Moving From Conscientious Objector to War Resister

 

The Day I Moved from Conscientious Objector to War Resister by Steve Clemens 9/15/22

 

I’m not sure which Nixon speech it was. It happened near the end of 1971 or early in 1972. Once again, the President called for an escalation of the war on Vietnam. That day I had received in the mail a letter from the Selective Service Administration (my draft board) asking me, I assume, to update my mailing address since I had just graduated early from Wheaton College and my II-S Student deferment had just expired. I looked at the letter, remembered Nixon’s speech and took it into the bathroom of my parents’ home.

 

Three years earlier, when I turned 18 in the fall of 1968, I chose to register as a Conscientious Objector. Looking back on that time, it wasn’t a political statement against the War on Vietnam; rather, it was a religious statement that my commitment to the words of Jesus to “love my enemies” took precedence over the demands of my government. For almost a year after filing my claim as a CO, I took no part in anti-war demonstrations in my college town just outside of Chicago. However, in the Spring of 1969 I was invited to attend a “Black Power Symposium” at Augustana College in Rock Island, IL and my carefully constructed conservative white world was turned upside down. That weekend was followed by a week of (compulsory) chapel services at Wheaton led by a former NY street gang member who “got saved, turned his life over to Jesus” and became one of a minuscule few Black, evangelical evangelists, Tom Skinner (https://www.skinnerleaders.org/our-history). Tom recommended that I spend my summer break working in the inner city (aka the Black community) of Philadelphia, just 30 miles south of my childhood home.

 

That summer introduced me to how the predominately white Philadelphia Police Force (under the direction of a very racist Frank Rizzo) responded to both Black and Hispanic neighborhoods. It was a wake-up call which forced me to consider the intersections between my religious identity and my political and social views. When I returned to my Illinois campus that fall, I joined a local Maryknoll priest in his weekly demonstrations outside the DuPage County Draft Board office in Wheaton. I started attending the weekly Operation Breadbasket services led by Jesse Jackson in Chicago. I chose an African American roommate. And I started reading Ramparts and other “leftist” magazines which were stridently against the war. I helped lead a campus anti-war group named after the pacifist, abolitionist founder of the college, the Jonathan Blanchard Association. I learned about my Anabaptist ancestors in a Bible History course. I met Jim Wallis as he was founding The Post American – which was re-named a few years later, Sojourners Magazine and was reading John Howard Yoder, Daniel Berrigan, and other faith-based peacemaking activists.

 

I knew there were people in these movements who were “draft resisters” and/or “draft card burners” – but I didn’t know any of them personally. But I also knew the consequences faced by those prosecuted for such: often 2-5 years in prison. So, when I went into my parents’ bathroom after the Nixon speech, I took the Draft Card from my wallet (we were required by law to carry them) and burned it, letting the ashes go down the drain. I knew doing so privately was a bit cowardly, so I then decided to up the risk level. I crossed my name and address off my un-opened Selective Service letter and wrote above it – “Refused, obscene material! - Return to Sender” and put it back in the mailbox.

 

[Fast-forward 8 years later when President Carter, trying to win re-election against Ronald Reagan, re-instated mandatory draft registration for males between the ages of 18-26. Never mind that I was 30 at the time. I wrote to the President, telling him I refused to resister for reasons of conscience. After numerous threatening letters over the next year, finally two FBI agents showed up at my workplace to inquire about my act of resistance. After politely refusing to tell them my Social Security number, my mother’s maiden name, or my birthplace and age, they decided amongst themselves that I was probably “older than 26” so they said they were closing my case.]

 

It still took me another 3 years after my burnt draft card for me to embrace “active” nonviolent resistance rather than just reacting to what our government was doing after the fact. Liz McAlister became a friend and mentor along with Phil Berrigan, her husband. She gently pushed me to embrace active nonviolence and see war resistance as a logical outcome if one takes conscientious objection seriously. Then she got arrested with me and 59 others at the White House in the last major demonstration against the Vietnam War in late March 1975. Dan Berrigan, the author who had inspired me and Dick Gregory who challenged me at the Black Power Symposium, were placed in handcuffs alongside me.

