Transcript of WKSU Radio Program, “Operation Information,” (initially called “Operation Quell”), May 3, 1970

[Mike Ewing]: –a lady calling from the Portage County community and we got interrupted by the news. A matter of lack of coordination I guess would be the best way to explain the problem.

Right now it’s eleven minutes after 11:00. This is Operation Quel, l once again the number is 672-7997 if you’re off campus. If you’re on campus it’s just 7997.

Hello, ma’am, you’re on the air.

[Caller 1]: Well, as I started to say–

[Mike Ewing]: Alright.

[Caller 1]: I’m a mother of a Vietnam veteran that was shot up in Vietnam–

[Ewing]: Yes.

[Caller 1]: –and some of his buddies were killed, and we’re quite upset about this thing going on at Kent State. We live here in Ravenna, and it’s just, well, [you have the whole United States, it’s upset us quite a bit?] because I really think the majority of the boys that have served in Vietnam know what’s going on over there. My son was drafted right out of graduation from high school, he didn’t really want to go into service but it was his country’s call and he went. And he didn’t really understand why he should go to Vietnam until he got over there. Then he realized how they were walking over those people, which are not very well educated. And he has seen since he’s been over there the, way that things went on, that if we, somebody, don’t go over there and protect those people, the Communists will come in all over. He did predict at the time, which was a year ago, that we would have to go in Cambodia, we would have to go into Thailand and Laos, and he said the next big place is going to be India because the Communists are going in there. And yet the students here that are privileged to go to college, finish their education, rebel, and then they want to say “peace” and all this and that. Are we supposed to lay down and let the Communists come in this country and walk all over it, like they are in the other countries? That’s what I don’t understand, why these students don’t realize that.

[Mike Ewing]: Well, back when Eisenhower was President of the United States and John Foster Dulles was Secretary of State, they came up with a theory that was called the Domino Theory, which was based on the idea that every country that was Communist would eventually get together as a unified force and take over the world, but of course in this day and age–in today’s complex political systems in the world, it’s obvious to many political analysts that this is not the case anymore. And, see, now in Vietnam for instance, the fact of the matter is that if the election in Vietnam, North and South Vietnam, were allowed to go through, that the Vietnamese people would have chosen Ho Chi Minh as their national leader. 80% of the people would have chosen him. Now, we’re not–should we really be in there supporting 20% of the people in Vietnam? That’s the question. We never should have gotten involved.

[Caller 1]: [Unintelligible] what about all the boys that have died? What are we going to do pull out and let their deaths be a waste? So that the [unintelligible] Communists spread out?

[Chris Kobrak]: Madam, I’m a student. A student who wouldn’t want to go to Vietnam. I think many–often friends of mine who have been to Vietnam overlook the fact that our troops do untold damage to the Vietnamese people, in bombings that they don’t often see, in other instances. I mean, that’s not defending what the–the very fact that the Communists are killing people, but it’s a tremendous tragedy and it goes on on both sides. I mean, just as the fighting that’s going on in Kent today is wrong, and the destruction is wrong here, it’s also wrong there and it should end. In many ways I think, as the commentator just mentioned, in 1954 our own President Eisenhower said in a free election 80% of the people of Vietnam would vote for Ho Chi Minh, and I think we’re possibly obstructing the will of the Vietnamese, and I think it’s a tragic destruction both here and there.

[Caller 1]: But how do these people spouting peace though think that that’s going to happen? If you read–trace back in your Bible you will see there is always war. I mean, I’m against it, as they say I’m a mother. I really went crazy when my son had to go, as far as that goes, but it’s life. I consider it life. I mean, you read your Bible you’ll see there’s always war. You straighten up one place, there’s somewhere else.

[Chris Kobrak]: Yeah, but it has to change. Never in the Bible were there atomic weapons, and never has man reached a stage of technology where he is able to destroy, obliterate all civilization, and I think it’s time, in this day and age, people have to start questioning the concept of war. As you say, it’s always been with us, but disease has always been with us, and we’re beginning to conquer it. I think it’s time we become civilized and start conquering one of the greatest plagues man knows, and that is his killing of other men.

[Caller 1]: Well, if they’re against the military then if we didn’t have the military or train our men with ROTC how would they keep–how would they protect our country even if we pulled back and stayed within the boundaries of the United States?

