A Just and Lasting Peace : The New York Draft Riots

Who is the more selfish?

Someone who insists you risk death and give up 3 or 4 years of your life to do him a signal good he cannot do for himself or you for refusing him?

And if he or his friends attempt to use the power of the state to make you do it?

And if you do your best to evade the power of the state?

Many have been the people who came to the United States and who have done so, even lately, to avoid involuntary servitude in the armies of their homelands and, in case they were at war or were apt to be, the risk of death or injury in a cause they were willing to skip.

Not unlike Dick Cheney, they have had other priorities.

Imagine their chagrin if, upon arrival here . . . .

New York City draft riots

In the 1970’s I knew a young man who had come here as a student and then overstayed his visa and sought asylum just to avoid military service in his native Poland, a country not then at war nor very much likely to be.

Update,  later that same day.

J J Thompson once argued in a similar way for unrestricted abortion rights for women.

I think the situations are not that similar and the analogy not only limps but falls on its face.

And given my own position the argument seems moot.