Daniel Berrigan: Mentor and Inspiration

Dan Berrigan: Mentor and Inspiration by Steve Clemens, May 3, 2016

I don’t think I heard about the draft file burning at Catonsville, MD until a year or two later. After all, our high school baseball team was hoping to win its second straight Ivy Prep League title (we fell one game short with me in the on-deck circle with bases-loaded and two outs) and I was caught up in Senior Weekend and my up-coming graduation. Even Dr. King’s assassination the month before didn’t register in my sheltered life at an all-boys college prep school on Long Island. My life of privilege allowed me to virtually ignore the increasing carnage of the Vietnam War because it was assumed all 41 of our graduating class of 1968 would be attending college and receive “student deferments” as long as we maintained a decent grade-point average.

I do remember thinking that the destruction of property, coupled with the fact that most of the actors of the Catonsville 9 were Roman Catholic, was not an appropriate act of dissent when I became aware of it about a year after the May 17, 1968 occurrence. At the time of their trial, I was wrestling with the momentous decision of registering for the military draft. A month earlier I was issued a rifle and a uniform as part of my registration at Wheaton College; all male students were required to enroll in U.S. Army ROTC unless they had an honorable discharge from military service or a 4-F (physically or morally unfit for service) or 1-O (conscientious objector) status from their draft board. I was scheduled to register for Selective Service on October 16 when I turned 18 years old.

It was not an easy decision; my father had left his Mennonite heritage and entered the U.S. Army when drafted in World War II. He never talked to me (or to my brothers, I assumed) about his experience in France and Germany as a radioman in the infantry as his unit followed General George Patton’s soldiers. Only after his 80^th birthday did he share any details with us about this period of his life and then mostly to say he wasn’t proud of the things he had done but he had “promised the Lord that if he got home safely”, he’d return to the church and “follow the Lord.” Even though the Mennonite Church my Dad helped found in 1950 never affiliated with any of the Mennonite conferences and did not stress the traditional “peace witness” expected of Mennonites, I was aware that some of my relatives were pacifist or conscientious objectors even if my parents weren’t.

After prayer, reading scripture, and talking with a Resident Assistant on my college dorm wing, I decided that I must register as a conscientious objector – to all wars, not just the current one in Vietnam. But it was a personal decision – a moral stand as an individual – rather than a social or political decision at that point. I couldn’t in good conscience take up a gun to kill the Vietnamese but I also wasn’t sitting in judgment on those who did go or my government’s “foreign policy”. I knew little about what was happening in “the far East” other than what my parent’s copies of US News and World Report stressed: those “godless Communists” were killing our “Christian missionaries” and wanted to force their atheism on all of southeast Asia.

So Father Daniel Berrigan, his brother Phil Berrigan and the other actors of the drama at the Draft Board office in Catonsville, Maryland didn’t register. A year after becoming a conscientious objector, I started participating in anti-war marches on the Wheaton, Illinois Draft Board, led by “Father Tom”, a Maryknoll order priest from nearby Glen Ellyn. Sometime that fall or early winter I came across Dan’s book about their trial, The Trial of The Catonsville Nine. I was struck by Dan’s poetic description of the draft files – they were cast as “hunting licenses for human beings.” That made me re-think what was really going on. As I spent more time with Father Tom and other “radical Catholics” at anti-war marches or taking courses at the Maryknoll Seminary where he taught, I was struck by their vibrant Christian faith and was jolted from my anti-Catholic upbringing.

That was a good thing as the books of Dan Berrigan fed my soul and spirit in a way that few others did. No Bars to Manhood, The Dark Night of Resistance, Night Flight to Hanoi, They Call Us Dead Men, The Raft is Not the Shore, America is Hard To Find, To Dwell In Peace, We Die Before We Live,  …. The list could go on and on, especially his commentaries on the Psalms (Uncommon Prayer), the Prophets, Lamentations, Exodus, … Again, insight, challenge, humor, conviction. I didn’t understand probably half of his poetry – but what I did understand, wow! Especially “No and Yes and the Whole Damned Thing” that was published in Sojourners Magazine in 1976.

