however vague or remote, in a Supreme Being. But by 1970 tie Court was prepared to accept moral and ethical scruples against the war as meeting the requirements which the Congress had set for exemption on account of conscience. That requirement, wrote Justice Black-from your section of the country, Senator Thurmond-that requirement "exempts from military service all those whose consciences, spurred by deeply held moral, ethical or religious beliefs, would give them no rest or peace if they allowed themselves to become a part of an instrument of war." 398 U.S. 333, at 344.

Clearly if those whose opposition to war is based not on formal religious beliefs but on moral and ethical principles, are now exempted from service, then those with the same beliefs who were denied conscientious objector exemption in the past have an almost irresistible claim on us for pardon or amnesty.

There are to be sure some serious objections to be met-not the objections inspired by passion, by prejudice, by vindictiveness; these must be left to that religion which so many feel the deserters and evaders have flouted, or to the healing force of time-but objections based on considerations of public policy. It is alleged, for example, that a sweeping amnesty would somehow lower the morale of our fighting forces. Quite aside from the observation that it is difficult to see how that morale could be any lower than it now appears to be-it is proper to say that there seems to be no objective evidence whatever to support this argument. It does not appear that amnesty worked this way in the past, in the relatively few instances where it was applied while the war was still going on. Nor is it irrelevant to note, for what it is worth, that there is strong support for amnesty from a number of veterans' organizations today.

But would a sweeping amnesty make it more difficult for the United States to recruit or draft an army for another war as Mr. Tarr observed yesterday. Such speculations are what Lincoln called pernicious abstractions: certainly Lincoln's use of amnesty did not appear to have any effect whatever in later wars. The notion that 30 years later, people remember these things and act on them seems to me a figment of imagination.

There is a further point here. Is there not something to be said for putting Government on notice, as it were, that if it plunges the Nation into another war like the Vietnam-it will once again be in for trouble? After all governments, like individuals, must learn by their mistakes, and though the process of teaching Government not to make mistakes is a very arduous one, often hard on those who undertake it, it is also often very useful. Southern States no longer threaten to secede; Congress no longer threatens to establish military government in States that do not behave themselves; whatever we may think about the dangers of alcoholism, we no longer try what was once called the noble experiment of prohibition. If the war in Southeast Asia is a mistake from which we are even now extricating ourselves, is it just that we should punish those who-at whatever cost-helped alert us to and dramatize that mistake?

For almost a decade now our Nation has been sorely afflicted. The material wounds are not as grievous as those inflicted by the Civil War-not for Americans anyway-but the psychological and moral

wounds are deeper, and more pervasive. Turn and twist it as we may, we come back always to the rootcause of our malaise, the war. If we are to restore harmony to our society and unity to our Nation we should put aside all vindictiveness, all inclination for punishment, all attempts to cast a balance of patriotism or of sacrificea task to which no mortal is competent-as unworthy a great nation. Let us recall rather Lincoln's admonition to judge not that we be not judged, and with malice towards none, with charity for all, strive on to bind up the Nation's wounds.

Senator KENNEDY. Thank you very much, Mr. Commager. That is an enormously helpful comment and statement. I think the benefit of insight of history is of great value to all of us on this committee and I think to Americans generally. I want to express my appreciation for your making it.

Let me ask if I could what your general view of amnesty today would be? Do you favor an unconditional amnesty today or do you favor an unconditional amnesty at the end of hostilities or when the American prisoners of war return? Do you favor conditional amnesty prior to the time that you see an end of hostilities? Given this kind of philosophical background, where do you come out?

Mr. COMMAGER. As I have said, I do not think conditional amnesty is meaningful. It is not forgetfulness, it is not oblivion, it is not the things our society needs. I therefore favor total amnesty. If we are to wait until the end of hostilities, we may have to wait generally until those who might otherwise profit from amnesty perish of old

age.

Quite aside from that, I think our President has given clear indication that he proposes to end the war as fast as possible, to withdraw as many of our ground troops from Vietnam as possible. While overtures to China indicate a real desire for a new policy in the Pacific and in Asia. In the circumstances, it seems to me that an unconditional amnesty now would be in harmony with the presidential policy and with that policy which I believe most Americans now subscribe to.

