Opinion ID: 1261957
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: The Military Training Requirement

Text: The Corps of Cadets is essentially a part of the Reserve Officers Training Corps, and the military training requirement has its genesis in Title 10 of the United States Code, under which provision is made for a source of commissioned officers for the United States Army. The requirements which North Georgia College must meet to retain its status as a recognized military college are detailed in Title 32, Code of Federal Regulations § 562.12 (a) (1) (revised as of July 1, 1977). Appellants' argument attacking the college's requirement that all resident male students participate in the Corps of Cadets is too vague and formless to subject the requirement to serious challenge. Appellants do not challenge the validity of the military college concept, thus conceding its presumptive validity. They do not attack the military training program directly, nor do they allege any significant right or interest of their own which it impairs. Careful study of their brief leads us to the conclusion that their argument is, basically, that they do not like military discipline, do not care to participate in the Corps of Cadets, and should not be required to participate as a condition of receiving an education at a publicly funded school which is uniquely attractive to them because of its locale and quality. Moreover, though they might originally have escaped the Corps of Cadets by living at home with their parents and commuting, they argue that this similarly unattractive alternative should not have been forced upon them. (The college has now withdrawn this alternative, for their failure to honor their oaths to live at home and commute.) Hamilton v. Regents of the University of California, 293 U. S. 245 (1934) approved a state law which established a compulsory course of military training for male university students. In language which addresses the present litigation, the court wrote, Taken on the basis of the facts alleged in the petition, appellant's contentions amount to no more than an assertion that the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment as a safeguard of `liberty' confers the right to be students in the state university free from obligation to take military training as one of the conditions of attendance. Viewed in the light of our decisions that proposition must at once be put aside as untenable. 293 U. S. at 262. It is true that there are no recent federal decisions construing a military requirement in light of modern conditions. Nonetheless, in the absence of a challenge which is more pointed than this one, we must conclude that our constitutional question is merely whether appellants have carried the burden of showing that this is not a requirement rationally related to a legitimate state end. See McGowan v. Maryland, 366 U. S. 420 (1961). Appellants simply do not argue anything which would call for a reexamination of the premises of Hamilton. Compare Anderson v. Laird, 466 F2d 283, 295 n. 80 (D. C. Cir. 1972), cert. den. 409 U. S. 1076 (1972). To state the question, is there a rational relation between North Georgia's concededly valid military college status and the decision of the college that enrollment in the Corps of Cadets should be mandatory and not voluntary for all but a few classes of male students? Under the governing section of the Code of Federal Regulations, supra, without the mandatory military training the college would lose its status as a military college with the Department of the Army. Since the federal regulation is not challenged, the rational relation is thus demonstrated, and the required participation in the Corps of Cadets easily passes the minimal judicial scrutiny which appellants' attack invokes. Appellants' additional claim that compulsory military training for male students constitutes invidious sex discrimination and denies males equal protection of the laws because women students participate only voluntarily, is similarly without merit. Contrary to appellants' assertion, a majority of the United States Supreme Court have never ruled that sex is an inherently suspect classification. See Frontiero v. Richardson, 411 U. S. 677 (1973) (four justices found sex an inherently suspect classification); Reed v. Reed, 404 U. S. 71 (1971) (rational relation test applied). The evidence introduced by the college at the hearing included a showing that the need of the armed forces for female officers was adequately met through voluntary training of a relatively small number of women. Mandatoriness of training for male and not female resident students was thus shown to be rationally related to the needs of the services. Additionally, appellants argue that subjecting them to membership in the Corps of Cadets is unreasonable because exempt women students and exempt classes of males are so numerous that only a small percentage of students are actually required to join the corps. Numbers alone are not decisive. There being no attack here on the validity of the exemptions, this argument raises nothing for decision. Finally, appellants argue that although they might avoid the military training requirement entirely by attending another state supported school within the state. they should not be forced to go elsewhere when North Georgia College is conveniently located for them. This argument is entirely fallacious. Assuming other state colleges existed, not only might the state choose to maintain only a military college in appellants' locale, but it might choose to maintain there only a college limited to females, which would have the effect of excluding appellants (males) entirely from the only state-supported school close to their homes. E.g., Williams v. McNair, 316 FSupp. 134 (D.S.C. 1970), affd., 401 U. S. 951 (1971). Compare Kirstein v. Rector & Visitors of University of Virginia, 309 FSupp. 184 (D. Va. 1970).