The Lancaster news. [volume] (Lancaster, S.C.) 1905-current, 1917-10-23
PLAN FOR APPLYING
ARMY SELECT|vE DRAFT
WORKED OUT TENTATIVE
LY BY CROWDER.
Would Establish Various Grades
of Dependency and Indus
trial Value.

army Selective draft which would
take first only men without de-
pendents and of no particular value
to war industries, and establish va
rious grades of dependency and in
dustrial value from which future
drafts would be made strictly on the
selective basis, has been worked out
tentatively by the provost-marshal-
generals office and discussed with
the President.
The plan was submitted recently
to conference of civilians who di-
rected exemption board activities in
number of States, and received in
dorsement of most of them. who are
now discussing the proposed plan
with their State governors.
1t is proposed to formulate in
each local draft district a table of
all registrants, placing each in a col
umn denoting his dependents ana
industrial value in the wars prose-
cution. For instance horizontal
columns or classfcations would be
based on dependency. Men with no
dependents would be placed in the
first class, those with dependent dis
tant relatives in the second class,
those with wives in the third class,
those with wife and one child in
the fourth, and so on.
Industrial Classes Under Considera-
ton.
might represent certain industries
arranged according to their respec-
tive merit as war necessities. In
dustrial classes Under consideration
yard employees, munition workers,
railway and transportation opera
tives. miners, steel plant and motor
industry workmen, and certain other
individual plants or industry
branches to be designated from time
to time by the President or the war
department as temporarily essential.
The latter classification might in
clude plants making military cloth
ing, harness, first-aid materials. or
professions such as chemists and
other scientific men more needed for
war research than to carry arms.
Thus the table with horizontaY de-
pendency classifcations and vertical
industrial classifications would hold
a place for each registrant in ac-
cordance with his depend nedency or
industrial value claims. In selecting
men for examination, boards will
first take all men physically fit. hav-
ing neither dependents or value in
essential war industries. When this
class was exhausted, draft authori-
ties would draw on the classes hay-
ing the slightest dependency claims
and the least value in essential in
dustries. Theoretically. the draft
would work down through the table
to the classes with most dependents
and highest industrial value.
Less Essential Classes to Be Ex-.
hausted First.
! NO class would be exempted as
such, but the valuable men would he
placed so that they would not he
called until the need for soldiers be-
came more urgent and all the less
essential classes were exhausted.
1t is understood the entire pro-
gram will be made known as soon as
1t is completed and approved by
President Wilson. to allay the anx-
iety prevailing throughout many in
dustries over the next draft. which
had been planned for as early as De-
cember, before the new plan was
proposed. but which now may be de-
layed.
The proposed plan would meet
President Wilson's objection to class
exemptions. On the other hand il
ia claimed, ii would successfully
prevent the drawing of men into the
army who are needed more in the in
dustries or in agriculture, and would
avoid mistakes of Great Britain ear
iy in the war, when coal mines and
war industries were depleted of
skilled workers for the sake OF
swelling the first expeditionary
force. II also would give each man
more or less definite place in the
liability list. and set his mind at
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