I only met Dan Berrigan a few times – the first being at my first arrest for civil disobedience a month before the Vietnam War ended. He was one of the 62 of us who refused to leave the grounds of the White House in March 1975, demanding that we meet with President Ford to reject the continued funding of the South Vietnamese military and in rejecting what we called his “punitive clemency” program for Vietnam War draft resisters. I was much closer to his brother Phil and his partner in resistance, Liz McAlister, having joined their Bible study group the year before. In 1980 I heard Dan speak at a national Fellowship of Reconciliation gathering at Berea College and then in the mid-1980s Dan came to our Georgia communities gathering at Koinonia Farm to lead a weekend Bible study on the book of Revelations. I saw him again briefly at larger gatherings or demonstrations but his inspiration and challenge to me was much greater than my personal contact with him.

What stands out most vividly was his claim that our [Christian] baptism is an embracing of the life and crucifixion of Jesus, and, when we are raised out of the water, our resurrection to new life means that there is nothing the state can do to threaten us if we’ve already chosen to “die with Christ”. The state has no power over us since it’s most harsh sanction, death, has already been embraced in our choosing to follow Jesus. The state can jail us – but we’ve already “died to Christ.” They Call Us Dead Men – if we can excuse the pre-feminist exclusionary language – was Dan’s call to me to act out of my faith rather than my fears. Dan didn’t just write about faith and resistance, he embodied it. He incarnated his faith by standing in the street, hammering warheads, ministering to other fellow prisoners, and sharing the Eucharist with all who gathered.

Dan, I love you, I thank you, I miss you. But I know your spirit is still with us every time we gather to say “No” and “Yes” – not too soon, not too quickly, not too easily, not too cheaply. Until our “No” is swallowed up in [Christ’s] “Yes”. We are called to continue on the path you trod for the past 50+ years.

No and yes and the whole damn thing … A poem by Daniel Berrigan. 1976

   What is the point in saying no,

What is the point in not saying no?

   The questions make sense as long as there is a point toward which the questions are moving.

   If I say no, and there is a point at distance, at which someone is saying yes, then it makes sense to say no; for my no is transfigured, hastening into that yes.

   If I do not say no, and there is a point at distance at which someone is saying yes, then my not saying no also makes sense, as long as I am attentive to that yes, and want my not naysaying to echo and be included in that yes.

   I may however say no in a void, just as I may refuse to say no, in a void. In which case my no saying and my non no saying are lost in a void.

   We look for land marks, we look for sea marks.

   “When we are seated in a moving vessel and our eyes are fixed upon an object on the same vessel, we do not notice that we are moving. But if we look further, upon something that is not moving along with us, for instance upon the coast, we notice immediately that we are moving. It is the same with life. When the whole world lives wrongly we fail to notice it, but should only one person awake spiritually, the life of all others becomes immediately apparent. And the others always persecute those who do not live like them.”

                                    (Pascal)

   We must come from somewhere if we are to go somewhere.

   We must go somewhere if we are to remember that we come from somewhere.

   There is only one word in all creation. ‘Jesus is the YES of God.’ (Paul)

   We however dwell on the other side of that yes; the grave side, the dark side, the death side, the underside.

   So it is important not to say yes too soon, too easily, too often, too cheaply. This would be to debase the currency of life itself which is not a money, but the blood of our brothers and sisters, the blood of Christ.

   Just as it is important not to say no in a void. This would be to join our voices to the despairing wail of the damned.

   It is important to say no in view of, in the direction of, a yes which is forever distant, forever nearing.

   Because we are hungry for fullness, for non death, for life, for non suffering.

   Because we cannot merely stand by  or bystand or spectate or grandstand or freeload or grimace.

   Because a because joins us, life to lifeline, to the cause of goodness, of love, of truth in deed.

   Because the distance between the no we insist on and the yes that insists on us, is constantly narrowing, reaching, almost touching.

   Therefore our word to all systems of this world, right, left, center, imperial, colonial, fascist, racist, capitalist, Marxist, maoist, castroist, reformist, is

   Not yet, not enough, not quite, not at all, not by a half, not by a long shot.

