Draft registration for 15-year-olds?

"There may be no 'plans' for a national military draft, but that hasn't kept Louisiana from registering teenagers too young to serve in case conditions change," reported the Town Talk of Alexandria, Louisiana, on November 13. Local resident Larry Chevalier "was alarmed when his 16-year-old son Nathan had to register with the Selective Service System in order to get a driver's license." "I just can't believe it," exclaimed Chevalier. "That amazes me."

During its 2003 session, the Louisiana state legislature passed a measure "dictating that all males 15 up to 18 seeking a first-time driver's license or [a state-issued] identification card must register with Selective Service," continued the report. Several other states require young men age 18 and older to register when they apply for a license, but "no other state requires males as young as 15 to register."

Notes Everett Bonner, Louisiana's state director of Selective Service, anyone failing to register is "considered a felon without conviction." Bonner maintains that the information collected on minors as they are registered for the draft is not processed "until the young man turns 18" and that the state system was established for the "convenience" of the registrant.

"What I don't like is somebody having all this information about kids and somebody sitting up there in some private meeting discussing how many young people they have available for the draft in two years," comments Mr. Chevalier. In addition to ongoing wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, "we have Syria, Iran and North Korea sitting out there," he points out.

Speaking on behalf of those who would harvest young men to fight and die overseas, Bonnet adopts a posture akin to that of a rapist ordering his victim to give in to the inevitable. "I would venture to say the federal government has all sorts of information about us through various sources," he maintains. "If someone thinks it's 'Big Brother,' he'll have to deal with that."