@LeslieBurns @mattblaze Back when the world was young and the Vietnam War was raging, there was a lottery based on birthday during some year, assigning each person a number. There was a cut-off number for the year, and if you were eligible for the draft even one day during the year but your number was too high, you were effectively exempt. I lucked out with a high number, and so on December 31 of the appropriate year, I was on line at the main post office in Manhattan to send a certified letter to my draft board surrendering my student deferment. The clerk asked me why so many people were sending certified letters to their draft boards that day…

@SteveBellovin @LeslieBurns And you didn't even have bone spurs!

@mattblaze @LeslieBurns Student deferments were arguably even more unfair, since they applied primarily to college students—predominantly white, at least middle class, etc. Earlier, I had sent a letter to my draft board saying that I didn't know if I could take part in a war I considered morally unjust, and I spent a lot of time wondering what I would do if I received that dreaded letter, but it never happened. (Aside: by that point, other than college students, student deferments were available to seminary students—so seminaries therefore saw quite an enrollment jump, with lots of DD degrees awarded.)