   Ours being an ethic of the promise, implying that we keep our promise; to say no until the day when our no is swallowed in His yes; until then we await and press forward and trust to His keeping of the promise which is to say a payment no power or form or arrangement of this world can estimate or hand over to mint or hoard or bribe us with

a war payment but more

a blood sacrifice and more

a livid stigma and more

   His payment coming due on His day; nothing less than the substance of his promise which is our rising from the ‘body of this death’

Life unimaginable

to the degree that our misery, our moral stagnation, our spiritual and corporal and social plague, is beyond healing

any healing but one; maranatha, come Lord Jesus.

A Forty-Year Crime Spree by Steve Clemens

Near the end of March marked the 40^th anniversary of my first arrest beginning a life of crime that has averaged about an arrest per year – or arrest-able actions. Truth be told, it actually began three years earlier when I burned my Selective Service Registration Card after one of Nixon’s speeches and mailed the ashes back to my local Draft Board. I had registered as a Conscientious Objector when I turned age 18 in the fall of 1968 but then my lottery number was 254 when the military draft switched to that system in the government’s attempt to lessen the growing anti-Vietnam War protests. 

Despite the likelihood that my Draft Board would never be sending me an induction notice given my relatively “safe” lottery number and the withdrawal of combat troops from South Vietnam so, after I graduated from college and losing that “educational deferment”, I decided to do my “alternative service” by volunteering with the Mennonite Central Committee, first in rural Mississippi and then in Washington, DC. I arrived in the nation’s capitol city just a few weeks after President Nixon resigned in disgrace following the exposure of the Watergate scandals.

I soon was invited to join a Monday evening Bible study group at the Community For Creative NonViolence (CCNV) led by Phil Berrigan and Liz McAlister. We used Abraham Joshua Heschel’s provocative book, The Prophets, as a jumping-off point for our discussions on how we as Christians could embody the Gospel for our own times. The end of January 1975 found me helping as volunteer staff for “The National Assembly To Save The Peace Agreements” with thousands gathering to hear anti-war speakers and listen to Joan Baez and other musicians who arrived for the rally.

In February I joined my housemate John Swarr in going to the White House tour entrance and reading aloud a copy of the Paris Peace Accords to those awaiting entrance to the President’s home and office – highlighting the ways our government was violating the agreements we has signed. When threatened with arrest if we didn’t leave after being there for more than an hour, we both left – not ready (yet) to cross that line of deliberate civil disobedience. As our Monday night group processed our experiences, the radical Catholic couple from Jonah House – especially Liz – were gently urging me to consider risking arrest as a next step in my journey as a Christian peacemaker.

President Gerald Ford was asking Congress for more funds to support the flagging efforts of the South Vietnamese troops who had replaced the American soldiers under Nixon’s “Vietnamization” of the war. At the same time attempting to quell anti-war protests, he had also proposed what we called a “punitive clemency” program stating that draft resisters who had gone to jail or fled to Canada or other countries or had gone “underground” could have their rights restored and criminal records amended if they returned, surrendered to authorities, and completed two additional years of some approved community service. This “offer” was seen by many of us opposed to the war as a continued justification for what we felt was not only illegal but also counter-productive. Someone suggested we should respond to the President personally.

Little did we know that this proposed act of civil disobedience would be the last large arrest before the Saigon regime fell to the North Vietnamese and NLF troops the next month. The plan for the action was simple: a group of us would gather for the daily tour of the White House and once inside, we would gather on the lawn of the building and refuse to leave until we were granted a meeting with President Ford. I carried with me a typed letter to the President outlining why I was participating. Many of those joining the group had years if not decades of nonviolent arrests and expected that we would be given a warning to leave prior to arrest. Those not planning on going to jail that day should leave at that time recognizing that those remaining would likely be handcuffed and hauled to jail. I’m not sure any of us expected the President to meet with us.

