A month ago Tom Hall was a Sophomore at Harvard. Today he faces a two-year prison term. Hall was a scholarship student, a Group II man, although no one could call him a grind, and he spent more than twenty hours a week running the Student Food Service. He was a quiet fellow, interested in music and social anthropology, and in his political views inclining towards what his friends considered a somewhat naive utopianism. As a natural consequence he was a pacifist, and his beliefs made it impossible for him even to register for the draft. His refusal has earned him a sentence which, even under the present law, must be called severe.

There are very few Tom Halls, but we cannot afford to mistreat them. Because there are such a tiny minority, the only danger from them arises out of our own brutality towards them. We recognize the right of sincere objectors not to serve in the Armed Forces. We cannot then refuse them the right not to participate in a compulsory registration designed primarily to provide men for those Armed Forces. The British as a matter of fact recognize this right, and they have apparently found it possible to distinguish between draft dodgers and genuine pacifists. We might do well to learn from our ally.

Two years from now Tom Hall will be a jailbird. We can win the war without his help. But we shall need his help, and the help of other men like him, in the tremendous job of post-war reconstruction. His private tragedy is apparent; it will be almost equalled by our own loss.