I paused in front of the door to the Selective Service office and considered the implications of the next hour, then tried to relax. I took a couple of deep breaths, as I wondered about what this day would bring, and how it might change my whole life.
I opened the heavy wooden door and entered the room. The secretary that sat at a desk inside asked what she could do for me, and after I had stated my purpose, she asked my name, told me to have a seat, and then disappeared behind another door. Upon reentering the room, she held the door open and said, “Mr. Marchant, the board is ready to see you now”.
The high ceilinged room was cramped and smaller than I imagined. It’s walls were lined with filing cabinets, leaving just enough space for the five stern-faced older men, who sat around the large rectangular oak table. To me, the five looked like the rural farmers or the small business owners I had grown up seeing in the pews of our church. They wore older suits and ties, and all sported closely cropped haircuts. The secretary reentered the room and took a seat with her pad of paper to record the procedure. They told me sit down in the wooden chair in front of the table.
The five then proceeded to introduce themselves using a false friendliness that I immediately recognized from all the years I had worn my hair long in the very conservative Bible Belt of Southern Indiana. I could tell they had immediately stereotyped me as one of those despised “long haired hippies.” These five conservative “good old boys” who were being paid by the government to supply young bodies for the war, were not going to have much sympathy for my sincerely held moral beliefs.
The inquisition began:
“Why have you registered as a Conscientious Objector, Mr. Marchant?”
“I think it is morally wrong to kill other human beings and I do not want to be a part of any organization that does.” I was being careful not to be political in my answers or reference Vietnam. This meeting was about my moral beliefs, so I stuck strictly to that.
“Why would you not accept the 1-A-O classification? You would be helping others.”
“I would still be in the military, and supporting those whose function is to kill other human beings. I don’t want to have any part in doing that.”
“Why would you not consider being a medic and help save lives?”
“Medics are part of the military, their job is to patch people up so the military can use them again.” was my reply.
Then, as I knew they would, the questions became more sly.
“Do you mean if you saw someone lying there, bleeding and hurt, that you would not want to help him?”
“If I knew that by helping him that I would just be enabling the military to eventually reuse him to kill others, or to put him out there again to be killed, no, I wouldn’t want to help him.”
Then the questions became ridiculous.
“What if a man was trying to kill your mother, you mean you wouldn’t want to fight him off?
“Well,” I replied, “of course I would try to do whatever I could to save my mother, but I wouldn’t want to kill the perpetrator.”
This back and forth went on for some time. Their questions never really delved into my moral beliefs, they just kept throwing out situations, trying to trick me into saying I would kill someone. At the end of the session they asked me if I would like to say anything.
I took a breath, summoned up my courage and told them, “Look, I am willing to do two years of alternative service as a 1-O conscientious objector, but I will not be a part of the military. If you try to induct me into the military, I will refuse and go to jail.”
That was the end of the inquisition. The Draft Board told me they would send me the results of their decision in the mail.
The photo above is not my Draft Board, but another. The people behind the table are pretty similar to men in my Draft Board that I had to confront.
You can view my paintings at: davidmarchant2.ca
No comments:
Post a Comment