There were 62 arrested that March 1975 afternoon, the largest mass arrest at the White House to that date. Human Rights activist Dick Gregory, Catholic priest Daniel Berrigan, former-nun Elizabeth McAlister, Ladon Sheats, and many others became my co-defendants that day. What a group to serve as mentors for a first arrest! It took several hours for the arrests and to be transported to the jail. As we were being booked, the elderly gentleman processed in front of me told the arresting officer his name and “occupation” when asked. He responded, “James Peck, war resister”. I hadn’t met him before but I knew well his steadfast commitment to justice and nonviolence when he was savagely beaten during the Freedom Rides in the Civil Rights struggle in the South as well as his opposition to nuclear weapons testing and drills in the 50s. It was an honor and privilege to be booked with an American hero!

Yes, I was nervous that day. Other than a parking ticket while in college, I prided myself in being a law-abiding, conscientious citizen. To not “obey” a police officer or Secret Service officer went against everything I was taught – and the decision to do so did not come easily. I was greatly relieved to discover that we were being “released on our own recognizance” (ROR) after being booked, photographed, and fingerprinted. I felt proud that I survived the close to 6-hour ordeal and especially grateful for my companions.

It wasn’t until our debriefing time the following Monday evening during our regular Bible study that I discovered that not all of us were released: apparently 3 of the group remained in jail because they felt that if they weren’t white and well-educated with jobs they wouldn’t have been offered ROR. They chose to act in solidarity with the poor black men who so frequently populated those DC jails. Boy did I have a lot to learn – I never even considered not acting on my privilege!

Liz delivered her first child before our trial and was nursing infant Frida Berrigan in the courtroom. I clearly remember her standing up in that courtroom with her newborn resister and telling the Judge she was compelled to act on behalf of the future generations. (That mother’s milk –and example - has obviously nurtured Frida’s exemplary activism for peace and justice in her own right).

We were given a 60 day jail sentence which was suspended provided we weren’t arrested again during our probation period of 15 months-2 years. It was a good start and introduction to a life of crime and punishment – but also one of deep joy and commitment. I can’t say our world is better off today but I’m certain it would have been worse if not for groups of nonviolent seekers of justice, peace, and compassion. I’m so grateful for this mentoring.

My Application for Conscientious Objector status during the Vietnam War in 1968

On Conscientious Objection by Stephen D. Clemens. November 1968

[In October 1968, at age 18, I was required to register for the Military Draft under the provisions of the Selective Service Act. I chose to register as a conscientious objector, Classification I-O, and submitted these answers in response to the 4 questions from my Draft Board in Norristown, PA as required.]

1. It is my belief that participation in war of any sort or in any form is wrong, and I am thereby opposed to service in an organization (the Armed Forces) which is actively engaged in such activity. I believe that it is wrong to kill, and this is the basic goal of the Armed Forces in defeating an enemy. I believe there is one God, a Supreme Being, and it is his right alone to decide who should or should not continue living. If I am fighting as a soldier and kill a man, I am essentially playing god, because I have decided that I should live while my enemy must die. Who am I to judge that I deserve to live; yet he doesn’t?

My religious training and beliefs have led me to believe that I am to love my enemy, and I feel that taking up arms against someone is contrary to this. Although the ultimate goal or purpose of war may be honorable, such as the purpose of peace or freedom from tyrannical rule, I believe the goal may be reached through other means than the taking of other men’s lives. In the instance of war, I do not believe that “the end justifies the means.”

I believe that by participating in any way, shape, or form in the Armed Forces, not only am I condoning, but I am actually helping something with which I am religiously opposed. I am commanded, I believe, by God in Exodus 20:13, that I must not kill and therefore participation in war is morally and religiously wrong for me. In the situation of war, one is obviously subjected to the emotions of anger and hate when je sees his buddies killed before his eyes, or after he has been forced to crawl through swamps, trenches, not knowing when he will be killed or have to kill to protect his life. I believe that [the Apostle] John was correct when he claimed that hatred of the other man (in this case the enemy) is essentially the same as murder (I John 4:15), when one realizes that although only one may be a physical act, both are morally alike. The Bible claims that “man only looks on the outward appearance” (murder as a physical act) “while God looks on the heart” (hate as a state of mind), found in I Samuel 16:7.

