The United States House of Representatives passed a bill last week that would deny federal defense funds to universities without ROTC programs and give military recruiters the same access to their campuses as other job recruiters.
The legislation would require schools with Reserve Officers’ Training Corps programs to file an annual report with the Defense Department certifying that they will continue ROTC operations. The bill is an expansion of the Solomon Amendment, a series of requirements passed by the House in the late 1990s that allows most national security programs to withhold grants from universities that deny military recruiters and ROTC programs equal access to their campuses.
Sponsored by Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.), the bill added the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Nuclear Security Administration to the list of groups that can deny funding to universities.
Rogers said the bill is an important step to clarify past legislation and provide the military with fair access to potential recruits.
“It is vital we act now to clarify current law so the military continues to have fair and equal access to the nation’s best and brightest, just like any other prospective employer,” Rogers’ Press Secretary Marshall Macomber said in an email.
Last October, a group of law schools called the Forum for Academic and Institutional Rights filed a lawsuit against the Solomon Amendment. The FAIR lawsuit argues that the military is violating the schools right to only support equal-opportunity programs because of its policy banning homosexuals from serving.
Opponents of the bill say it is unnecessary and an attack on university equal rights policies.
Rep. Martin Meehan (D-Mass.) opposes the bill. He said in a House session that the bill unfairly punishes schools with policies banning discrimination based on sexual preference and that it was created to protect the government from pending lawsuits.
“This bill is designed to force universities to violate their own policies against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and will undermine pending lawsuits that can challenge the so-called Solomon Amendment,” Meehan said.
But Rogers said the military needs support from universities.
“In times of war, our nation’s colleges and universities must follow the lead of the vast majority of Americans and do everything they can to support the efforts of our nation’s Armed Forces,” Rogers said.
Meehan said the legislation answers a problem that he does not believe even exists. He added that there is no current military recruitment crisis and that the Defense Department has exceeded its recruitment goals.
Lt. Morton Orlov, chairman and professor of Boston University’s Department of Military Science, said that while he is unfamiliar with the specifics of the bill, he thinks it is important that students have more access to information about ROTC and the military. He said many students he has met barely have information about their options.
“It’s always been a challenge to reach interested students, and the more information that we can get out enables students to make informed decisions,” Orlov said.
He added that ROTC is a voluntary program and information about it can only be useful to students.
Harvard University, which offers ROTC only through noncredit cross-registration at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, says it is in compliance with the bill and the Solomon Amendment.
Kevin Casey, Harvard’s vice president of government, community and public affairs, said Harvard students have full access to ROTC and military recruiters.
“Students have had access to programs and the system has been working fine,” Casey said.
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