"Rich Man's War and a Poor Man's Fight"

[Donnachaidh]

http://www.truth-out.org/rich-mans-war-and-a-poor-mans-fight67666

According to David Nasaw, a history professor at the City University of New York, after having received his draft notice to report for military service during the Civil War Andrew Carnegie, the billionaire rail and steel magnate, paid an Irish immigrant $850 to fight in his place.(1) Needless to say, Carnegie was by no means unique in his unwillingness to serve, as "draft dodging" was a common practice among the wealthy.

"A large number of the men of his generation, who would later be referred to as 'robber barons,' including Phillip Armour, Jay Cooke, J.P. Morgan, George Pullman, Jay Gould, Jim Fisk, Collis P. Huntington, and John D. Rockefeller spent the war as he did, making money by providing the Union Armies with fuel, uniforms, shoes, rifles, ammunitions, provisions, transportation and financing."(2)

Nor was it illegal: The Conscription (Enrollment) Act, passed by Congress in 1863 to address a manpower shortage in the Union Army, allowed an exemption from military service to those who either paid a "commutation fee" of $300 or, like Carnegie, hired a substitute. Since only the privileged, wealthier citizens could afford such a remittance, military service, fighting and dying, became the exclusive burden of the poor and the working classes. As a consequence, those who were "condemned to serve," and perhaps to die, viewed their conscription as forced servitude in a "rich man's war and a poor man's fight," the rallying cry that mobilized thousands to take to the streets in protest. During one such uprising, the 1863 New York Draft Riots, some 2,000 protesters were killed and 8,000 injured, according to one estimate.

I believe the protester's resentment and dissatisfaction with the Civil War draft and its exemption policy was not only understandable, but justifiable. According to contractarians like John Locke(3) , whose thinking profoundly influenced the Republicanism of our founding fathers, military service, especially in times of national emergency, becomes an obligation and civic responsibility of ALL able-bodied citizens in the state. Ideally, these citizen soldiers act from obligation, civic virtue, patriotism and love of country. Any exemption from military service, other than for physical or psychological disability, ignores the universality requirement of this civic (and moral?) obligation and violates the American ideals of fairness and shared sacrifice.

More at the link --

[SpiralHawk]

1. "Smirk." - xCommander AWOL (R)

[SpiralHawk]

2. "Sneer." - xVP Dickie 'Five-Military-Deferments' Cheney (R)

[SpiralHawk]

3. "Only suckers serve." - Rush DraftDodger Limbaugh (R)

"Me and my fellow overpaid republicon proaganda pimps -- like O'Reilly, Beck, and Hannity - always have a good laugh together about you sucker proles who actually served America. Bwaaa ha ha ha ha."

- Rush DraftDodger Limbaugh (R)

[Starry Messenger]

4. Worker's Song

Come all of you workers
Who toil night and day
By hand and by brain
To earn your pay
Who for centuries long past
For no more than your bread
Have bled for your countries
And counted your dead

In the factories and mills,
In the shipyards and mines
We've often been told
To keep up with the times
For our skills are not needed,
They've streamlined the job
And with sliderule and stopwatch
Our pride they have robbed

But when the sky darkens
And the prospect is war
Who's given a gun
And then pushed to the fore
And expected to die
For the land of our birth
When we've never owned
One handful of earth?

We're the first ones to starve
The first ones to die
The first ones in line
For that pie-in-the-sky
And always the last
When the cream is shared out
For the worker is working
When the fat cat's about

All of these things
The worker has done
From tilling the fields
To carrying the gun
We've been yoked to the plough
Since time first began
And always expected
To carry the can

[hedgetrimmer]

5. Sweet!

[bluestateguy]

6. Lincoln was no saint

This draft law was repugnant and it bore his signature.

[ladjf]

7. My father used to say "If it was that law that only white men over

the age of 50 could serve in the military, there would be no wars."