DRAFT RESISTERS

Why they come to Canada

By PHYLLIS CLARKE

R people south of the bor-
der, Canada, historically,
has been a place of refuge.

Speaking at the Peace Arch
on Hiroshima Day, Rev. J. R.
Hord, secretary of the Board of
Evangelism and Social Service
of the United Church of Canada
had this to say:

“Americans may decide that
one method of opposing the war
in Vietnam is to resist the draft.
It is my conviction that we Ca-
nadians should extend welcome
and practical support to draft
evaders who come to our coun-
try. Personally, I believe that
the United Empire Loyalists who
left your country after the Revo-
ution had less worthy grounds
for emigration to Canada than
the draft resisters of today. Can-
ada welcomed the U.E.L’s. We
should be happy to receive your
draft evaders”.

He also could have added that
people who have come with
more worthy grounds include
the Negro slaves who reached
Canada_ through
ground railway and the refugees
from McCarthyism only 10 years
ago.

While pondering this role
played over the last 100 years,
I had an opportunity to meet a
number of draft resisters from
the United States.

They were sitting and talking
in a restaurant and I went over
and introduced myself and asked
if I could ask them some ques-
tions for the Tribune.

I had already read in various
publications that there was an
organization in Toronto as well
as other centres which assisted
the men who wanted to come
with advice on legal require-
ments and assistance when they
arrived.

Just a few days earlier the
newspapers had published a
story to the effect that an em-
ployment service had been estab-
lished and many Toronto firms
circularized to help in the find-
ing of jobs. I had been conscious
that most of the stories I had
read described the draft resist-
ers aS way out, or hippies, or
drug addicts.

The three men I spoke to fit
into none of these categories.
They were pacifists, university
educated, anxious to become
good citizens of Canada.

One, a young Negro from
Philadelphia said that when his
deferment was lost he decided
he “wasn’t going into service,
wasn’t going to jail, and the
decision to come to Canada was
the only alternative.”

He figured that there are at
least five a day coming into To-

the under-.

ronto alone and that the number
would be growing. He had even
run into people who are not yet
old enough to be registered for
the draft who are making plans
to leave the U.S.

He said that he had met very
few other Negro draft resisters
so far but that he expected there
would be more.

He said that the action of Mu-
hammed Ali has stirred up the
Negro youth. “They have ‘seen
one of their own leaders oppose
the draft and the war and decide
to go to jail if necessary.”

One problem he felt was that
in the Negro ghettos there was
little knowledge of Canada but
as information would get back
from those that had come, plus.
the activity of the peace move-
ment and the growing aware-
ness of the possibility of saying
“No, I won’t go” that more will
come.

Just two months in Canada,
he had been active in the anti-
war movement before he came
and had been at the Spring Mobi-
lization in New York. He is al-
ready working in Toronto and
beginning to become a Cana-
dian.

I asked about the Canadian
immigration since there had
been reports that some of the
officers were active in keeping
draft resisters out.

The three told me that there
were differences between the
various officials. One thing that
bothered them was that some of
the immigration officers were
asking about the draft status of
those coming in although there
is nothing in Canadian regula-
tions that requires such infor-
mation. They felt this was an
example of prejudice against
draft resisters.

Generally though they have
found many Canadians willing
to help. As people who had re-
ceived help from the Toronto
Anti-Draft program they knew
there were lawyers, teachers,
businessmen and ministers as-
sisting the work.

Another thing that concerned —

them was whether the Canadian
government would pass a law
against the draft resisters. The
way the government has knuck-
led under over the medical sup-
plies from the U.S. for the
Quakers won’t help give them
confidence that such a law
would not be passed.

The second young man turn-
ed out to be a Canadian, but
one who had been living for
many years in California and
now had returned because of
the draft.

He said there were many re-
sident aliens taking the same
step. In some cases he knew

|

whole families were returning
to Canada. In addition he said
that there are people from many
countries who had been living
in the U.S. who are now mov-
ing to Canada.

I asked if they had any knowl-
edge of the total number of draft
resisters in Canada and they
said it would be very hard to
estimate. They felt that in addi-
tion to people like themselves
who had sought assistance there
were an even larger number who
on their own had come to Can-
ada, got jobs and were settling
in as Canadians.

I then turned to the third man
and discovered he was a Texan
and had lived not far. from the
LBJ ranch.

With a wry smile he said, “I
decided one of us had to leave
the U.S. and since Lyndon was
not showing any signs of it, I
oni to come to Canada my-
self.”

A graduate in philosophy he
also is already at work here. He
spoke of the “fresh air and
friendliness of the people” here.
“The atmosphere created by the
profit motive in the U.S.” he
said, “precludes any deep human
relationship.”