I believe we are to be “our brother’s keeper” (Genesis 4:9-10). This does not mean that we are “our brother’s keeper” for just our allies but also for our enemies. In taking their lives, this concept is violated. I receive this concept through the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:30-37). The Good Samaritan was praised because he helped his enemy, not because he took his life or ignored him.

I do not believe in the use of force for revenge or retaliation, which is a purpose of the Armed Forces. I put my trust in God and in the Bible, which I believe is God’s word to men. It claims, “The wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God.” Jesus Christ commands us to “love one another as I have loved you” (John 15:9), a direct contrast to the idea of war. Christ instructs us to “not return evil with evil, but overcome evil with good” (Romans 12:17) – not armed force. We are commanded to pray for, comfort, and feed our enemies, not destroy them.

We are instructed to “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Surely we don’t wish to be killed. Maybe if we take the initiative and love our enemies instead of warring with them, peace might finally be established. It is man’s natural instinct to resist force, but “love conquereth all things.”

I base much of my belief on the exemplary life of Jesus Christ. One relevant example can be seen in Christ’s actions on the night before he was crucified. His enemies came to capture him and one of the disciples, Peter, drew his sword and lopped off the ear of one of the guards. Christ could have helped in the use of force against force but he didn’t. He not only told Peter to put away his weapon of force, but even went to the extent of showing love to his enemy in that he healed the man!

The Bible instructs: “Avenge not yourselves, but rather give place unto wrath: for it is written, Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord” (Romans 12:19). In the verse following the former, He also instructs us to feed and give drink to our enemies, not to heap vengeance on them. The prophecy of “beating swords into ploughshares” (Micah 4:3) shows that our efforts should be turned toward a constructive goal (plowing to support life, rather than using the sword to take away life). Christ claimed, “I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly” (John 10:10). The Bible instructs to “obey God rather than men” (Acts 5:29). God has said, “A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another” (I John 1:5).

2. I was born and raised in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, and as early as I can recall, I attended Calvary Mennonite Church in Souderton. I was dedicated to God by my parents in March 1951 in that church, and have attended there regularly prior to my sophomore year in high school. Since that time I’ve been away at prep school on Long Island and now I’m attending a religiously based college in Wheaton, Illinois.

It was from my parents, my father being a deacon in the church, and from the church itself along with personal investigation into the Bible, that I have arrived at my beliefs. I’ve attended Sunday school, church, youth fellowship, Sunday evening services, and Wednesday prayer meetings ever since I was a small child. I believe that the Bible is the inspired Word of God. I have been taught that what I believe should not be so much how my church or parents believe, but how I feel God is causing me to believe through the personal relationship which I have established with his Son, Jesus Christ; and through reading the Bible, I found in the majority of cases that I totally agree and believe in what my church and my parents believe in. However, this is from my personal investigation rather than being molded into believing and never questioning that which my parents and the church as a whole believe.

I was baptized and accepted as a member into the Calvary Mennonite Church at age 14. Most of my religious training I received through Sunday School, vacation Bible school, discussion of topics with my parents who supported their beliefs with the Bible, and trough hearing scripturally based messages.

Through daily reading of my Bible, I have my beliefs affirmed so that presently I know that God wants me to serve in some peaceful program, rather than being connected in any way with war and killing. I mentioned in the above paragraph that I feel this is an individual decision concerning one’s beliefs and therefore, I feel my decision must be a personal one. I have no right to condemn others who do not believe the same as I do.

Most of the articles, books, and related material which I have taken in probably do more to affirm my already established belief and strengthen it rather than “instructing” me as such. Most of the influence of such works merely strengthen my conscience toward the subject of nonresistance and opposition to war. I have read several articles in magazines such as Christianity Today and Christian Life on conscientious objection to war. Another work which struck me as a relevant commentary on this idea was Hemmingway’s masterpiece, A Farewell to Arms. Also reading books aimed with another point of view in mind, or at least on the surface, such as The Red Badge of Courage, has convinced me that I thoroughly believe in the position which I am trying to explain.

Many people have caused me to think about my position; many disagree with the viewpoint for themselves but see how it is valid for me. A lot of times I, or someone, will bring up the question of military service in “bull sessions.” Some in the discussions help build up my belief either by saying things which I do believe but never have expressed in their way, or by opposing my beliefs, making me analyze my stand in view of their new ideas.

