Conscription in the United States
The Draft redirects here. For other
uses, see Draft.
Conscription
Military service
National service
Conscription crisis
Conscientious objection
Conscription by country:
Australia
Finland
Germany
Greece
Israel - regular service
Israel - reserve service
Malaysia
New Zealand
Russia
Singapore
Turkey
United Kingdom
United States
Historical Conscription:
Ottoman Empire
Conscription in the United States (also
called compulsory military service or the
draft) has been employed several times, usu-
ally during war but also during the nominal
peace of the Cold War. The United States dis-
continued the draft in 1973, moving to an
all-volunteer military force, thus there is cur-
rently no mandatory conscription.
However, the Selective Service System re-
mains
in place as a contingency; men
between the ages of 18 and 25 are required
to register so that a draft can be readily re-
sumed. More recently registration is not re-
quired, instead information is collected for
each person after their 18th birthday.
History
In colonial times, the Thirteen Colonies used
a militia system for local defense. For long-
term operations, conscription was occasion-
ally used when volunteers or paid substitutes
were insufficient to raise the needed man-
power. During the American Revolutionary
War, the states sometimes drafted men for
militia duty or to fill state Continental Army
units, but the central government did not
have the authority to conscript. President
James Madison unsuccessfully attempted to
create a national draft during the War of
1812.[1]
Civil War
The United States first employed national
conscription during the American Civil War.
The vast majority of troops were volunteers,
however; of the 2,100,000 Union soldiers,
about 2% were draftees, and another 6%
were paid substitutes.[2] Resistance to the
draft touched off the New York Draft Riots in
July 1863. The Confederate States of America
instituted conscription in 1863, and resist-
ance was both widespread and violent, with
comparisons made betwe