[Chris Kobrak]: Well, I think–

[Caller 1]:You have to have a military.

[Chris Kobrak]: That’s a very difficult problem.

[Caller 1]:We have to train and educate our men for it too.

[Chris Kobrak]: It does have some merit. There’s a slogan of radical, leftist sort of groups, that if every man wouldn’t fight, if the unknown soldier wouldn’t fight then we wouldn’t have wars. To a great extent, that’s very naïve, but I think it’s just time that the leaders of the Soviet Union, and China, and of our country begin to sit down and talk reasonably with each other and somehow work out the problems that we have, to a degree that we don’t have to go to war to settle it. And the other thing is that possibly we have to tone down the emphasis on military in our society. You see, if we have the military around and if children are constantly on television and see and our military people are made heroes of on television in unrealistic scenes, you know–war isn’t fought with–I recently saw a movie called The Battle of Britain, you know, and it was a very horrible movie to me because I saw these people being burned, but it was sort of ironic that they had this music playing, while they were having the dog fights. And as your son will testify to you, there’s no music playing when he’s fighting in Vietnam. It’s not nearly as romantic, and I think it’s about time that the people in our society begin to tone down and deemphasize the role of the military in life, that we have to begin to tell people that the military way of life is not necessary, it’s not, you know, it doesn’t have to be, that it can change and start making war and the military and the sort of a goal to–something we should abolish and something that is not part of life, and not something to be worked towards, but to be worked –a great evil–that should be worked against. Sometimes a necessary evil, but an evil that should be worked against.  

[Caller 1]: I think if they let the mothers run the word–

[laughing from the panel]

[Chris Kobrak]: I know my mother is one of the most peaceful people I know.

[Caller 1]: We’d settle it among ourselves instead of involving our children, I’m sure. Well, it’s been nice talking to you, thank you ever so much.

[Chris Kobrak]: Thank you.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you for calling.

This is Operation Quell, the number is 672-7997 and if you’re on campus it’s 7997. We will welcome calls, in fact, we welcome calls very much so from the community of Portage County because right now sitting at the desk with me is Chris Kobrak, who you just heard speak, and very intelligently so; Jackie Stewart, a grad assistant at Kent State University; and Dave Kritzer. We’re all students and we’re all open for your questions about how we feel about the war. And I think this would be a very interesting exchange between the community and those of us here on the panel because I know many of you wonder why this all happened this weekend.

Operation Quell, you’re on the air.

[Caller 2]: Hello?

[Mike Ewing]: Hello, you’re on the air.

[Caller 2]: I’m a resident of Kent–

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Caller 2]: –and I’m concerned at why the curfew was imposed upon the other residents of Kent and not upon the University Community until eleven o’clock.

[Mike Ewing]: We’ve been wondering about that. Do you have an answer, Dave? I mean, excuse me, not Dave. Or am I right?

[Chris Kobrak]: This is Chris.

[Mike Ewing]: Chris, right, I’m sorry.

[Chris Kobrak]: It was imposed on the community and not on the campus because the authorities felt that if it was imposed on the campus that it would create so much resentment among students that, you know, bottled up in the dorms on a hot night at eight o’clock just would be too much for most students, moderate, radical, or whatever their ideology is.

[Caller 2]: I see, they might explode later.

[Chris Kobrak]: Yeah, right. I think it was–at the time it was a very reasonable thing to do, I mean, given that the curfew to have it not apply to University was sort of a good thing to do.

[Caller 2]: I see, but if it had been imposed last night the ROTC building would still be standing.

[Chris Kobrak]: I don’t know, there’s a curfew now in effect on the campus and from what I’ve heard the last report is that there are students in the library and there was, until a short time ago, a band of about 500 students roving the campus and they don’t seem to be very bothered by the curfew. But it does keep students, innocent students, who may go out to see what’s going on, keeps them from being on the street I think. I don’t know.

[Mike Ewing]: They also moved the curfew up, as you probably know, to 11:00.

[Caller 2]: Yes, I heard.

[Mike Ewing]: There was one in the morning. Does that answer your question?

[Caller 2]: Yes it does. Thank you.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you for calling in. You’re welcome.

