On June 12, 1982, 750,000 people demonstrated in New York City against the nuclear arms race. One of the Mennonite nonregistrants at this rally, David Lohrentz, stayed after the rally for a gathering of nonregistrants from around the country. They discussed networking and setting up contingency plans to implement if and when there were indictments. With these ideas from this meeting, he came back to Bethel and helped set up the "Mid-Kansas Nonregistrant Support Group." ⁽¹⁶⁷⁾ This group met several times during July of 1982 to discuss legal defenses, media appearances, and writing up a support statement. Dwight Platt, a professor at Bethel who had been imprisoned in the early 1950s for not registering, noted that the crime was not that Epp and Warkentine had not registered, but that they refused to register. Nonregistrants threatened with prosecution could register at that point and still escape prosecution. It used to be that the act itself of not registering was the crime. ⁽¹⁶⁸⁾ Eighty people signed the Mid-Kansas Nonregistrant Support Group statement which pledged their personal and financial support for those nonregistrants who were prosecuted.

It was obvious that Chuck Epp and Kendal Warkentine would be the first nonregistrants from Bethel to be indicted. The FBI had interviewed Warkentine during the summer, but they could not find Epp because of his travels with the Summer Peace Team. ⁽¹⁶⁹⁾ Later Epp, along with Bob Hull and Fred Loganbill, who worked with peace and justice issues for the General Conference Mennonite Church, and Mark Friesen and Garth Isaak, two nonregistrants from Bethel College, met with the FBI. The meeting was for both Epp and the FBI an attempt to acquire more information on the other's motives and methods of operation. ⁽¹⁷⁰⁾

The federal grand jury handed down the indictment against Epp and Warkentine on September 21, 1982. ⁽¹⁷¹⁾ The District Attorney claimed to have the names of two other nonregistrants that he could indict. These were probably Isaak and Lohrentz, but no more indictments have come down in Kansas. ⁽¹⁷²⁾

Lohrentz set up a press conference at the Lorraine Avenue Mennonite Church in Wichita the day after the indictments. At it Epp read a prepared statement in which he noted that registration was a "symbolic threat which can only lessen world security," a military threat that he could not support. Warkentine said that registering for the draft would violate his religious convictions, and that he had no choice but to obey God and disobey the government. ⁽¹⁷³⁾ Stephanie Hiebert read the Mid-Kansas Nonregistrant Support Group statement that had been signed during the summer. ⁽¹⁷⁴⁾ At this same time, Harold Schultz, the President of Bethel College issued a statement in which he pointed out that "the great majority of students" registered. While Bethel would support the right not to register, it refrained from supporting the position of nonregistration as the church conferences had. Schultz's statement also stated that Bethel supported the right of the U.S. government to prosecute Epp and Warkentine. ⁽¹⁷⁵⁾

On February 14, 1983, just before Warkentine's sentencing, the faculty of Bethel College also released a statement expressing their support for Warkentine and Epp. James Juhnke, a professor of history at Bethel who was very supportive of nonregistrants, drew up this statement that affirmed Warkentine and Epp as being a part of the the Anabaptist-Mennonite Christian heritage, deplored the Justice Department's selective prosecution tactics, and called "for an end to the compulsory registration system which causes unnecessary disruption and which is not achieving its policy objectives." ⁽¹⁷⁶⁾

At his arraignment on October 10, 1982, Warkentine wanted to be nonresistant to what the government would do to him and therefore stood mute. The magistrate would not accept this and entered a plea of "not guilty" for him. Warkentine tried to change the plea to "no contest," but Judge Sam Crow refused this because he wanted the case to be judged in a manner consistent with previous nonregistrant trials. Instead, Crow entered a plea of guilty for him. ⁽¹⁷⁷⁾ Warkentine became the first indicted nonregistrant to have such a plea.

A group of about 160 supporters showed up at Warkentine's sentencing in Wichita, Kansas on March 7, 1983. Warkentine had expected to receive a short prison term followed by a voluntary service term, but instead he was given two years of unsupervised probation with the condition that he register within ten days on a special form that would acknowledge his conscientious objection. In order to express their solidarity with Warkentine, eight nonregistrants from Bethel and Hesston College had planned on holding a press conference after the sentencing to publicly announce their refusal to register. This group of nonregistrants decided to wait for a more appropriate time for this action when they discovered that Warkentine had received such a light sentence. ⁽¹⁷⁸⁾

Junior Elder, the Kansas State Director of Selective Service provided Warkentine with a standard registration form on which he had typed in after the statement "I AFFIRM THE FOREGOING STATEMENTS ARE TRUE" the addition "and hereby declare that I am conscientiously opposed to serving in the armed forces." The significance of this registration is a bit vague. The Selective Service was not classifying registrants, and, as Selective Service spokesperson Joan Lamb noted, "We've accepted other (registrations) like that without a judge's ruling. ⁽¹⁷⁹⁾ Warkentine has stated that the registration form was not exactly what he had expected, ⁽¹⁸⁰⁾ but this ruling increased the pressure on the government to include a "CO check-off box" on the registration forms. ⁽¹⁸¹⁾

In August of 1984, Warkentine was released seven months early from his probation. Since he had been sentenced under the Youth Corrections Act, this felony conviction was expunged from his record. Following his release from probation, Warkentine began teaching at the Christian Challenge School in Wichita, Kansas. ⁽¹⁸²⁾

