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

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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