# Draft and students
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/draft-and-students/82526
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [September 19, 2001, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/draft-and-students/82526 "2001-09-19T03:37:47Z")
**Posts on this page:** 7
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@gtzaskar00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gtzaskar00)
#### Post date: [September 19, 2001, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/draft-and-students/82526/1 "2001-09-19T03:37:47Z")
True or false, full time college students are immune from the draft? Or is it not that black and white? Can anyone come up with a cite?
---
### Author:  [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)
#### Post date: [September 19, 2001, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/draft-and-students/82526/2 "2001-09-19T04:25:49Z")
From the [Selective Service](http://www.sss.gov/viet.htm) website:
> [@](#):
>
> **Before Congress made improvements to the draft in 1971, a man could qualify for a student deferment if he could show he was a full-time student making satisfactory progress toward a degree.
> Under the current draft law, a college student can have his induction postponed only until the end of the current semester. A senior can be postponed until the end of the academic year.**
---
### Author:  [@Nenya\_Elizabeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nenya_Elizabeth)
#### Post date: [September 19, 2001, 9:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/draft-and-students/82526/3 "2001-09-19T09:48:09Z")
Eeek, just to the end of the semester? ☹ Makes sense from the POV of people enrolling in college to escape the draft, but it would be nasty if a draft was called just a couple of weeks before the end of a semester…
What about American citizens living abroad? (Canada in this case.) Would we be responsible to an American draft? What if we are dual citizens? Which allegiance comes first?
Wonder if Canada has the same rules re: college students. Wouldn’t be surprised…
Are women ever subject to the draft, now that they can be in the armed forces?
---
### Author:  [@acconav](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/acconav)
#### Post date: [September 19, 2001, 10:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/draft-and-students/82526/4 "2001-09-19T10:07:16Z")
**Nenya** - as far as women and the draft goes, here’s the quote from the selective service website…
“Selective Service law as it’s written now refers specifically to “male persons” in stating who must register and who would be drafted. For women to be required to register with Selective Service, Congress would have to amend the law.”
- [http://www.sss.gov/FSwomen.htm](http://www.sss.gov/FSwomen.htm)
---
### Author:  [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)
#### Post date: [September 19, 2001, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/draft-and-students/82526/5 "2001-09-19T12:52:51Z")
Here’s [a good article](http://usmilitary.about.com/library/weekly/aa091401a.htm) about the current draft laws in the US.
---
### Author:  [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)
#### Post date: [September 19, 2001, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/draft-and-students/82526/6 "2001-09-19T13:05:27Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by Nenya\_Elizabeth \*
> **l… it would be nasty if a draft was called just a couple of weeks before the end of a semester…**
Speaking as someone who was required to register for the draft by Jimmy Carter, I ask that you please define a draft that isn’t nasty.
---
### Author:  [@Milton\_De\_La\_Warre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Milton_De_La_Warre)
#### Post date: [September 19, 2001, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/draft-and-students/82526/7 "2001-09-19T15:45:57Z")
Don’t worry about it unless you have NOT registered. Just like taxes, avoidance is quite legal; evasion is a crime (even though it CURRENTLY is not prosecuted).
A. It is highly unlikely that a draft will EVER be reinstituted in the USA.
B. If it were, it would break down quickly because:
1. Registration compliance is highly uneven. The inequatibility of who goes and who doesn’t would be so obvious that they would have to stop the process until they could come up with something better.
2. The process for hearings, appeals, re-hearings, etc. is so lengthy and cumbersome that if even a small percentage of draftees avail themselvs of it, the whole system would likely collapse quickly.
C. If you didn’t want to go, all the grounds you need are basically to say you don’t like war and so on. You can even be an atheist. They will have to try to find objectors “alternative service” at home. Cooperative employers could register a draftee’s current position as “alternative service”.
If the powers that be were actually serious about registration for possible --if unlikely-- conscription as an “insurance policy” for national defense, then there would be more incentive to register and more disincentive for non-registration.