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IPFS News Link • Political Theory

Will Politicians Revive American Slavery?

• https://www.fff.org, by James Bovard

Apparently, slavery was evil not because of the unjust subjugation but because plantation owners, not politicians, were the profiteers.

Politicians have long been hustling to establish their prerogative to commandeer young Americans' lives. At a "Volunteerism Summit" in Philadelphia in 1997, President Bill Clinton announced that America needed more "citizen-servants" and that "the will to serve has never been stronger." Clinton praised Maryland and the District of Columbia for making "service" mandatory for any student seeking a high school diploma. In a Playboy article headlined, "The Return of the Hitler Youth?" I ridiculed Clinton for "crusading for a national kiddie draft — forcing all teenagers to labor in politically approved community service" for hundreds of hours before being granted a diploma.

But the "kiddie draft" was only the opening bid. There were plenty of progressives and conservatives itching to compel all young to sacrifice a year or more in "national service" — a perpetual fantasy inside the Beltway ever since military conscription was suspended in 1973. Unfortunately, the easiest way to prove your moral superiority in Washington is to champion destroying everyone else's freedom.

It began with AmeriCorps

AmeriCorps, a program created by Bill Clinton, is viewed as a prototype by many advocates who seek to shackle all young people to "serve" politically approved causes. AmeriCorps presumes that volunteering is such a wonderful thing that the federal government should subsidize it, paying AmeriCorps members as much or more than many of them could have earned in real jobs. Subsidizing volunteering by some people was a stepping stone to mandating "volunteering" for all young Americans.


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