[Caller 2]: Okay.

[Mike Ewing]: This is Operation Quell, the number is 672-7997. Right now it’s 20 minutes after eleven o’clock and this is WKSU FM and AM in Kent, Ohio.

What are your peoples’ immediate–let’s ask for a girl’s opinion. What is your opinion, right off the top, about what happened the last couple of days here on campus, Jackie?

[Jackie Stewart]: Well, naturally I’m extremely disturbed as is everyone else. I got involved in it when I was called, at the time the other faculty members were, by Dr. Kitner, to meet at 7 yesterday, to get involved in talking to students and sort of just roaming around the campus. At the time it seemed like a very reasonable idea. We were terribly organized. When we got onto the Commons at 8, it became almost immediately apparent that we were not going to be able to do anything significant because, first of all, there weren’t–at least to me–apparent, any obvious organizers of this.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes

[Jackie Stewart]: It was mostly spontaneous. There were various little things going on across the Commons that had nothing in common. Bad metaphor.

When the fire broke out we called the fire department. That of course was a bad move, placing firemen in jeopardy.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Jackie Stewart]: While roaming again around campus, staying with the crowd but not being involved with the crowd–this is merely a personal observation, and the other faculty member who was with me does not share it at all, but I had the impression that as soon as we saw the National Guard, that people who before had been merely observers, merely following along with the crowd, began to feel personally threatened by this. I think that’s why there are so many students on this campus who ordinarily do not get involved in politics of any kind, have become so involved in this because they are especially concerned about the appearance of the National Guard and feel reasonably threatened by their presence. Obviously, it was a very bad move to bring them onto the campus.

[Mike Ewing]: Well, it also reflects on the individual’s own self, when you see your campus and you’re not really an involved student in this, and you see the National Guard coming on, it kinda reflects badly on yourself as an individual.

[Jackie Stewart]: Well, I think it takes away all sense of individuality when grown men and women are sitting around in here talking literally about how we can possibly get home safely. That sounds, to me, disturbingly unnatural.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Chris Kobrak]: But Jackie, do you really think the National Guard caused this?

[Jackie Stewart]: No, I’m not saying the National Guard caused it, I’m saying that the presence of the National Guard certainly contributes to it.

[Mike Ewing]: Because you feel more people take part in it because of the National Guard.

[Jackie Stewart]: I think that their presence tends to polarize what is already a bad situation.

[Mike Ewing]: Students and non-students.

[Jackie Stewart]: Exactly.

[Mike Ewing]: Yeah. So they’re sticking up for their own kind, other students, in a sense.

[Jackie Stewart]: Yeah, and people who I think would not ordinarily otherwise get involved.

[Mike Ewing]: Right.

[Chris Kobrak]: What evidence do you have of this?

[Jackie Stewart]: Evidence? Personal observation and discussion with people.

[Dave Kritzer]: What would you have had them do last night?

[Jackie Stewart]: Who?

[Dave Kritzer]: What would you have had done, last night by the authorities, people in authority. Would you have had the guard here, would you have had sheriff’s departments? Who would you have had taking care of that fire?

[Jackie Stewart]: Certainly I realize that people in authority had to be present. It was obvious to me and obvious to other faculty members who got involved that in fact we could not do anything. Step out a few minor little fires, but it was an incendiary condition. There had to be some kind of authority present, but I would hope that, and I think, again, personally, I think that the National Guard was not necessary. My own opinion was that the National Guard was, while obviously effective, they cleared the campus of people–

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Jackie Stewart]: –were disturbed, the kids–they were kids, mostly; they were very young men, they were very, very nervous, they were–

[Chris Kobrak]: They didn’t want to be here.

[Jackie Stewart]: No, they didn’t want to be here, and they were, I think, as frightened as the people that they were frightening. But that in itself is a very threatening kind of thing because if you–I don’t want to have a gun pointed at me by a very nervous, very scared kid. I don’t–

[Mike Ewing]: What would have been better, although this is very idealistic, is if students who had been opposed to what was going on had gotten together themselves. Because I think, as you say, this polarization thing is a very important factor and that is that, the minute you bring a force in like the police or like the campus police, the off-campus police, or National Guard, you immediately polarize the situation, and I think students in general are down on police, and down on this type of authority.