Senator KENNEDY. Let me just, if I could, make a point that I think was suggested in Mr. Tarr's testimony yesterday. That would be if you provided an unconditional amnesty today while you have a continuation of the draft, would it not be possible for a young person who receives a draft notice just to go across to Canada, pick up his unconditional amnesty, and come back into the United States and be free of any kind of military obligation.

Mr. COMMAGER. It might indeed, sir. I believe, however, the draft has been suspended for 3 months. If we are indeed going to reduce our forces markedly in the Far East, reduce them even in Taiwan, as we now learn, and probably in Europe, as we have greatly increased the pay-scale for military service, I think it highly probable we shall go on a Volunteer Army basis. I hope so in any event and I think almost anything that could contribute to that would be desirable.

Aside from that, however, I am deeply suspicious of hypothetical reasoning-what Mr. Tarr, I believe, indulged in. President Jefferson once said, "shake not your raw head and bloody bones at me."

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Do not conjure up all these dreadful things that are going to happen if something else happens. They usually do not and I do not believe that our society will unravel, that the military would come apart. or even that volunteers would cease to volunteer, or that all draftees would cease to respond if amnesty were to be promised.

Senator KENNEDY. As I understand from your comment, you would grant the amnesty to those who have deeply felt moral, ethical, or religious reservations about the war and your amnesty would not apply just in a broad sense to just any evader or deserter despite what motivated him to leave this country?

Mr. COMMAGER. I do not think there is any right answer to that question Mr. Senator: that is true of most hard questions. If what we want to do is achieve a kind of abstract justice so that everyone who is offended gets his punishment and those who have not offended are excused from punishment, the proposal if it is indeed a proposal, that you phrased is of course reasonable. If the objective is, however. to restore harmony, to wipe out dissension, to reduce those hatreds and antagonisms that are tearing our society about. I think we cannot pick and choose in this fashion. I think we must do what Mr. Lincoln was prepared to do, what Mr. Jefferson and so many other Presi dents were prepared to do-to wipe the slate clean and start over without looking too closely into the degree of sin and of fault. This seems to be the religious, the deeply Christian view of morality: the view that parents take with children, that husband and wives take, that is required not only by some abstract virtue but by the desire to achieve the end you want, which is peace, and harmony, not some abstractual judg ment of degrees of inequity and degrees of punishment.

Senator KENNEDY. Well, the example I was thinking of was sur gested in Senator Hart's example yesterday of those that might have fled and gone to Canada because they had their hand in the company headquarters till, so to speak.

Mr. COMMAGER. Quite right. Whether it is worth while doing what the Roberts Commission recommended for 15.000 people-that is, taking every case on an individual basis-or not is very hard to say. My guess is that that would cause more trouble than it would be worth. Obviously, no one is in favor of giving amnesty to people who did not plead conscience or who did not indeed have conscience. But how one discovers these and how one decides between genuine and not genuine is another matter. Certainly no amnesty should be given those who are charged with or guilty of other offenses.

Senator KENNEDY. Would you suggest, then, that perhaps a way of proceeding would be the granting of amnesty and then the burden. for some kind of prosecution would rest either with the army or the Justice Department to show that there had been other kinds of crimes or offenses?

Mr. COMMAGER. Oh, ves, I imagine there is a record of these, and perhaps those who fled are already under indictment of some kind. And I think to go at the case by case with the 70 to 100 thousand who at one time or another deserted-and equal numbers who fled may commit us to more than we are prepared to carry through. Senator THURMOND. Mr. Chairman, the Judiciary Committee is

having a full committee meeting at 10:30, so I will have to leave at this time.

Senator KENNEDY. Could I just ask one question before yielding to Senator Hart?

Could you tell us as a historian what kind of country we would have or what the atmosphere would be within this Nation if we did not take an understanding and a tolerant and a merciful view of these young people who left the country as a matter of deep conscience? What can you say about the kind of climate and atmosphere that we might find ourselves in in the United States?

