At any rate, the argument that there must be alternative service because _immature_ 18-year-olds must by no means be subjected to prison experience seems to me to become completely impotent in the mouths of those religious pacifists who acquiesce in the arrangement under discussion and enable it to work—unless indeed they mean to contend that the average religious CO has less stamina than the non-religious CO and that, therefore, the former should be given gentler treatment. Advocacy of alternative service for the teen-age CO is based on considerations relating to the future of the pacifist movement, as well as on the effect on the COs themselves. It is argued that if the only choice young pacifists have is the army or jail, there will be very few pacifists. This argument was not, however, first advanced when the draft age was lowered. It was often heard during World War II when most COs were older and more seasoned. It has always impressed me as a dubious argument and I wonder where it leads us. What, for example, is the relationship of this argument to the one which is also advanced—sometimes by the same person—that the IV-E position is very meaningful and perhaps to be preferred to the more “absolutist” one, because it is the IV-E man who gives a glorious demonstration of the spirit of selfless service which is the essence of pacifism at its best? These two concepts cannot very well be harnessed together as a team. We can hardly contend in one and the same breath that we want alternative service because most young pacifists are not ready to follow a stronger and more sacrificial course _and_ that we want it because it is the strongest and most meaningful course pacifists can follow. It seems to me we have to decide whether our problem is to find shelter for COs or whether it is to find freedom and the opportunity for self-expression and service, even though the price be high. To consider the matter for a moment from the tactical viewpoint, it seems quite certain that the number of 18-year-olds who take either the IV-E or the non-registrant position (perhaps even the I-A-O position might be included) will at least at the outset be small. The draft now gets the young man at the very age when it is most difficult for him to stand out in any way from the mass of his fellows. Even if he is intellectually pretty well convinced of the pacifist position, he is not emotionally mature enough to take it. It is a fair guess that the accessions to the pacifist movement, if military service and/or training becomes universal, will in the future come mainly from young people who have gone through the experience of life in the armed forces. In other words, the additional number of pacifists recruited because alternative service is provided may turn out to be very small. If so, the numerical advantage from the adoption of a less uncompromising pacifism is illusory.