Bill Clinton’s Draft Record

Enough already about Bill Clinton and the Vietnam draft! The Bush reelection campaign continues to variously assert that a person must have experience in the U.S. military to be a respected and competent commander in chief. In other words, since Bill Clinton did not serve in the Vietnam War he is unqualified to be President; unsuited to make the momentous decision to send American troops into combat. This tired refrain reflects a serious ignorance of American presidential and military history.

The United States has declared war on five occasions during its 203-year history: the War of 1812; the Mexican-American War; the Spanish-American War; World War I, and World War II. Of the presidents who made the difficult decision to place American troops “in harm’s way” in each of these cases, only William McKinley had any experience in the military. None of the others, not James Madison (father of the U.S. Constitution), James K. Polk, Woodrow Wilson, or Franklin Roosevelt ever served in the military; for that matter, neither did Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of Independence.

Indeed, Abraham Lincoln’s only military experience, prior to serving as commander in chief during America’s greatest national emergency--the Civil War--was three months of service in the Illinois militia, from April 18 to July 16, 1832. Lincoln did not volunteer to serve in the Mexican-American War; instead his inaugural speech to the House of Representatives in 1847 was a condemnation of “Polk’s War.”

Like millions of Americans in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Clinton, a newly minted college graduate, was perplexed and disturbed by the morality of the Vietnam War. There’s nothing unpatriotic or ignoble about a sentiment shared by so many Americans during those tragic days. Military service is neither a necessary condition for becoming President nor is it a good predictor of how well an individual will serve the nation as President.

MARK P. PETRACCA

Irvine

Petracca is associate professor of political science at UC Irvine and co-author of “The American Presidency” (1983).