A special speaker here at college on Veteran’s Day unconsciously helped me see the aspect of me being “my brother’s keeper” in relation to war – in this case a specific war – Vietnam. Colonel Robinson, the speaker, emphasized that the people in South Vietnam are our “brothers”, so we must protect them by helping them militarily. But this point caused me to consider the fact of the enemy too. Just because they live under a different political structure and have a different religion, does that mean they are not are “brothers” too?

I have also talked to several people who have been classified I-O because of similar beliefs and we discussed our position. I have talked to two of my friends from my church, and also two or three friends here at college who are conscientious objectors. These talks have helped to affirm my belief and clarify it in some areas where I didn’t know how to articulate my feelings, while some of the others could understand and verbalize my beliefs.

Another encounter which points me to the stand of conscientious objection to service in the Armed Forces is my present experience in ROTC here at Wheaton. ROTC is mandatory the first two years. In there, I find myself thoroughly disgusted with the pervasive emphasis on killing and bloodshed. I strongly object to the fact that the basic “mission” of the Rifle Infantry is to seek out and “destroy (kill) or capture the enemy.” I all good conscience, I could not support such a mission.

Probably the source which I have used the most to arrive at my position is the Bible. I find that Christ preached a message of love and peace – not destruction and war. Not only have I received ideas from God (the Bible), but also through the songs of contemporary men. Donovan in his song, “Universal Soldier”, proposes that without the soldiers “there is no War. He decides who lives and dies.” I think that decision must rest with God, not the “universal soldier”. Eric Burton informs the listener in “Sky Pilot” that just the “sky pilot praying” won’t “stop the bleeding or ease the hate.” Bob Dylan also reminds us of the serious crimes of war in “Masters of War.” He goes on and adds that the soldier coming back from battle “remembers the words, ‘Thou shalt not kill.’”

3. According to my beliefs, I want no connection whatsoever with the Armed Forces because by being associated with them, I would be condoning something against my conscience. I have nothing against helping those injured or sick, but I could not do so within the confines of an organization with whose mission I am at odds.

I feel that it is my duty and patriotic privilege to serve my country in a program where I know I would be doing good rather than in the Armed Services as a non-combatant where my conscience would not permit me to serve. I am anxious to serve in a capacity similar to the Peace Corps, or work in inner-city problems. I hope to major in sociology, and I feel I could do a positive good serving my country in such a manner.

I have received information and am very interested in an organization called “Christian Service Corps,” which is similar to the Peace Corps but is not supported through the Federal Government, and whose aim, along with loving people by helping them with physical and social problems, is to help people fulfill a basic need of man, a spiritual one. In such a program I feel I can spread goodwill for the United States and also do something I know to be worthwhile.

I am not afraid to die – here, in Vietnam, or elsewhere – but when I do die, I want to die doing something which I consider to be worthwhile and morally acceptable to me. Serving as a medic I would have to face a dilemma which to me presents two distasteful choices. If while serving as a non-combatant, the base would be overrun, I would have a choice of taking up arms or not. If I take up arms and kill, I know it is wrong for me, and if I stand by and refuse to interfere while helpless patients are slaughtered, I feel I am guilty there. My only solution is to avoid such a situation, if possible, by completely cutting myself off from the Armed Forces.

4. Although I have never formally presented the views stated herein, I have discussed them in detail with several individuals. I have discussed my views with my professor of Military Science of the ROTC department. I have discussed them with my [academic] advisor and his assistant here at Wheaton [College] also. In my speech class we have briefly exchanged views. And numerous times I have been glad to explain my views to them.

I feel (as expressed in #2) that the decision of one’s military service should be on an individual basis, and I feel that I have no responsibility to persuade others to adopt this opinion against their will. This is why I have never formally presented my views on war or service in the Armed Forces. However, if someone is not sure of their position, I will explain my position to him so that he may have a clearer idea of what stands he is deciding on. It is up to the individual’s conscience in deciding this matter, and I believe it should be settled with the individual and God alone.