How did draft deferment categories work during the Vietnam War and who qualified?
Executive summary
The Selective Service operated a multi-tier classification system during the Vietnam War that sorted registrants into categories ranging from "available for military service" to legally exempt or deferred, and those classifications — especially student (II-S/2-S) and hardship (III-A) deferments — determined who was likely to be called up [1] [2]. Widespread use of deferments, and later the 1969 lottery and 1971 reforms, shifted induction patterns and fed critiques that the system advantaged the well‑off while placing a disproportionate burden on poorer and non‑college men [3] [2] [4].
1. How the classification system actually worked: a paper bureaucracy that decided lives
Selective Service used numbered classification codes to determine liability: Class I covered those available for immediate service (I‑A) and several special I‑class statuses (I‑O conscientious objector variants, I‑S student, I‑W civilian work, etc.), Class II covered deferments such as occupational and student deferments, Class III held hardship deferments like III‑A, and Class IV covered exemptions or disqualifications including IV‑F medical unfitness [1]. Registrants were evaluated on paperwork, local board findings and tests — the classifications determined whether someone was immediately eligible for induction, deferred temporarily, or excused [1] [5].
2. Student deferments: broad, then narrowed, and at the center of controversy
College students could secure a student deferment — commonly listed as II‑S or 2‑S — which allowed full‑time students making “satisfactory progress” to postpone induction and, before reforms, to remain deferred for much of their academic career in virtually any field [3] [5]. Elite campuses initially enjoyed strong protections (Harvard students were automatically 2‑S early on), but by the mid‑1960s those privileges narrowed and the Selective Service Qualification Test and class‑standing rules were used to standardize eligibility as criticism grew [6] [5].
3. Hardship, marriage and paternity deferments: social engineering with demographic effects
Hardship deferments (III‑A) — granted to men who could demonstrate a “bona fide” relationship with dependent children or extreme family hardship — became widespread after an executive order in 1963 and proliferated during the war; by 1969 millions held III‑A paternity deferments, a phenomenon that even influenced birth rates as some scholars argue men fathered children to obtain protection [2] [4]. Marriage initially provided broader protection but was curtailed in August 1965 so that only fathers generally qualified thereafter, and policies shifted again over time [4].
4. Occupational, religious and medical categories: varied pathways to avoid combat roles
Besides students and fathers, the Selective Service permitted occupational (II‑A) and agricultural (II‑C) deferments for jobs deemed essential and recognized conscientious objector statuses (I‑O, I‑W) for religiously based noncombatant service or approved civilian work; medical disqualifications such as IV‑F removed registrants from liability [1] [7]. These categories created multiple legal avenues to avoid frontline service, though their application often depended on local board discretion and documentary proof [1] [7].
5. The lottery, reforms and the attempt to equalize risk (1969–71)
Growing public outrage over perceived inequities helped push the 1969 draft lottery and 1971 congressional reforms: the lottery assigned induction priority by birthdate to reduce arbitrary board decisions, and reforms limited long student deferments so college postponements no longer insulated men indefinitely; boards were also required to better represent local demographics [3]. These changes aimed to make the draft “fairer,” but they came late in a war already politically and socially polarized [3].
6. Who effectively benefited and the critiques that followed
Empirical and contemporary accounts argue that deferments favored men with means and access to higher education or employment considered essential, concentrating induction among lower‑income, less‑educated, and minority men — a distribution that fueled the anti‑war movement and critiques of class bias [2] [4]. Historical summaries and scholarly work document massive numbers of deferments and describe how policy changes reduced some disparities but could not erase the social controversies provoked by earlier practices [2] [8].
7. Limits of this report and what the records show
Public sources document the legal categories, common uses, and subsequent reforms but do not settle every contentious anecdote about individual cases or local board practices; further primary‑source board records and contemporaneous studies are needed to map local variation in how classifications were applied [1] [3] [5].