> > Did the American army conscript foreign citizens? > > On Friday, 28 June 2013 10:58:24 UTC+1, Evertjan. wrote: > Yes, in/from? 1942, however the foreign citizenship was not the point, > their US-residency and not having the US citizenship are, methinks. > > Evertjan. > The Netherlands. I'd have thought being a foreign citizen was the entire point! Matt

On 6/28/2013 6:48 AM, mllt1@le.ac.uk wrote: >>> Did the American army conscript foreign citizens? >> > On Friday, 28 June 2013 10:58:24 UTC+1, Evertjan. wrote: >> Yes, in/from? 1942, however the foreign citizenship was not the point, >> their US-residency and not having the US citizenship are, methinks. > > I'd have thought being a foreign citizen was the entire point! > I would have thought that, too - but in the 60s, the English husband of an American friend, was drafted by the US.

> >>> Did the American army conscript foreign citizens? > >> > > > On Friday, 28 June 2013 10:58:24 UTC+1, Evertjan. wrote: > >> Yes, in/from? 1942, however the foreign citizenship was not the point, > >> their US-residency and not having the US citizenship are, methinks. > > > > On 6/28/2013 6:48 AM, Matt Tompkins wrote: > > I'd have thought being a foreign citizen was the entire point! > > > On Friday, 28 June 2013 12:21:21 UTC+1, S Viemeister wrote: > I would have thought that, too - but in the 60s, the English husband of > an American friend, was drafted by the US. As so often, google provides the answer - there is a detailed account of the conscription of foreign citizens into the American army in WW1 in NG Ford, Americans All!: Foreign-born Soldiers in World War I (Texas, 2009). It seems America accepted the usual principle that states may only conscript their own citizens, but extended the category of US citizens to include immigrants who had applied to become citizens and were waiting out the statutory period of 5 years' residence before citizenship could be granted (called 'declarants'). Foreign citizens who had not applied ('non-declarants') were specifically exempted, however though they were very nearly included - there was considerable pressure for them to be included (senator G.E. Chamberlain, chairman of the Senate Military Affairs Committee, even tabled a bill empowering military courts-martial to order the execution by firing squad of non-declarant foreign citizens who refused to be drafted - a later version which substituted deportation as the penalty actually passed through the House of Representatives before being stopped in the Senate after the government pointed out that it would expose Americans living or travelling overseas to retaliatory conscription or deportation). Charlie Henry's draft card shows that he was a non-declarant, and so he should never have been conscripted. He might nevertheless have volunteered - over 190,000 non-declarant foreign citizens did - though it is also possible that he was simply railroaded into the army by an over-eager draft board - more than 80,000 non-declarants were illegally conscripted, causing diplomatic spats with 34 foreign governments who objected to their citizens being conscripted into a foreign army. Some neutral foreign governments even objected to their declarant citizens being conscripted, and at the end of the war the law had to be changed to permit declarants to withdraw their application for citizenship and be thereby released from the draft. Allied governments also objected and agreements had to be concluded with them allowing their citizens to choose to serve in their own armies - 48,000 Britons chose to join the British Army, for example. Charlie Henry appears not to have availed himself of this, however, though perhaps for him the treaty with Britain came too late - it was only concluded in late 1918. Matt Tompkins