Registration & Student Aid

The agenda for the Dartmouth trustees' February meeting included a sensitive question: How should the College respond to the Congressional mandate that male students 18 or over must be registered for the draft in order to qualify for federally funded grants and loans?

Not at issue was registration itself, which the College supports and encourages in accordance with the law. The central concern was with those needy students already enrolled and not convicted for failure to register who stood to lose the opportunity to continue their education. The basis on which the College would assist such students was spelled out by President McLaughlin in the following statement explaining both the law and some of the developments regarding it since its enactment last September:

A federal statute enacted last year, the Solomon Amendment, denies federal financial aid to all male students born in 1960 or after who fail to register for the military draft. This law and the proposed regulations, which are to become effective July 1, 1983, require Dartmouth and other schools administering federal aid programs to obtain from such students written evidence of draft registrations as a condition to the granting of scholarships and loans provided or guaranteed by the federal government.

The Solomon Amendment is the law of the land, and Dartmouth College will certainly comply with it. Dartmouth students are encouraged to register for the draft, and those enrolled students who fail to do so will necessarily forfeit their eligibility for federal financial aid.

Students entering Dartmouth next fall will be advised that they will not be eligible for federal funds, or for College assistance to replace lost federal assistance, if they fail to register. Since needy students already attending the College were admitted without notice that their financial aid awards would be conditioned on draft registration, those not convicted for failure to register will have available to them College loans at commercial rates to enable them to continue their Dartmouth education. If any such student is subsequently prosecuted and found guilty, the College will call its loan.

It would be erroneous to suggest that the action by the College permitting financially needy students to continue their education will encourage them not to register. Students who do not register will in most cases do so as a matter of conscience, and those without adequate financial means will pay a substantial financial price in the form of lost grants and interest subsidies. Furthermore, non-registrants face a felony prosecution and, if found guilty, may be sentenced up to five years in jail and/or fined up to $1O,OOO.

I recognize the government's need to be able to identify those potentially subject to military service, and I strongly urge our students to comply with Selective Service registration requirements.

I also share the concern of many regarding the possible unconstitutionality of the enforcement process that the Solomon Amendment requires of Dartmouth and other colleges and universities. A federal court has within the past month enjoined enforcement of the Solomen Amendment on the grounds that it violates the students' constitutional right against self-incrimination and entitlement to due process.

How these matters will eventually be resolved is at the moment unclear. Pending further clarification, the College has adopted an interim financial aid policy which attempts to serve the national interest in encouraging full draft registration while also protecting the educational interests of our currently enrolled undergraduates. It is my hope that the Congress, the courts, and the federal administration will resolve these pending issues in a way that will serve the national interest while respecting the traditional roles of academic institutions and the constitutional rights of students.

(( A bout this time [1785] came also from John Flude, a London broker, the curious and beautiful gold 'jewel' still worn suspended from the neck of Dartmouth's president on great occasions. A little later a collection of curiosities brought to England by Captain Cook became the nucleus of the 'Museum and Cabinet,' to which some kindly disposed Englishman added a stuffed zebra, long a worthy rival of Yale's two-headed snake." Wilder D. Quint '87The Story of Dartmouth