[Jackie Stewart]: One thing I don’t understand because we’re obviously talking about authority and I–first of all there should have been definite measures taken beforehand. Anyone who had thought carefully about it would have realized that the ROTC building under the circumstances was an obvious target for any kind of action if any was going to take place. And yet, first of all they did not remove any of the ammunition, secondly, the building was totally unguarded. There was no one there.

[Dave Kritzer]: But by your argument, if they’d started having people here on campus to take care of trouble that might happen they would have created more trouble.

[Mike Ewing]: They would have caused more.

[Jackie Stewart]: Well, alright, we have campus police as such, who happened to be stationed in that area anyway. I think possibly they could have at least had someone in the area. Perhaps the fire would not even have been started.

[Mike Ewing]: Let me intervene and take our caller. Operation Quell, you’re on the air.

[Caller 3]: Hello?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, you’re on the air.

[Caller 3]: Hello, Mike?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Caller 3]: I’d like to ask a couple questions. First of all, roughly, I mean, how many militants are there, roughly, on campus, you’d say a quarter or twenty-five percent, is there that many?

[Mike Ewing]: Of the student body? I doubt it. It’s probably more like two percent.

[Caller 3]: Two percent, well–

[Mike Ewing]: If even that.

[Caller 3]: Well they’re more or less instigating very much of this that is going on.

[Dave Kritzer]: We don’t even know–

[Mike Ewing]: Well, we don’t know. Nobody’s really sure about this. You know, it’s a lot of–

[Caller 3]: Outside help.

[Mike Ewing]: No, we don’t know about that either.

[Caller 3]: Oh.

[Mike Ewing]: You know, the fact of the matter is nobody really knows much of anything. We had a caller earlier tonight who said–and of course we can’t document this in any way whatsoever–who said he had a group of friends, he didn’t say how large they were, who they were or anything, that were the main instigators of what went on the last two days.

[Caller 3]: Yeah.

[Mike Ewing]: From what I would gather I guess he meant a group of about 15 or 20 people at the very most, but whether or not we can believe this, I don’t think we should. In other words, I’m not going to back it up because it’s purely speculation on the part of someone who called, and there’s no way to prove it. So there’s a lot of theories going around but I think a point that has to be made is that a lot of people who got involved may not have been a member of this group, but the fact is they got involved.

[Caller 3]: I agree. They just happened to be there at the wrong time.

[Mike Ewing]: Well, yeah, but they also got involved, they weren’t just there.

[Caller 3]: Uh huh.  And I’d like to ask you something else, now, what do you think that the local townspeople think of this situation?

[Mike Ewing]: Well, we’ve gotten a couple of remarks. One person called in and asked why we had a much later curfew than the town had. I guess they were–they don’t feel too happy about that. The second–the other reaction we got was from a lady whose son was back from Vietnam. He was injured, he’s a veteran, and we were discussing the war. And she was very down on what happened here at Kent State University. My plea would be right now–is if more people from the community would call in at 672-7997, and express their feelings on this. And we’ll move the calls as much as we can because I think we can get some more community people calling in on the program.

[Caller 3]: Yeah, I’d like to say I agree with the–I don’t know if you want to call them militants or disagreeable parties–I mean, everybody has that thing every day at work, right? To a certain extent.

[Mike Ewing]: You mean–

[Caller 3]: You have something that you don’t agree with every day of the week.

[Mike Ewing]: Right, well as we determined before, there’s a difference between dissent and disagreement.

[Caller 3]: Yeah.

[Mike Ewing]: And this was outright dissent. And disagreement’s a different thing which is what you face every day.

[Caller 3]: Uh huh. But–

[Mike Ewing]: Alright, we have to–excuse me for a minute but we have an important message here from our news department and we have to break for an ID, so hold on, alright?

This is WKSU AM and FM, Kent Ohio. And right now in the studio is Bill Eames of the WKSU News Department. Go ahead Bill.

