Until World War I, Americans traditionally resisted the European trend toward conscription as the principal means for accessing men into the armed forces. Thousands of Europeans had migrated to America to avoid the draft. Moreover, a large standing army seemed both unnecessary and a potential threat to American civil liberties. The disastrous and unsuccessful attempts by both sides in the Civil War to introduce conscription only reinforced these ideas. The Wilson administration was careful to note that its system of "selective service" only called men who had voluntarily placed their names on lists, although significant informal local pressure existed. Conscription started again in 1940 and was renewed by Congress in 1941 by just a single vote. The United States quickly disestablished the draft at the end of World War II under pressure to return the nation to a peacetime footing.

The increasing military pressures...