Citizen and Soldier

A Sourcebook on Military Service and National Defense from Colonial America to the Present

Henry C. Dethloff,Gerald E. Shenk

• Editorial: Routledge
• Año: 2010
• ISBN:
  9781136934605
• Edición: 1
• Categoría: History
• Categoría: Military & Maritime History

Americans grow up expecting that in a time of need, their country can depend on its people for volunteer service to the military. Indeed, this has been a social and at times legal expectation for the citizenship of this country since 1776. Yet, since the end of World War II United States forces have been caught up in many long term military engagements, and the military aspect of citizenship has become an increasingly marginalized one in a world where only a minority of citizens even vote.

Citizen and Soldier: A Sourcebook on Military Service and National Defense from Colonial America to the Present provides a useful framework and supporting documentary evidence for an informed discussion of the development of the American ideal of the "Citizen Soldier". Presented with insightful introductions and useful discussion questions, this concise collection of 27 primary documents takes a close look at the United States military and shows how it became entwined with the rise of American national identity.

CHAPTER 1
COLONIAL AND REVOLUTIONARY AMERICA

The founding documents of the United States, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, established the principles and institutions that defined the role of the military in American life. Although these principles and military institutions were central to the Revolution against England, they reflected one hundred and fifty years of colonial military tradition and experience. At the core of these traditions lay several apparent paradoxes that persist in American culture to the present day. The first is that in most colonies and local communities all free adult white males were involuntarily enrolled in the permanent militia, yet there was a deep distrust of permanent military institutions. The second is that involuntary enlistment in the militia came into conflict with a growing belief, especially during the eighteenth century, in individual freedom and rejection of social hierarchies. A third paradox is that although militia service was officially associated with the status of free white males, increasingly during the eighteenth century, and continuing into the Revolutionary War, it was the poor, the indentured servants, and sometimes former slaves who actually did the fighting, when it came to that.

These, however, are broad generalizations whose appropriateness varies from place to place at different times. In the seventeenth century, the Virginia Company expected its male settlers to be armed and prepared to defend themselves. But those men frequently challenged how and when they were to fight, and who would command them. Captain John Smith felt that these men were unreliable as soldiers, and demanded that the Virginia Company provide a mercenary army under his command that would allow the settlers to cultivate their plantations in security without interruption. Free white men opposed the enlistments of white male indentured servants and Negroes, while men from both of these groups frequently demanded the right to join militias. But as John Smith had argued, militias tended not to be the best defense in the Chesapeake region, where homes and plantations were scattered across the countryside. It was different in Massachusetts, where close-knit towns made militias more practical. In both Virginia and Massachusetts, colonial statutes assumed that free white men would be armed and ready to fight as part of their respective militias, if called. Pennsylvania was very different in this respect. The political power of the Quakers, and the presence of other pacifist religious groups, such as the Mennonites and Amish, who had been invited there by William Penn with the promise that their pacifist beliefs would be honored, meant that mandatory militia duty for all white males never became associated with citizenship in Pennsylvania.

Despite strenuous efforts to change this, Benjamin Franklin and others in Pennsylvania only succeeded in establishing a volunteer militia. The following documents illustrate both differences and similarities with respect to whom was expected or required to perform military service in seventeenth-century Virginia, eighteenth-century Pennsylvania, and eighteenth-century Massachusetts.

DOCUMENT 1.1

THE FIRST LAWS MADE BY THE ASSEMBLY IN VIRGINIA,ANNO MDCXXIII (1623–24)

9. The governor shall not withdraw the inhabitants from their private labors to any service of his own upon any colour whatsoever and in case the publick service require ymployments of many hands before the holding a General Assemblie to give order for the same, in that case the levying of men shall be done by order of the governor and whole body of the counsell and that in such sorte as to be least burthensome to the people and most free from partialitie.

10. That all the old planters that were here before or came in at the last coming of Sir Thomas Gates they and their posterity shall be exempted from their personal service to the warrs and any publick charge (church duties excepted) that belong particularly to their persons (not exempting their families) except such as shall be ymployd to command in chief.

[…]

23. That every dwelling house shall be pallizaded for defence against the Indians.

24. That no man go or send abroad without a sufficient partie well armed.

25. That men go not to worke in the ground without their arms (and a centinell upon them).

[…]

27. That the commander of every plantation take care that there be sufficient of powder and amunition within the plantation under his command and their pieces fixt and their arms compleate.

[…]

32. That at the beginning of July next the inhabitants of every corporation shall fall upon their adjoyning salvages as we did the last yeare, those that shall be hurte upon service to be cured at the publique charge; in case any be lamed to be maintained by the country according to his person and quality.

***

These First Laws of Virginia made it very clear that every colonist had an obligation to assist in defense of the colony and their own household. Laws also provided for some degree of standard armaments for each household, in quantity if not in quality. It is also notable that the community had an obligation to care for those who were hurt, injured, or maimed in their course of defending the community. The 1657–58 law also provided a special exemption to a group of recent settlers, presumably that they might organize and construct their farms and homes—but that ministers and their families were not exempted from service when called upon.

