gone and who have sons who have not yet gone. (Applause.) I am very much gratified at the immediate prospect of raising the age limit. (Applause.) I do not see any reason, and I never have seen any, why the boys between 21 and 31 should absorb all this magnificent glory that is coming to us. I never have been able to understand why men from 31 up to 45, at least, should not be compelled to respond, and had not untied themselves long before this from their mother's apron strings and got into the game. (Applause.) I am glad that I occupy a position where I can put them into the game. (Applause.) I am unequivocably opposed to lowering the age limit, lower than 18. I hope, however, that the boys of 18 to 21 will be in a position where they will not be called to go until they are 21, unless it becomes necessary. (Applause.)

I am

This is the greatest age that the world has ever seen. I am glad that I live in this age, although it, in this war, is the most terrible age that the world has ever seen. I am glad that I shall be able to remember this terrible confliet that I was too old to take a part in. I am glad to have been able to contribute to the army that is now fighting this great battle of freedom, by having three boys in it, and one of them, the youngest, has been there long enough to get wounded, and another one, the oldest, will soon be in service across the seas. so proud of those boys that I can hardly stand still. (Applause.) And I want to tell you this, they would not have been the boys of their mother if they had not gone. (Applause.) I have sometimes asked her if she would not be glad if they were here, and her invariable reply is, "I am glad they are not over here, dressed in low-quartered shoes and a straw hat." (Applause.) We have not been hearing any talk lately about peace, and I don't want to hear any. (Applause.)

A VOICE: You are right.

MR. WHITAKER: Some of my friends ask me when I think the war will close. I think I know when it will close-now, ladies, don't get shocked at any of the words which I may use, because these are war times-the war will close whenever the damnable Huns will look up into the face of the Allies and cry for peace, and it won't close until then. It will never

close until every nation on the face of the earth, both large and small, can conduct its own affairs according to its own will, and not according to the will of the household of Hapsburg or Hohenzollern, and until every one of that clan are damned and in hell. (Applause.) We will have peace when the spirit of Prussianism is destroyed; when that is done the war will end, and it will not end until that is done. We are proud of our Allies; we rejoice in them. We are proud to be associated with the French-God, bless France. (Applause.) We are proud of Sunny Italy, and we love all our Allies. They are great fighters. I canot help but admire the splendid type of men that are associated with us in this great struggle. Those men who have within the last few weeks turned a defensive into an offensive, and they are still pressing this offensive line, and I hope that they will not stop until they have pushed the Huns across the Rhine into their own territory and the Stars and Stripes are waving from every citadel in Berlin (Applause.)

A MEMBER: There is a gentleman present here who joined the army when he was but 16 years old, and made a splendid soldier. I would like for this crowd to see and hear from Judge Frank Wilson, who is the man to whom I refer.

(Ap

JUDGE FRANK WILSON: I joined the Confederate Army when I was 16 years old, and while I am over 73 now, I am exceedingly anxious to join the army in France. plause.) I will resign my judgeship now, to which I have been recently elected for a term of eight years, if they can find anything on the face of the earth that I can do. (Applause.) Now, in the other war, of course, I fought for the Confederate cause, and I was willing to die for it, and I have no apologies to make for it now; but America is the greatest government in the world today. (Applause.) Every man, young or old, ought to be willing to do everything in his power today to uphold American traditions and American honor. (Applause.)

PRESIDENT WATKINS: If there are no more remarks the Association will take up its programme where it left it off yesterday afternoon. We had under consideration, Judge Higgins, your report.

JUDGE FRANK WILSON: Let me interrupt the proceedings for just a moment, and I make this interruption at the request of at least twenty people, and that is that we suspend business for a sufficient length of time for this young lady to sing one more song.

(Mrs. Meek then sang one of her own productions for the Association, which was very gladly received.)

PRESIDENT WATKINS: Before we proceed I have been asked that all fathers and mothers who have sons that are represented upon this service flag, that are in France, to please stand up, in order that they may be seen.

(They stand.)

