Re: Kent State
Tue May 3, 2005 04:39
64.140.158.164
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Re: Kent State
Mon May 2, 2005 5:37pm
posted at:
discussion.cgi.63.html
The shootings were a complete travesty. No one should have died that day. But, too few people remember why the Ohio Guard was there in the first place. It was not because of the anti-war demonstration. It was because the night before, the students from Kent State burned and looted a business district in the town of Kent, that had historically catered to them. When the governor sent in the guard, many students demanded to know why the guard was allowed on "our" campus. The real question should have been:" what does looting have to do with protesting the war?" The guard was ill-trained for that type of deployment. But once the decision was made, it set the stage for an event that will be remembered forever as a black day in the Republics history. The cover-up continues to this day, but there is enough blame to go around for everyone, including Washington, the governor, the guard and the students.
------------------
Kent State shootings remembered - May 4, 2000
... National Guard troops fired on Vietnam War protesters at Kent State University
will be commemorated Thursday on the campus. ... Kent State remembered ...
MORE:>>
Introduction
On Kent State University in Ohio May 4, 1970, four students were killed by the Ohio National Guard during an antiwar rally. Sandra Scheuer was killed while on her way to class; Jeffrey Miller was killed when taking part in the rally; William Schroeder was killed while looking at the fight between demonstrators and Guardsmen; and Allison Krause, who may or may not have been taking part in the rally, was also killed. Nine others were wounded. After the killings more than 450 universities and colleges throughout the nation were closed because of student or faculty protest strikes. Riots swept over the nation`s campuses and at the ending of May the National Guard had been called out 24 times at 21 campuses in 16 states.
I will try to give an explanation of how the killings could happen; describe how and why the public reacted the way it did; and how the Kent State killings would be and will be remembered. I will attempt to mix contemporary 1970 material with material from books, magazines, reports and papers from 1971 and onward, to show wether the public, the media and the University itself, have changed attitudes towards what happened on Monday, May 4, 1970.
As it is said in one of the books I have used, the conflict which resulted in the killings at Kent State on May 4, 1970, did not develop that day, the night before or the nights before that1. To try and understand why it happened and why people reacted the way they did, it is necessary to look at some of the events leading up to the killings.
LAW AND ORDER
The election of 1968 was centered around three men. The Democrat Hubert Humphrey, the Republican Richard Nixon, and George Wallace, the governor of Alabama who formed the American Independent Party. It was Wallace who came up with the popular "slogan" for that year`s election: "Law and Order".
____________________
1 Kent State / May 4: Echoes Through a Decade, ed. Scott L. Bills (Kent, Ohio: Kent State University, 1982) p. 247.
Nixon was quick to adopt the same theme as it was an issue which the public was clearly interested in. Moreover, he chose as his running mate Governor Spiro T. Agnew: "A declared enemy of radicals."*
A majority of Americans - in particular the white middle class - wanted to hear about "the point at which the urban crisis became the problem of `law and order`"2. They were fed up with the riots in the black ghettoes, the antiwar movements, and young people`s behavior - which was incomprehensible to them. They were disgusted by the "revolt of middle-class youth"3. Many Americans did not understand why the young people - students in particular - dressed, spoke and lived like they did - or why they protested against the war in Vietnam instead of supporting their country and its soldiers. Not only did they not understand it, they saw it as an "erosion of standards" and "a loss of morality."4.
In these years there were often violent clashes between demonstrators - often these were students - and the police. It was common for the public to always support the police`s actions, even when the police were in the wrong.
It was - among many other issues - things like this Nixon used in his election campaign when he talked about the need for law and order. In his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention, he addressed the people which came to be known as "the silent majority", Nixon said:
"a new voice...being heard across America...It is different from the old voices, the voices of hatred, the voices of dissension, the voices of riot and revolution...the forgotten Americans, those who did not indulge in violence, those who did not break the law, people who pay their taxes...people who love this country."5
From the beginning of the "Nixon years" it was clear where Richard Nixon stood on issues concerning campus unrest. In the years up to May, 1970, there came numerous statements from the Nixon Administration on student unrest and antiwar movements. In February, 1970, Vice-President Agnew talked at a political banquet where he "denounced the SDS and other radicals and revolutionaries: `I would swap the whole damn zoo for a single platoon of the kind of young Americans, I saw in Vietnam,"6 he said.