[Bill Eames]: WKSU Radio News, we hate to interrupt, but there is a lot of action going on outside. We have mobile monitors out and we are communicating also with police control. There are at least 250 students, sometimes up to 500 students in the Taylor, Commons, Prentice, Dunbar, Tri-Tower area. They’re spread out. The three helicopters with the searchlights are conjugated in that area. They’ve let loose with a heck of a lot of tear gas and some of our units even got involved with the tear gas. Once again, there is a curfew in effect. Students are requested very strongly to get in their dorms and stay there. Onlookers or spectators are just going to get hit with tear gas and they’re going to get hit hard. Presently there’s gas all over the place. Tri-Towers tennis courts got hit. The area between Tri-Towers and Prentice/Dunbar got hit. The tennis courts over by Taylor Hall got hit, and the Commons. So there are quite a few National Guard moving into the area right now. There are about 20 individual National Guardsmen between Prentice and Dunbar, and other units around. WKSU News is in contact with all of them, and I have to leave now to keep monitoring, but that’s the situation at the moment. A lot of students have tried to move around and conjugate, but the National Guard simply won’t let them. It’s sort of useless moving around at the moment. That’s the latest news. Bill Eames reporting.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you, Bill. Bill, is there a possibility we can get a tape report from somebody on the scene?

[Bill]: On the scene at the moment, no. Unless we can get some actualities from Radio, TV, Information. They’re so busy over there they can’t even feed our open line at the moment, but reports will be coming in soon. I’ll get one as soon as I can for you.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much, Bill. That’s the latest news on what’s happening on the Kent State University Campus. And I will reiterate, stay in your dormitories, stay in your apartments, stay in your off-campus housing, stay inside, because all you can do is get yourself in trouble.

Right now it’s 11:31, this is Operation Quell and the telephone number here is 672-7997 if you’re living off campus, and 7997 if you’re on campus. We do–I reiterate–we do request calls from people who are members of the community and not directly associated with the University. We would like to get some dialogue going between the community and the University.

And we’re back to our caller. Hello?

[Caller 3]: Ok.

[Mike Ewing]: Yeah, you’re back on now.

[Caller 3]: Now, like I was saying about these militants and disagreements that you have with–everyday disagreements and things like that, I mean–but is violence necessary? Is it really necessary to get something across, really? Does–

[Mike Ewing]: That’s a very good question. It doesn’t seem that the people that started it here seem to think so. Carl, you being a communications expert and we haven’t really gotten into this–Carl Moore is back with us again, and he is a professor of Speech here at the University. I’d like to ask him, for you, if he could tell me if he feels the lines of communication on this campus are strong enough, and if the lines between University students and our government are strong enough. And if–what effect you feel this has on the situation, Carl.

[Carl Moore]:  The lines of communication exist, but that doesn’t mean a communications problem doesn’t exist because there’s a bit of a dilemma. The communications exist, but you’ve got to communicate to the people what those lines are. The problem exists in that people, being unaware of those lines, hence not being able to readily use them in times of crisis, times that are a little befuddling to the mind anyway, turn to other recourses.

Now your other question is whether violence is ever justified. I would like to think not. But just because I think not, doesn’t mean not.

[Mike Ewing]: In other words, it justifies to other people, yes. Go ahead we have other comments.

[Tom Dubis]: This is Tom Dubis, an instructor in History. I’d like to–you made the analogy before about a kind of situation that occurs in the shop or on the line, and it seems to me that there are some parallels. For example, working men do have organizations–unions–which very often, I gather, in given situations, like the post office thing, in which the lower echelon has for some reason or another, ceased to communicate. They say the channels of communication are there and exist but somehow or other those channels seem to have gotten clogged up. Consequently, within the field of labor relations, there are situations like a strike and there are of course violent things going on.

In the student situation, most of the grievances in regard to the campus are not of major proportions, and don’t come to the kind of situation that we have here now. The important thing is that, it seems to me, that this–what is going on at the University at this moment is related to national agony that we’re all going through, and the national failure of communication that we’re all suffering under.

[Caller 3]: Why is that?

[Tom Dubis]: Well. Why is that?

[Caller 3]: Why is there–I mean, I’ve been listening to your program and there–one of the men said something that there are representatives for all these different groups and everything, that there should be communication.