DOCUMENT 1.2

LAWS OF VIRGINIA, MARCH 1657–1658 (9TH OF COMMONWEALTH)

ACT LIX. Old Virginians freed from Taxes.** IT is enacted and confirmed by the authoritie aforesaid, That all such persons as were here or came in at the last comeing in of Sir Tho: Yates, † shall be exempted from their personall service to the warrs and all publique charges, ministers duties excepted, not exempting their families (excepting such as shall be imployed in cheife.)

DOCUMENT 1.3

LAWS OF VIRGINIA, MARCH 1658–1659 (10TH OF COMMONWEALTH)

ACT XXV. Provision to bee made for Amunition. BEE it enacted that a provident supplie be made of gunn powder and shott to our owne people, and this strictly to bee lookt to by the officers of the militia, (vizt.) That every man able to beare armes have in his house a fixt gunn two pounds of powder and eight pound of shott at least which are to be provided by every man for his family before the last of March next, and whosoever shall faile of makeing such provision to be fined ffiftie pounds of tobacco to bee laied out by the county courts for a common stock of amunition for the county.

***

The New England Articles of Confederation of 1643 in a very broad sense foreshadowed the adoption of the Articles of Confederation that were adopted by the Revolutionary Government of the United States in 1781. Prominent in both documents was the understanding that the defense of any one element of that union (colony, plantation, or household) was a responsibility and an expense to be borne by all.

DOCUMENT 1.4

NEW ENGLAND ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION, 1643

1. It is by these Confederates agreed that the charge of all just wars, whether offensive or defensive, upon what part or member of this Confederation soever they fall, shall both in men, provisions, and all other disbursements be borne by all the parts of this Confederation in different proportions according to their different ability in manner following, namely, that the Commissioners for each Jurisdiction from time to time, as there shall be occasion, bring a true account and number of all their males, males in every Plantation, or any way belonging to or under their several Jurisdictions, of what quality or condition soever they be, from sixteen to threescore, being inhabitants there. And that according to the different numbers from which from time to time shall be found in each Jurisdiction upon a true and just account, the service of men and all charges of the war be borne by the poll: each Jurisdiction or Plantation being left to their own just course and custom of rating themselves and people according to their different estates with due respects to their qualities and exemptions amongst themselves though the Confederation take no notice of any such privilage: and that according to their different charge of each Jurisdiction and Plantation the whole advantage

of the war (if it please God so to bless their endeavors) whether it be in lands, goods, or persons, shall be proportionately divided among the said Confederates.

5. It is further agreed, that if any of these Jurisdictions or any Plantation under or in combination with them, be invaded by any enemy whomsoever, upon notice and request of any three magistrates of that Jurisdiction so invaded, the rest of the Confederates without any further meeting or expostulation shall forthwith send aid to the Confederate in danger but in different proportions; namely, the Massachusetts an hundred men sufficiently armed and provided for such a service and journey, and each of the rest, forty five so armed and provided, or any less number, if less be required according to this proportion. But if such Confederate in danger may be supplied by their next Confederates, not exceeding the number hereby agreed, they may crave help there, and seek no further for the present: the charge to be borne as in this article is expressed: and at the return to be victualled and supplied with the powder and shot for their journey (if there be need) by that Jurisdiction which employed or sent for them; But none of the Jurisdictions to exceed these numbers until by a meeting of the Commissioners for this Confederation a greater aid appear necessary. And this proportion to continue till upon knowledge of greater numbers in each Jurisdiction which shall be brought to the next meeting, some other proportion be ordered. But in any such case of sending men for present aid, whether before or after such order or alteration, it is agreed that at the meeting of the Commissioners for this Confederation, the cause of such war or invasion be duly considered: and if it appear that the fault lay in the parties so invaded then that Jurisdiction or Plantation make just satisfaction, both to the invaders whom they have injured, and bear all the charges of the war themselves, without requiring any allowance from the rest of the Confederates towards the same. And further that if any Jurisdiction see any danger of invasion approaching, and there be time for a meeting, that in such a case three magistrates of the Jurisdiction may summon a meeting at such convenient place as themselves shall think meet, to consider and provide against the threatened danger; provided when they are met they may remove to what place they please; only whilst any of these four Confederates have but three magistrates in their Jurisdiction, their requests, or summons, from any of them shall be accounted of equal force with the three mentioned in both the clauses of this article, till there be an increase of magistrates there.

***

In 1652, Massachusetts adopted an act specifying that militia enlistments were to include “all Scotsmen, Negers and Indians inhabiting with or servants to the English.” According to historian Benjamin Quarles, “four years later the legislature prohibited the mustering in of Negroes or Indians, explaining the step as necessary in the interests of ‘the better ordering and settling of severall cases in the military companyes.’”

PENNSYLVANIA’S COLONIAL MILITIA

Pennsylvania’s 1671 “Laws of the Duke of York” required that every person who can bear arms from 16 to 60 years of age “be always provided with a convenient proportion of powder and bullet for service for their Mutual Defence, upon a penalty for their neglect … That the quantity of powder and shot…be at least one pound of powder and 2 pounds of bullet. And if the Inhabitants…...