___________________________
* John Morton Blum, Years of Discord: American Politics and Society, 1961-1974 (New York: W.W. Norton & Company,
1991), p. 312.
2 Journal of American Studies 3-4 1961-1971, ed. Dennis Welland (Cambridge: University Press, 1971), p. 6.
3 The Report of the President`s Commission on Campus Unrest (New York: Arno Press, 1970), p. 85.
4 ibid. p. 40.
5 John Morton Blum, Years of Discord: American Politics and Society, 1961-1974 (New York: W.W. Norton & Company,
1991), pp. 213-214.
6 Newsweek, February 23, 1970, p. 24.
In March, Nixon wrote that "protest on college campuses...persuaded the nation`s enemies that Americans were divided." In Years of Discord the author explains that statement with "as, of course, they were." In 1970 a Gallup poll, made previous to the killings, showed that two out of three Americans approved of the president`s handling of Vietnam 7.
But while the president and his men were opposing the antiwar movement still more Americans were opposing the Vietnam war. People were beginning to feel frustrated with the war. Millions of people opposed it and still there seemed to be no end to it.
NIXON`S CAMBODIA SPEECH AND "BUMS" STATEMENT
In April, Nixon had told the public that he was going to withdraw large numbers of U.S. troops from Vietnam. That is why, when he made his TV address in which he told about the invasion of Cambodia, people reacted so strongly. The announcement was made on the eve of April 30, 1970. In his speech the president talked not only about Cambodia, but also of campus unrest. He said that universities in the U.S. were being systematically destroyed 8.
In his memoirs Richard Nixon says: "I never had any illusions about the shattering effect a decision to go into Cambodia would have on public opinion."9.
The reactions to the speech were, in the student/university environment, swift and in most cases angry. The students saw the Cambodian incursion as a widening of the Vietnam war. One young woman, a student at Kent State University (KSU), said she felt "tremendous anger"10. A young male student said: "I wasn`t sure what would happen, but I was certain something would. Such an arrogant switch in national plans could not go unnoticed."11. The following day, on May 1 , the young man, together with other students at KSU, buried a copy of the Constitution at Kent State, declaring it officially dead.
CLICK FULL REPORT:
http://www.stud.hum.ku.dk/rikkebj/kent1970.html
Re: Kent State
Mon May 2, 2005 5:37pm
posted at:
discussion.cgi.63.html
The shootings were a complete travesty. No one should have died that day. But, too few people remember why the Ohio Guard was there in the first place. It was not because of the anti-war demonstration. It was because the night before, the students from Kent State burned and looted a business district in the town of Kent, that had historically catered to them. When the governor sent in the guard, many students demanded to know why the guard was allowed on "our" campus. The real question should have been:" what does looting have to do with protesting the war?" The guard was ill-trained for that type of deployment. But once the decision was made, it set the stage for an event that will be remembered forever as a black day in the Republics history. The cover-up continues to this day, but there is enough blame to go around for everyone, including Washington, the governor, the guard and the students.
------------------
Kent State shootings remembered - May 4, 2000
... National Guard troops fired on Vietnam War protesters at Kent State University
will be commemorated Thursday on the campus. ... Kent State remembered ...
MORE:>>
Introduction
On Kent State University in Ohio May 4, 1970, four students were killed by the Ohio National Guard during an antiwar rally. Sandra Scheuer was killed while on her way to class; Jeffrey Miller was killed when taking part in the rally; William Schroeder was killed while looking at the fight between demonstrators and Guardsmen; and Allison Krause, who may or may not have been taking part in the rally, was also killed. Nine others were wounded. After the killings more than 450 universities and colleges throughout the nation were closed because of student or faculty protest strikes. Riots swept over the nation`s campuses and at the ending of May the National Guard had been called out 24 times at 21 campuses in 16 states.
I will try to give an explanation of how the killings could happen; describe how and why the public reacted the way it did; and how the Kent State killings would be and will be remembered. I will attempt to mix contemporary 1970 material with material from books, magazines, reports and papers from 1971 and onward, to show wether the public, the media and the University itself, have changed attitudes towards what happened on Monday, May 4, 1970.
As it is said in one of the books I have used, the conflict which resulted in the killings at Kent State on May 4, 1970, did not develop that day, the night before or the nights before that1. To try and understand why it happened and why people reacted the way they did, it is necessary to look at some of the events leading up to the killings.