[Tom Dubis]: Well, it’s only of course in a crisis situation like this when these kinds of channels are turned to, when these kinds of channels open up. As Carl pointed out, the channels exist but the publication of the existence of those channels is often less than we would desire. And not only that, perhaps more important, the people who man these channels are anonymous to most of the students on campus, much as in industry today so many people are anonymous. And this anonymity is not simply, I don’t think, a factor of the size of the population. It’s the way in which we have organized from the–this whole kind of top-down structure, and on the campus it’s the students who are effectively not consulted. They are consulted only, most often, through very–well, less than satisfactory means. There’s no kind of system, effectively, of shop stewards. We have an ombudsman, but it doesn’t work out except, of course as I say, when everyone gets disturbed. So far as the national society is concerned, I think there are a number of reasons for the existence of this situation. The whole bureaucratic creation of bureaucracies that comes out of the way corporations–and a university is a kind of a corporation, it’s become that because of its size and its situation, its wealth, and its power.

Carl would like to say something.

[Mike Ewing]: Yeah, Carl has a statement or comment to make to the caller. Then we’ll go on to another one.

[Carl Moore]: One of the dilemmas of a democracy is that it does not provide as an efficient an organizational communication system as, let’s say, an autocracy or some more restricted kind of government. You see, if you’re going to allow people to disagree you’ve also got to allow people to take more time to do it, and you’ve also got to allow people more diffuse ways in which they can do it. Hence, given that we want to try and have a democratic system, we’ve got to permit for a much, much more complex communication system. Hence you’ve got the dilemma we find ourselves in.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much for calling. Alright we’re going to move on to some more people. I know that a lot of people are trying to get in.

[Caller 3]: Okay, thank you then.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you, too.

That was a beautiful point. I was just going to–I was thinking exactly the same thing when you talked about that because in a democratic society like we have, communication is the whole thing–

[Carl Moore]: That we seek, that we seek. The democratic society that we seek.

[Mike Ewing]: Well, yeah. That’s a good point. It’s not working out too awfully well today, is it?

Right now it’s 22 minutes before twelve o’clock, this is Operation Quell from Kent State University, WKSU AM and FM. The facilities of Kent State University radio and television.

Hello you’re on the air, this is Operation Quell. Hello?

[Caller 4]: Hello?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, you’re on the air, dear.

[Caller 4]: Yes, I’m calling more or less on the behalf of the National Guard. Earlier in your program, the girl on your panel, I forget the name, she made the comment that she understood that legal enforcements were necessary, and she said that they thought–they felt the police could handle it and the National Guard coming in, more or less, gave the people a different outlook on everything. Well, it comes down to where you have something like maybe 500 policemen against 1000 students and the odds are a little outnumbered, so they have to bring somebody in. Somebody has to say somewhere, the enforcement has to come from somewhere, so they call in the National Guard. And the students don’t like the National Guard on there, and the National Guard certainly isn’t happy to be in there because most of the guys are away from their families all this time, and they’re away from their jobs, and the government certainly isn’t paying them what they’re missing out on their jobs.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Caller 4]: And they’re not really that happy to be in there either, so it all comes down to the students say they want freedom, peace, love, happiness and all this and that, and then they go and cause all this trouble, and they’re just contradicting their own statements.

[Mike Ewing]: Well, don’t generalize it to all the students, I think this is one thing we’re trying to get across, and that is that I don’t really believe myself, and maybe all the people here will contradict me on the panel, but my feeling is that it’s not all the students, but rather a small group of students that are the main cause of the situation. And as far as the dilemma with the National Guard, I can go along with you, I feel for them too. If I was in the Guard I wouldn’t want to be up here, and, I would think, I would hope that there would be a better way to solve the problem than bringing the Guard in, but it doesn’t seem that there is right at this present time. My hope would be that students who didn’t want this happening on their campus would get together and try to quiet it themselves. But that’s very idealistic.

[Caller 4]: That’s what they need because they don’t have–there’s just not enough police force, and sheriffs, and what have you to handle the number of students that start in so they have to get the enforcements somewhere and then it’s the National Guard. And, I don’t know if–I know I’m probably speaking for many of the other wives of the guardsmen that are there too, and it gets kind of discouraging, the more the trouble there is, the more the husbands are gone, and the children don’t see the fathers, the wives don’t see the husbands, money isn’t coming in, and it just gets worse and worse all the time.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, Jackie.

