Answering The Call Again

The bill, which passed the House last week as the GIVE (Generations Invigorating Volunteerism and Education) Act, will create 175,000 new opportunities for service in areas of critical national need, including education, health, poverty and clean energy. It will do so not by creating new government bureaucracies, but by scaling up the efforts of existing public service, nonprofit and faith-based groups. At $14,000 per full-time service job, leveraged with countless additional volunteers, it is also an extraordinary value for our dollar in a time of economic crisis.

We are especially pleased that the legislation also calls for creating a Veterans Corps, which will both provide support to returning veterans and military families and - as important - engage them in service. This point is crucial - too often, veterans, especially wounded veterans, return home with a strong desire to serve but with few avenues to do so.

The Serve America Act will provide those avenues. Beyond the good accomplished by their actual service, the mere ability to continue serving provides incalculable benefits and meaning to the lives of our nation's young (and not so young) heroes. These men and women want nothing more than the chance to continue serving..

Organizations such as the Mission Continues and Survivor Corps provide injured veterans with opportunities to continue the fight. The Veterans Corps will give these groups and others like them the power to scale up so they can meet the needs of the 25 million veterans across the country and the hundreds of thousands streaming in from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The need for service is enormous. Unemployment among post-Sept. 11 vets stands at 11.2 percent, 3 points higher than the national average. Four hundred thousand veterans are homeless - a national disgrace. Health care, too, is increasingly a concern, with tens of thousands bearing the visible scars of wounds suffered in action and hundreds of thousands more bearing the invisible scars of traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder. Through the Veterans Corps, the Serve America Act will dramatically enhance the opportunities for all Americans to aid these wounded heroes.

Finally, those who serve in different ways have too long been divided by politics, culture or geography. Whether people enlist in the Marine Corps or volunteer for Teach for America, they do so from love of country. This legislation, by formally connecting in word and deed the value of civilian service and military service, can at last begin the long process of making us one nation - a nation of service.

The history of this country begins with citizen-soldiers sacrificing for the higher good. It continues today with warriors overseas protecting our freedom and heroes at home dedicating their lives to the health, education and well-being of their fellow Americans. The Serve America Act will assist both of these groups in their causes, and the country will be stronger - and more united - as a result. We urge its immediate passage!

William R. Richardson and William G.T. Tuttle Jr. are retired generals of the U.S. Army. Other authors of this article include Henry A. Hatch and Harry E. Soyster, both retired Army lieutenant generals; Leo M. Childs, a retired Army major general; Joseph R. Barnes, Clarke M. Brintnall, Gerald E. Galloway, James R. Ralph Jr., Richard L. Reynard, Alan B. Salisbury and Anthony A. Smith, all retired Army brigadier generals; John Cameron Fraser, retired U.S. Navy rear admiral; and John A. Hurley and Edward F. Rodriguez Jr., both retired U.S. Air Force brigadier generals.