New York City draft riots
The New York City draft riots, sometimes referred to as the Manhattan draft riots and known at the time as Draft Week, were violent disturbances in Lower Manhattan, widely regarded as the culmination of working-class discontent with new laws passed by Congress that year to draft men to fight in the ongoing American Civil War. The riots remain the largest civil and most racially charged urban disturbance in American history. According to Toby Joyce, the riot represented a "civil war" within the city's Irish community, in that "mostly Irish American rioters confronted police, [while] soldiers, and pro-war politiciansĀ ... were also to a considerable extent from the local Irish immigrant community."
An illustration in The Illustrated London News depicting armed rioters clashing with Union Army soldiers in New York City
A recruiting poster in New York City in June 1863 for the Enrollment Act, also known as the Civil War Military Draft Act, which authorized the federal government to conscript troops for the Union Army
John Alexander Kennedy, NYC police superintendent from 1860 to 1870
Bull's Head Hotel, depicted in 1830, was burned after it refused to serve alcohol to the rioters.
Conscription in the United States
In the United States of America, military conscription, commonly known as the draft, has been employed by the U.S. federal government in six conflicts: the American Revolutionary War, the American Civil War, World War I, World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War. The fourth incarnation of the draft came into being in 1940, through the Selective Training and Service Act; this was the country's first peacetime draft. From 1940 until 1973, during both peacetime and periods of conflict, men were drafted to fill vacancies in the U.S. Armed Forces that could not be filled through voluntary means. Active conscription in the United States ended in 1973, when the U.S. Armed Forces moved to an all-volunteer military. However, conscription remains in place on a contingency basis; all male U.S. citizens, regardless of where they live, and male immigrants, whether documented or undocumented, residing within the United States, who are 18 through 25 are required to register with the Selective Service System. United States federal law also continues to provide for the compulsory conscription of men between the ages of 17 and 44 who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, U.S. citizens, and additionally women in certain health care occupations, for militia service pursuant to Article I, Section 8 of the United States Constitution and 10 U.S. Code Ā§ 246.
Young men registering for conscription during World War I in New York City, on June 5, 1917
Rioters attacking a building during the New York anti-draft riots of 1863
World War I era draft card belonging to writer Stoddard King
Secretary of War Newton Baker draws the first draft number on July 20, 1917