Mr. COMMAGER. I do not know that a historian has any better credentials on that kind of prediction than a Senator has. I am inclined to think, however, on the basis of the experience in the American States after the Revolution, on the experience with radical reconstruction of the South, and of other countries which have taken vengeance on those who deserted or were guilty of treason. that the consequences would be deeply disturbing and that we would later deeply regret them. I fear they would be consequences which would leave a stain on our history. It is always better to forgive than to take vengeance and our society is, as all of us know, now deeply torn. It has been torn for 10 years. It is torn not only on the issue of the war, but on the issue of race, which closely connects with the war. It has torn hostilities within our great cities. We should be ready to pay any reasonable price to restore harmony, to win once again the confidence of the American people in the wisdom and the generosity of their government, to reknit a society which is in danger of unravelling. I do not think granting amnesty to all deserters and draft evaders alike, however unfair it may seem to be to some, is too high a price to pay.

With respect to this feeling that comes up again and again, that some make a great sacrifice and others do not. I think there are two observations. Just obviously going underground, leaving home, leaving country, giving up work, living from hand to mouth, wondering what will happen to them, is itself a great price to pay for dissent. And, second, I need not remind you, Senator Kennedy, that the parable of the workers in the vineyard is not wholly irrelevant, that those who came in the last hour and received the same compensation as those who came in the first. Perhaps we would not go too far astray in adopting that philosophy in this situation.

Senator KENNEDY. Senator Hart?

Senator HART. Mr. Chairman, I must leave to attend that committee meeting. I just wanted to thank Professor Commager for helping allat least helping me shake down some of these what you would suggest are almost footnote kind of questions-how do you accept, when do you do it. I want to thank you very much for suggesting that there are not any wholly satisfactory answers to those things.

Mr. COMMAGER. There are not, nor to any problems in life, I fear. Senator HART. Parenthetically, I still do not understand that parable you mentioned. I do not need it to persuade me to amnesty. I have listened to that in a different setting than you, but they have never made clear to me just what was meant in that one.

Mr. COMMAGER. Well, perhaps, sir, we could substitute the familiar

"betwixt the saddle and the ground the mercy sought and mercy found." This is a very old concept in philosophy, literature, and religion, that we can forgive. God forgives; man, too, can forgive mistakes-if they are indeed mistakes.

I am not adopting the position of the distinguished Senator from South Carolina, but pointing out that even if you refuse to concede the validity or sincerity of conscientious objection, nevertheless, there is a case to be made for forgiveness, for an individual ground and from society.

Senator HART. To be specific, I have never understood, unless it was to suggest what we now describe as a minimum wage law, why somebody that works 6 hours would get no more than somebody who worked 1. But that has very little to do with the problem here. Mr. COMMAGER. Yes.

Senator HART. Thank you, sir.

Senator KENNEDY. Thank you very much, Professor Commager. We appreciate very much your coming.

Our next witness is Mr. David Harris, former Stanford student body president, convicted draft resister who has finished a 2-year term. Currently working as an organizer with the people's union, which has placed on the California ballot a referendum on the war in Indochina.

Mr. Harris, we want to welcome you here before the Committee.

STATEMENT OF DAVID HARRIS

Mr. HARRIS. A short statement I would like to make. As I understand it, this committee is considering the question of amnesty. If amnesty were granted, the obvious reason I am here is that I would be subject to it. In January of 1968, I refused to submit to induction into the U.S. Armed Forces. My refusal bought me a sentence of 36 months in Federal prison. I was released from the Federal Correctional Institution of La Tuna, Tex., in March of 1971 after serving 20 months of my original sentence. I am presently under the supervision of the U.S. Board of Parole and will remain so until July of this year, when my original sentence expires. My own history makes amnesty a very pressing question. I am now a convict. I have no rights or civil liberties as they are commonly understood. I have a parole officer instead. But I did not start out as a convict. I started out as a high school football player who believed everything he was taught in his classes about American Government. I believed in liberty and justice for all, I believed in peace and democracy and freedom and all the virtues that the American state recites in its own honor. I believed in them so hard that I discovered they did not exist.

Its hard to say when that discovery began, but it is easy for me to remember when it became obvious, because it was then that I decided to be a convict.

I decided to be a convict because I believed in the peace and justice and freedom and democracy I had heard some people talk about. I decided to break the law because the law obviously stood