SECTION IV

Time-35 minutes

27 Questions

Directions: Each passage in this section is followed by a group of questions to be answered on the basis of what is stated or implied in the passage. For some of the questions, more than one of the choices could conceivably answer the question. However, you are to choose the best answer, that is, the response that most accurately and completely answers the question, and blacken the corresponding space on your answer sheet.

Opponents of compulsory national service claim that such a program is not in keeping with the liberal principles upon which Western democracies are founded. This reasoning is reminiscent of the argument that a tax on one's income is undemocratic because it violates one's right to property. Such conceptions of the liberal state fail to take into account the intricate character of the social agreement that undergirds our liberties. It is only in the context of a community that the notion of individual rights has any application; individual rights are meant to define the limits of people's actions with respect to other people. Implicit in such a context is the concept of shared sacrifice. Were no taxes paid, there could be no law enforcement, and the enforcement of law is of benefit to everyone in society. Thus, each of us must bear a share of the burden to ensure that the community is protected.

The responsibility to defend one's nation against outside aggression is surely no less than the responsibility to help pay for law enforcement within the nation. Therefore, the state is certainly within its rights to compel citizens to perform national service when it is needed for the benefit of society.

It might be objected that the cases of taxation and national service are not analogous: While taxation must be coerced, the military is quite able to find recruits without resorting to conscription. Furthermore, proponents of national service do not limit its scoped to only those duties absolutely necessary to the defense of the nation. Therefore, it may be contended, compulsory national service oversteps the acceptable boundaries of governmental interference in the lives of its citizens.

By responding thus, the opponent of national service has already allowed that it is a right of government to demand service when it is needed. But what is the true scope of the tem "need" If it is granted, say, that present tax policies are legitimate intrusions on the right to property, then it must also be granted that need involves more that just what is necessary for a sound national defense. Even the most conservative of politicians admits that tax money is rightly spent on programs that, while not necessary for the survival of the state, are nevertheless of great benefit to society. Can the opponent of national service truly claim that activities of the military such as quelling civil disorders, rebuilding dams and bridges, or assisting he victims of natural disasters-all extraneous to the defense of society against outside aggression--do not provide a similar benefit to the nation? Upon reflection, opponents of national service must concede that such a broadened conception of what is necessary is in keeping with the ideas of shared sacrifice community benefit that are essential to the functioning of a liberal democratic state.

1. Which one of the following most accurately describes the author's attitude toward the relationship between citizenship and individual rights in a democracy?

(A) confidence that individual rights are citizens' most important guarantees of personal freedom

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