Lane you're pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness comes at the expense of those who are dying for it. And why shouldn't every eligible to vote young adult be equally exposed to that risk?
Because forcing such a thing on people is detrimental to life, liberty, and (and the pursuit of) happiness. A draft involves involuntary servitude, you can't get much more detrimental to liberty than that, other than making the forced service permanent (so it become full blown slavery).
Also in the context of the way our military works today and the type of wars we have been in, its detrimental to the military mission. Yes "boots on the ground" are important, but we go with well trained and well equipped "boots", to try to reduce our casualties and those of civilians in the theater of war. Mass armies means you can't afford to train or equip them as well. It also means your taking more people who really don't want to be there, or even to be in any way associated with the military. Some of those people will perform great anyway, but I think the percentage is less.
And its detrimental to our federal budget situation. Paying so many would be too expensive, or if you pay them peanuts because you can force them to accept the low pay, than you increase the harm to their "life, liberty, and happiness", and still have a situation where its too expensive to adequately support them.
And its detrimental to the economy, as you lose the production, or education in preparation for future production that you would have gotten from all those you force to "share the burden".
Now you have stated that you disagree with the principle of fairness in requiring service
Fairness in requiring service generally means not requiring service. Its unfair to force people to serve, and unfair in another way since practically you can't force everyone to serve.
we could at least reinstitute a lottery system that would give us a more representative military.
That might solve the budget problem. It could help with but doesn't fully solve the lost work and education problems; probably doesn't solve the reduced military effectiveness problem (you still have more people who don't want to be in the military, and besides just desire, those who self select for the military are more likely to have the attitudes and abilities the military needs than a random selection); and doesn't touch the infringement on liberty issue. It also greatly reduces any possible fairness argument. Accepting volunteers is more fair, than forcing some but not forcing others.
I also don't really think the draft (esp. one with deferments, or even just a very low percentage lottery) would do well at creating a sense of shared sacrifice being beneficial. Or even that such a sense is generally what we need. |