He was violently opposed to
the war on Vietnam on moral
grounds and felt it was the most
violent reflection of all that was
bad in the American scene.

The young Philadelphian then
added that he was completely
against the war and that he did
not feel that “any Negro youth
should have anything to do with
it. There is a lack of equality
for the Negro and if we go to
fight in this war there will be
even more difficulties in winning
equality.”

I asked the Texan how his
family felt about his decision
and he replied, ‘“‘They wished me
well and hoped I would make a
good useful contribution to Can-
adian society.”

As I wags saying thanks and
goodby a young couple camé in.
He was also a draft resister, from
Virginia, 20 years old with a
beautiful young wife of 16.

They had only arrived in To-
ronto the night before. I asked
him why they had come and he
answered, “I was tired with the
whole social atmosphere. How
can you live in a country which
brags about the number of peo-
ple they are burning with na-
palm?” —

How indeed can you?

They were of course only a
sample of the thousands of draft
resisters that have come to Can-
ada but there was no doubt in
my mind that they were repre-
sentative. They deserve the sup-
port of the whole Canadian
peace movement in becoming
part of this land so new to them
because they represent some of
the finest in America’s democra-
tic and humanist tradition.

There are those heroic young
Americans who are prepared to
go to jail in their principled
opposition to the war on Viet-
nam but let’s not sell short these
thousands of young Americans
who by coming in a veritable
flow to Canada as draft resist-
ers have heightened the aware-
ness of Americans and Cana-
dians about the atrocity that is
that war.

As Rev. Hord said we should
be happy to receive them. This
is for our times the equivalent
of the underground railway of
just a little over 100 years ago.

involved,” he said.

the Vietnam Objectors Group, whose aim

‘sible for his actions in a war. Logically, if 4 m

By RICHARD YOUNG
When David Monaghan’s appeal again

__ the Vietnam War was upheld it set the preceden
_ develop into a large and successful move

tralians of similar views.

David, 21, from the Melbourne suburb of
against his call-up and was granted to
training on political grounds. He appeare'
Murray, $.M.- — :

David stated that he had a conscienti

_tralia’s involvment in the Vietnam war was mor

He was the first Victorian, and the second
ly te go te court with a political objection.
He said that he didn’t oppose war in ge
willingly do his national service training if Au
all her troops from Vietnam, or if Australia he!
He said he had never belonged to any

group ond had no political ambitions.

“This is an unjust war and } don’t think

. ~ €£

The First Australian to oppose the war ©
was Lindsay Anderson, a 21-year-old analy
Sydney. :

Lindsay, who was represented in court by
tious objector, Simon Townsend, lost his case @

He is now serving his two years training in Fu

Meanwhile, another objector Leonard :

_ graduate physics honors student at Sydney 4
_ twenty-five days in Long Bay gaol.

_ Munro refused to pay a $25 fine incurn
attend his national service medical and was

And in Sydney a group of young ob
tight of conscientious objection to a part ula
“The group hopes to raise money to

ef putting this kind of application through

Townsend, the 19-year-old convenor of the
He continued, “If this right was este
one of the most significant moves in the oF

to Australian involvement in Vietnam.”

In a recent statement Steven Townsen
“We believe the Lindsay Anderson

- misrepresentation of the Act, but on a ™

complete denial of the principles established
Trial—to which Australia subscribed. + ad
“These principles say that each man |S a

considers that the actions he would have t ©
to in a particular war were criminal, he must
exemption.
“We want to establish that this conse! otal
as sacred and his objections as valid as the |
Townsend believe there were many young
tiously opposed to the Vietnam war who.
National Service training against their cons"
unless this right was lawfully recognized.
And now, with the danger of Australian
creasing after Prime Minister Holt's recent
with General Westmoreland calling for a" © iow
the need for an organized body of conscié
far greater than ever before. ha
For there are many young people who 5),

re

The

will want to do something positive about it. iL
jectors Group will be a positive vehicle.

Japan to boy
military cargo”

APAN’S largest trade union

organization, the General

Council of Trade Unions, is
to launch a campaign to boycott
military cargoes being shipped
to South Vietnam it announced
in Tokyo yesterday.

A spokesman for the council
said that the decision follows a
request from the North Vietnam
Federation of Trade Unions and
the Workers’ Federation of the
South Vietnam National Libera-
tion Front.

To spread the boycott through-
out South-East Asia and the
Pacific area, the Japanese trade
union leaders intend to call an
international conference of ma-
ritime transport workers next
March.

Supplies from Japan to the
U.S. forces in South Vietnam
and to the Saigon regime have