(a)
Persons already in the armed forces or
national guard [Only these men were
also exempt from registration]
(b)
Officers of the federal and state
legislatures, judiciary and executive
branch
(c)
Clergy and theological students
(d)
Those who were physically or
"morally" deficient
(e)
Those with dependents
(f)
Persons whose occupations were
necessary for maintaining military or
national interests
The
president had discretionary authority to
exempt local elected officials, custom
house clerks, and mail carriers.
Attendance
at school was not a valid reason for
deferral. In contrast, the Vietnam-era
draft law provided for such a deferral.
There
was no classification for conscientious
objectors, as in the Vietnam-era draft
law, but about 2,000 men claimed such a
status, and their cases were then
reviewed by a special board. The draft
law had made specific provisions, on the
other hand, for members of well-known
pacifist religions -- continuing a
long tradition in American wars. Persons
belonging to these designated religions
were subject to being drafted for
noncombatant duty. Consequently, there
are many examples of members of the
Friends (Quaker) and Mennonite religions
and several other pacifist sects
indicating on their registration cards
that they were opposed to war. A group
of Russian émigrés in Arizona who
belonged to a small religious group
there refused to report for the 1917
registration. A much larger manpower
problem in the war, however, resulted
from desertion, which totaled almost
350,000 men by war's end.
The
boards were criticized for drafting too
many agricultural and war industry
workers, and in the final year of the
draft the boards responded by drafting a
smaller percentage of men in these
occupations. In 1918, a policy of making
unemployed men subject to induction was
put into operation.
Most
draftees were unmarried. About 75% of
married men received deferments. Some
married men, however, did not request a
deferment. In some cases, the military
wages with an allowance for dependents
exceeded what these men were earning as
partially employed workers. A few men
tried to claim dependents who did not
really depend on them. In Salt Lake
City, Utah, for example, three sons of
the same mother registered at three
different boards, hoping to persuade
each board that the son who registered
at their board was the sole support of
the mother. Notations will be seen on a
few registration cards indicating that
parents listed on cards denied being a
dependent.
American
Indians -- of all the identifiable
groups -- claimed fewer deferments than
any others. Nevertheless, registration
problems arose on Arizona and Colorado
reservations in 1917, resulting -- for
example -- in the registrars fleeing on
horseback from the Navajo reservation.
