[Peace-discuss] Recruiters target kids despite voters

[C. G. Estabrook]

	Judge tosses laws restricting recruiters
	Matthew B. Stannard, Chronicle Staff Writer
	Friday, June 19, 2009

(06-18) 18:44 PDT -- Without fanfare, a federal judge in Oakland on Thursday 
threw out voter-approved laws in two Northern California cities barring military 
recruiters from contacting minors.

U.S. District Judge Saundra Brown Armstrong ruled that laws passed in the 
Humboldt County cities of Arcata and Eureka in November were unconstitutional 
and invalid.

The finding was not unexpected by proponents of the laws, which passed with 73 
percent of the vote in Arcata and 57 percent in Eureka. The federal government 
quickly sued to overturn the laws, which have been stayed ever since.

But Dave Meserve, the former Arcata councilman behind the laws, said he was 
disappointed that the judge ruled without hearing arguments on the case. 
Armstrong ruled on filed pleadings after a hearing scheduled this month was 
canceled.

"She doesn't respond to any of our arguments in any way," he said. "The order 
reads like a restatement of the government's case."

Department of Justice spokesman Charles Miller said "We are pleased with the 
court's ruling."

Eileen Lainez, a spokeswoman for the Office of the Secretary of Defense, 
declined tocomment on the suit but said, "It is important for recruiters to 
provide information to youth and their parents."

The Arcata and Eureka laws join a long list of failed attempts to restrict 
military recruiting.

Opponents of recruiting have tried to keep recruiters off college campuses 
nationwide. Berkeley issued and then rescinded a letter calling Marine 
recruiters "unwelcome intruders."

And the San Francisco school board in 2006 killed the local Junior Reserve 
Officers' Training Corps, which some members saw as a recruiting tool, launching 
a three-year battle that ended last month with JROTC back in place.

The Arcata and Eureka laws represented a new tactic that experts said appeared 
to have been the first of its kind in America: a counter-recruitment law passed 
not by a handful of elected activists, but by a plurality of voters.

Many voters in Arcata and Eureka who supported the measures saw the laws not as 
anti-military, but as an expression of a community's right to set its own rules 
- particularly relating to children.

Opponents said the laws were unpatriotic, pointlessly quixotic, and imposed a 
government regulation on a domain that would be better handled by parents.

The laws made it illegal to contact anyone under the age of 18 to recruit that 
person into the military or promote future enlistment. Minors could still 
initiate contact with recruiters if they chose.

"The judge said that the question of military recruitment is a subject which 
must be regulated by the federal government and may not be regulated by states 
and localities," said Stanford Law School Senior Lecturer Allen Weiner, who read 
the opinion but did not take part in the case.

Under the supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution, federal laws trump state 
laws on issues the federal government is responsible for, like foreign affairs 
and national defense.

The cities tried to head off that finding by arguing that the United States is 
party to international treaties prohibiting the recruiting of children under 17. 
The treaties, the cities argue, hold equal standing to the supremacy clause, so 
recruitment aimed at children under 17 - such as posters or recruiter calls - is 
unconstitutional.

Armstrong did not address that argument. Brad Yamauchi, a San Francisco attorney 
who represented Arcata pro bono, said the reason she didn't may have been 
because the treaty addresses recruitment of children under age 17, but the laws 
in Arcata and Eureka barred recruiting anybody under 18.

Recruits must be 18 to enlist in the U.S. military, or 17 with parental 
permission, although contact with recruiters may begin earlier.

If the cities choose to appeal or draft a new law, Yamauchi said, they might 
focus on the 17-and-under crowd. But they would still need to solve other 
constitutional concerns raised by Armstrong - a task he said will be difficult 
at best.

But Yamauchi said an appeal might still be worth pursuing.

"Everything has to be done to put this pressure (on policymakers), and having an 
appeal could be part of that pressure," he said. Arcata City Attorney Nancy 
Diamond said the city has made no decision on whether to pursue an appeal.

But Meserve said that no matter what, the effort was worthwhile.

"Whatever the outcome, I think it's been very positive," he said. "It has opened 
people's eyes across the country to the fact that recruiters target kids."

E-mail Matthew B. Stannard at mstannard at sfchronicle.com.

This article appeared on page B - 1 of the San Francisco Chronicle

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/06/19/BAC3189PQJ.DTL