LAW AND ORDER
The election of 1968 was centered around three men. The Democrat Hubert Humphrey, the Republican Richard Nixon, and George Wallace, the governor of Alabama who formed the American Independent Party. It was Wallace who came up with the popular "slogan" for that year`s election: "Law and Order".
____________________
1 Kent State / May 4: Echoes Through a Decade, ed. Scott L. Bills (Kent, Ohio: Kent State University, 1982) p. 247.
Nixon was quick to adopt the same theme as it was an issue which the public was clearly interested in. Moreover, he chose as his running mate Governor Spiro T. Agnew: "A declared enemy of radicals."*
A majority of Americans - in particular the white middle class - wanted to hear about "the point at which the urban crisis became the problem of `law and order`"2. They were fed up with the riots in the black ghettoes, the antiwar movements, and young people`s behavior - which was incomprehensible to them. They were disgusted by the "revolt of middle-class youth"3. Many Americans did not understand why the young people - students in particular - dressed, spoke and lived like they did - or why they protested against the war in Vietnam instead of supporting their country and its soldiers. Not only did they not understand it, they saw it as an "erosion of standards" and "a loss of morality."4.
In these years there were often violent clashes between demonstrators - often these were students - and the police. It was common for the public to always support the police`s actions, even when the police were in the wrong.
It was - among many other issues - things like this Nixon used in his election campaign when he talked about the need for law and order. In his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention, he addressed the people which came to be known as "the silent majority", Nixon said:
"a new voice...being heard across America...It is different from the old voices, the voices of hatred, the voices of dissension, the voices of riot and revolution...the forgotten Americans, those who did not indulge in violence, those who did not break the law, people who pay their taxes...people who love this country."5
From the beginning of the "Nixon years" it was clear where Richard Nixon stood on issues concerning campus unrest. In the years up to May, 1970, there came numerous statements from the Nixon Administration on student unrest and antiwar movements. In February, 1970, Vice-President Agnew talked at a political banquet where he "denounced the SDS and other radicals and revolutionaries: `I would swap the whole damn zoo for a single platoon of the kind of young Americans, I saw in Vietnam,"6 he said.
___________________________
* John Morton Blum, Years of Discord: American Politics and Society, 1961-1974 (New York: W.W. Norton & Company,
1991), p. 312.
2 Journal of American Studies 3-4 1961-1971, ed. Dennis Welland (Cambridge: University Press, 1971), p. 6.
3 The Report of the President`s Commission on Campus Unrest (New York: Arno Press, 1970), p. 85.
4 ibid. p. 40.
5 John Morton Blum, Years of Discord: American Politics and Society, 1961-1974 (New York: W.W. Norton & Company,
1991), pp. 213-214.
6 Newsweek, February 23, 1970, p. 24.
In March, Nixon wrote that "protest on college campuses...persuaded the nation`s enemies that Americans were divided." In Years of Discord the author explains that statement with "as, of course, they were." In 1970 a Gallup poll, made previous to the killings, showed that two out of three Americans approved of the president`s handling of Vietnam 7.
But while the president and his men were opposing the antiwar movement still more Americans were opposing the Vietnam war. People were beginning to feel frustrated with the war. Millions of people opposed it and still there seemed to be no end to it.
NIXON`S CAMBODIA SPEECH AND "BUMS" STATEMENT
In April, Nixon had told the public that he was going to withdraw large numbers of U.S. troops from Vietnam. That is why, when he made his TV address in which he told about the invasion of Cambodia, people reacted so strongly. The announcement was made on the eve of April 30, 1970. In his speech the president talked not only about Cambodia, but also of campus unrest. He said that universities in the U.S. were being systematically destroyed 8.
In his memoirs Richard Nixon says: "I never had any illusions about the shattering effect a decision to go into Cambodia would have on public opinion."9.
The reactions to the speech were, in the student/university environment, swift and in most cases angry. The students saw the Cambodian incursion as a widening of the Vietnam war. One young woman, a student at Kent State University (KSU), said she felt "tremendous anger"10. A young male student said: "I wasn`t sure what would happen, but I was certain something would. Such an arrogant switch in national plans could not go unnoticed."11. The following day, on May 1 , the young man, together with other students at KSU, buried a copy of the Constitution at Kent State, declaring it officially dead.
CLICK FULL REPORT:
http://www.stud.hum.ku.dk/rikkebj/kent1970.html