Chuck Epp followed a different course of action with his case. He plead "not guilty" and filed a series of pre-trial motions on the issues of selective prosecution, illegal promulgation, and the continuing duty to register. ⁽¹⁸³⁾ Judge Frank Theis granted Epp a pre-trial hearing on the selective prosecution issue. The hearing, which took place on May 23, 1983, consisted of testimony from governmental officials who had been involved in developing the prosecution policy which led to Epp's indictment. The defense acquired additional strength when the court discovered a memo that David Kline, a Justice Department lawyer in Washington, D.C., had written in March 1982 which stated that "with the present universe of hundreds of thousands of non-registrants the chances that a quiet non-registrant will be prosecuted is probably about the same as the chances that he will be struck by lightning." ⁽¹⁸⁴⁾

Epp expected to hear the judge's decisions on his pre-trial motions in a couple of months. But Theis, apparently not wanting to make a precedent setting decision on these issues, procrastinated on making a ruling. It was a year later when Epp's right to a speedy trial forced the case to court. When the Supreme Court agreed to hear testimony on Wayte's selective prosecution case, it looked like the trial might be delayed again. Instead, Theis ruled against Epp's pre-trial motions, including the one that dealt with selective prosecution. In the trial, which began on June 21, 1984, Epp argued that he had already, in essence, registered by way of the letters that he had written to the Selective Service System stating his refusal to register. Epp's attorney, Eric Bruce, noted that Epp had already provided the Selective Service with all of the information it requested. "Who makes the decision as to what constitutes registration?" Bruce asked. David Cox, the assistant director of the Selective Service, claimed that they could not accept Epp's letters as registration because they lacked the OMB (Office of Management and Budget) number found on registration forms, an idea Judge Theis thought to be "ludicrous." Theis recessed the trial to his chamber where Epp and the government worked out an agreement. Epp wrote on a piece of scrap paper the information requested on the registration form, the same information that he had already provided to the Selective Service in his letters, and handed it to the prosecuting attorney. After several long distance phone calls to Washington, D.C., the Justice Department agreed to accept this information as registration and moved to dismiss the charges against Epp. ⁽¹⁸⁵⁾

This settlement brought a whole series of questions to Epp's mind. "Did I compromise my position? And, who won?" Epp wondered. ⁽¹⁸⁶⁾ Epp's attorney Eric Bruce declared, "I think we won. The government just plain backed off." ⁽¹⁸⁷⁾ Epp had not taken the symbolic step of obedience of signing a registration form, and he had communicated through the media his concerns with the arms race and the United States' moves in Central America. After his trial, Epp met briefly in the courtroom with his supporters. "I think I'm fairly satisfied with the settlement," Epp said. He concluded, "I'm mostly glad it's over." ⁽¹⁸⁸⁾

Goshen College

During the summer of 1980 several Goshen students publicly announced their decision to not register. They, along with others concerned with the recent moves toward registration and a draft, placed an advertisement in the Goshen News challenging young men to think before registering. They also set up a "registration information" table outside the Goshen Post Office during the two-week period of registration during the summer of 1980. ⁽¹⁸⁹⁾ The Goshen News printed an article that Byron Becker had written describing why he was refusing to register. This piece elicited about fifty letters to the editor, both supporting and attacking Becker and the stance that he was taking. But for the most part, thework on the nonregistration issue started the fall of 1980 when these students returned to college. The nonregistrants organized themselves into a support group which met once a week for discussion and Bible study. ⁽¹⁹⁰⁾

In October 1981, two nonregistrants at Goshen, Craig Miller and Greg Smucker, received warning letters from the District Attorney in South Bend. One month later, two FBI agents came to the Goshen campus to interview these two men. After the interviews, the agents met with other nonregistrants and the nonregistrant support group. ⁽¹⁹¹⁾ Don Blosser, a Bible professor at Goshen who worked extensively with draft and registration issues, met first with the FBI agents when they came on campus and made sure that the students knew that they were coming. ⁽¹⁹²⁾ In December Byron Becker also received a letter from the District Attorney. Instead of responding to the letter, Becker, Smucker and Miller went to South Bend and talked with Jerome Frese, the DA, attempting to establish a friendship with him. They found him to be somewhat sympathetic who, as a Catholic adherent to the just war theory, thought that the Vietnam War was not just. Frese found himself in a tight spot, for he had a job to do. After this visit, Becker, Smucker and Miller's cases closely paralleled each other. ⁽¹⁹³⁾

During the previous year students at Bethel College had put together the Mennonite Conscientious Resistor's Newsletter. When the nonregistrants had their "gathering of the tribe" at the Laurelville Mennonite Church Center over New Years of 1982, they decided that it was time for the editorship of the newsletter to move on. Eight or nine public nonregistrants at Goshen agreed to take on this responsibility. The editorial stance of the newsletter changed slightly when it moved to Goshen. "The nonregistrants at Goshen are refusing registration primarily on religious grounds," Smucker editorialized in the first issue of the newsletter published at Goshen. "We are not as much a part of the mainstream resistance movement as some of the rest of you may be." "But," he went on to say, "they would openly welcome other points of view." They saw the newsletter as having a four-fold purpose: to provide a network between conscientious resistors; to be a forum for an exchange of ideas; to present input