Dear Johnny:

There's always a first time: your first day in camp, your first night in the barracks, first gas masks, first bayonet practice. . . . Now your first letter from me.

What shall I say, that I'm knitting you a sweater, that I'll write every day? When you went away I realized suddenly that something big is cutting into our lives. . . .

(When he went away I thought that the draft is affecting permanently the lives of thousands of men and women. There are dozens of us here in college, engaged or in love, or thinking about the future.

Some of them know medical students who may be drafted too. What a waste of resources when 33 percent of the draftees were rejected for poor health, with our hospitals understaffed and overcrowded. And I remembered that 58,000 soldiers died of disease in the last war, most of them without leaving American soil)

. . . but then I thought "A boy scout is prepared" and crazy things like that, and how a year isn't such a long time, after all, out of a life-time. . . .

(but the president can extend the term of service indefinitely, by declaring a state of emergency)

About one particular conscript, in whom I have a kind of vested interest, do wear your rubbers, darling.

(don't mention the sea of mud in the camps, the overflowing infirmaries, the bad colds, the danger of infection. He doesn't have to be reminded of the Sundays playing poker, the unnatural off-duty life in the nearest town. We mustn't be soft.)

I know the loneliness must be hard, but I'm sure they'll make provisions for some kind of recreation. I don't see how they'll ever make a soldier out of you Johnny. They certainly aren't making one of me. But it isn't as though it were 1917. I know you won't be sent abroad. It's cheering to hear people like President MacCracken say that the war must be stripped of its moral veneer, that no one should urge us to kill and be killed in the name of Christianity. . . .

(I'm glad he wasn't in chapel Sunday night, terribly glad he didn't hear Jesus described as a "tough-minded man" of fibre, strength, and force, and that we believed a lie when we believed wars never solve anything. "It is a misconception common to most Christians that they must have nothing to do with war," that's what he said. And "History is made by men, not by economic forces.")

. . . but we've just got to assume, you and I, that we can make ourselves heard, that the pattern won't repeat 1917. There's so much to be done, in housing, in education, for the health of the people. The real defense job of the country is ahead of us. Do you really think you can work for peace in the army?

(What was that they said in Congress the other day? "If it ever becomes necessary for us to fight, we will fight! A country whose boys will not go out and fight to save Christianity and the principles of freedom from the ruthless destruction of a fiend, well, you won't find such boys in America." That's what Senator Austin said. Wonder if Johnny read it too.)

Of course, there are people here who are very much worried, who know how it all happened the last time.

(Is it true? The Times reports that the war department has ordered a million and a half soldiers' caskets and 4 1/2 million identification tags?)

Take care of yourself Johnny. When you get leave I'll meet you in New York, and we'll see a comedy--the funniest one we can find. Right now I have a class. Does it ever occur to you that all this education may be for nothing? But then again, it may be for everything. . . . All my love.   --From the Vassar Miscellany News.