MR. CHARLES MILLER: I move that we proceed with the regular order of business.

JUDGE HIGGINS: I wish to move, in lieu of the motion made by Col. Miller, that inasmuch as Mr. Maddin has been invited here, and has been assigned to a very important subjest, and has a very interesting paper on it, that he be now allowed to address the Association on the subject assigned to him. Motion seconded and carried.

Mr. P. D. Maddin then read a paper on "War Services Rendered by the Members of the Tennessee Bar."

WAR SERVICES OF TENNESSEE LAWYERS

The original draft law for increasing the military forces of the United States was approved by the President May 18, 1917.

Under this law, all persons who had attained the age of 21 years, and had not yet attained the age of 31, were required to register June 5, 1917.

Local Exemption Boards were created in every county in the United States, and in the larger counties additional ones were established. In cities of 30,000 and over boards were established sufficient to meet the expected requirements, so that no board would have more than about 4,000 to 5,000 registration cards. The registration cards were then assigned to the respective local boards having jurisdiction over the terri

tory in which the registrant lived.

By a drawing held at Washington, each registrant was given a number, which indicated the order in which he was required to present himself to the local board, to be accepted or rejected, for military service. Various regulations determining the ground for exemption or rejection were promulgated, and as each registrant was called and presented himself, he set up the various grounds, if any, upon which he claimed exemp tion. These were passed upon by the local boards, and if overruled the right to appeal to the District Board existed. The action of the District Board sustaining or overruling the appeal from the local board was then notified to the local board, which was governed accordingly. Thus, each local board was burdened with the necessity of examining and passing upon all claims of exemption of each registrant, according to his order number. This process continued until the completion of the draft of the first army of 687,000 men.

The total enrollment of men on June 5, 1917, aggregated 9,659,382 men.

After the first army was called there remained approximately 9,000,000 men not in the service. Many had been rejected and many had not been called. As the work progressed it became manifest that a more rational and effective system must be provided. The quick mobilization of a large army of several million men could not be accomplished by the slow and eumbersome method of the first draft.

The question as to how and by what machinery a large and effective army could be quickly drafted from the citizenship of 9,000,000 men, engaged in every manner of occupation, and with every complication of family dependents, so that the drawing of this number of men from the daily life of the nation would least interfere with the home establishment, was indeed one requiring the deepest thought and most careful consideration of the best heads in the nation. To provide such a system required the breadth of view of a statesman, the analytical mind of a lawyer, the knowledge of business and indus trial conditions of a financier, the agricultural knowledge of a farmer, the industrial knowledge of a manufacturer. and

90

PROCEEDINGS OF THE

with it all, military knowledge of the best military intellect of the country.

The task was entrusted to Provost Marshal-General E. H. Crowder. Mr. Crowder had graduated at the United States Military Academy in 1881, and in 1886 took his degree as Bachelor of Laws at the University of Missouri. In his military service he had held almost every army rank, being many years in the Judge Advocate's Department. His education and training eminently fitted him for this task.

The Selective Service Regulations, Form 999:

The Provost Marshal-General and his assistants brought out one of the most remarkable systems in the Selective Service Regulations that has ever been devised. It presents a wonderful plan for selecting the men best fitted for military service, so as to interfere the least possible with manufacturing, agricultural and general business, and also to leave at home. those having family dependents upon whom they relied for support.

These Selective Service Regulations were approved by the President on the 8th of November, 1917, and the same day were promulgated by the Secretary of War. It might be here stated that both the President and the Secretary were educated in law, the President having taken his law degree at the University of Virginia, and Secretary Baker at Washington and Lea.

It is manifest that a system for the selection of men most suitable for military service, to be drawn so as to least interfere with the home establishment, should provide for a distribution of registrants into various classes, according to their family relations, their occupations, and the ease with which they could be spared without interfering with the home establishment.

It is also manifest that the number of local boards of limited membership of three or four each could not, with any celerity, question each man and ascertain whether or not he should be taken.

The plan of providing an extensive questionnaire in which