SELECTIVE SERVICE MAY BE NEEDED AGAIN

A Republican lawmaker from New York has introduced legislation that would abolish the Selective Service system signed into law by President Franklin Roosevelt nearly 60 years ago. Actually, the provision is contained in an appropriations bill members of the House of Representatives will take up upon their return after Labor Day. Introduced as a cost-saving measure, it would supposedly save the Selective Service's $24.4 million annual budget.

We take a dim view of the proposal. If it's cost savings lawmakers have in mind, surely there are more fruitful areas for cutting than this item, which is minuscule in a federal budget creeping past $1.8 trillion toward $2 trillion.

Previous attempts to abolish Selective Service have failed as recently as 1993 and 1995. Ironically, the move reappears just as some congressional leaders are talking of the need to reinstitute the draft. House Armed Services Committee Chairman Floyd Spence, R-S.C., has said peacekeeping deployments in Bosnia and Kosovo may require Congress to reconsider conscription. Moreover, services are falling short of their annual recruiting goals this year. The Air Force will fall 2,500 short, the Army could fall 10,000 short, and, most alarmingly, the Navy expects to fall 22,000 short of its needed recruiting strength. The Marines are doing just fine.

There probably isn't anything wrong with recruitment levels that the election of a new commander in chief -- one with no history of loathing the military -- can't fix. Meanwhile, Congress should cool it on this latest attempt to eliminate our capacity for having an inventory of draft-age young men and women, available for service if and when they're needed.