by Sado Fri Apr 03 2009, 12:30
Some Internet postings claim the bill says the government must come up with plans for a
“mandatory service requirement for all able young people,” but that
phrase is nowhere to be found in either the House-passed bill or the
Senate version.
The bill as introduced in the House,
however, did call for examining whether this would be a good idea. It
called for a congressional commission to "address and analyze" several
topics, including "issues that deter volunteerism" and how they can be
overcome, how expanding international public service might affect
diplomacy and foreign relations, and "[w]hether a workable, fair, and
reasonable mandatory service requirement for all able young people
could be developed, and how such a requirement could be implemented in
a manner that would strengthen the social fabric of the Nation." The
commission would also investigate "[t]he need for a public service
academy, a 4-year institution that offers a federally funded
undergraduate education with a focus on training future public sector
leaders."
All of that language is now gone. To be clear,
the original bill didn't call for a mandatory public service program,
but called for the exploration of whether one could be established. But the entire section on creating a "Congressional Commission on Civic Service" was stripped from the bill.
And for those who hate walls of text I'll summarize, there is no phrase requiring the development of a plan for mandatory community service anywhere. The closest it came was the original bill presented to the house suggested creating a commitee to explore the ramifications of a mandatory community service, and even that has now been removed.