[Jackie Stewart]: Well, first of all you said that it’s mostly the students’ fault and it’s too bad they can’t get together to solve this themselves and then the Guard wouldn’t come on. Well, the problem is that the students can’t get together and it’s kind of a circular sort of thing. The Guard is here preventing the students from getting together, so the students are trying harder to get together, the Guard is increasing in number, the students are becoming more polarized. It seems to me that if they removed the Guard, tried to use the full amount of police force available, and perhaps work from there, then if absolutely necessary bring the Guard back, I don’t think it would be.

[Caller 4]: It doesn’t seem to have worked too well from last night though. Before the guards even came in they had the police force there. And the students–the ones trying to cause the trouble seemed to outnumber the ones trying to stop the trouble. So the police force wasn’t enough and they had to bring the guards in.

[Tom Dubis]: Well, that’s not exactly a faithful reproduction of the situation. First, let me say I agree totally with your being appalled by the Guard having to be sent in, and the personal agony, and pain, and the problems that it causes. It’s unfortunate that groups of citizens are forced into a situation where they must confront each other under these circumstances. It doesn’t improve relations between community and university, or between people. But, as far as last night is concerned, what we’ve been trying here to suggest, because we’re trying to operate on the basis of what evidence we have, and that is that we’re trying to suggest that this conspiracy theory carried to great extremes by the governor, is simply without foundation at this time. And as was suggested before, it’s a matter of getting evidence on this. At the time that the situation started, and there are questions about the circumstances under which it got started, the central point of irritation on the campus was being ignored. And, I think the fact that that ammunition was left in the ROTC building is just unsupportable. I don’t know why it was, but I agree that the appalling quality of this situation, and the best thing to do I think is to–is for us as a community to try and get together and to solve our own problems, and that’s going to take quite a bit because we’re very much strangers to each other, and the presence of the Guard, the presence of our men, does not help the situation.

[Caller 4]: Well I’m all for the idea of taking the guards out because I wouldn’t mind getting my husband back home again. He’s been gone since, well, since they first called our Wednesday for Teamsters. And–

[Tom Dubis]: Amen, we agree with you. Right on.

[Mike Ewing]: Yeah, right on.

[Caller 4]: I was just sending the call through to kind of give a good word for the National Guard because everybody knocks them and they have, as individuals, they have nothing to say. It’s the Commanders that are told, “Bring the guys in.” They tell the guys, “You’re going in,” and whether they like it or not, they go. So I thought somebody should call in and give a good word for the individual guards that are there anyhow.

[Mike Ewing]: Point well-made and I think everybody would like them out of here too, you know. We appreciate their help but I know they’d rather be home and we would rather have our campus at peace.

[Tom Dubis]: And to have them back as individuals to visit with us.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you, dear.

[Caller 4]: Ok, thank you.

[Mike Ewing]: Bye bye.

[Caller 4]: Bye.

[Mike Ewing]: This is Operation Quell. It’s right now a quarter ‘till twelve. The number is 672-7997 if you’re off-campus. If you’re on campus the number is 7997. We will be operating until, I don’t know, Rick? What do you say, how late are we going to be going with this? It’s up to us, as long as people are interested in getting together and conversing on this topic we are willing to sit here and accept your calls. Uh, yeah, ok, we will hold for a second here. We have a caller waiting which we are currently in the process of screening. We would like to get people from the community to call in because we feel this is a very valuable exchange. If you’re in the community, don’t feel that because this is Kent State University that you aren’t welcome to call in because you definitely are. Very welcome to call in.

Operation Quell, you’re on the air.

Hello, you’re on the air.

[Caller 5]: Who, me?

[Mike Ewing]: Yeah, you.

[Caller 5]: Me? I’m on the air.

[Mike Ewing]: You’re on the air.

[Caller 5]: Alright, I’d like to–the last thing I heard on air was that someone was saying that our National Guard members were good souls as individuals and I think that’s fine. The point is that we are all good souls as individuals, but we are working for bad causes. And I’m a little bit concerned, for instance, that the radio station has been told by the police that they are not to tell the community what is happening in the community. The only places I know like that are places like South Africa and Haiti and South Vietnam and so on. So I really think the radio station itself ought to examine the policy.

[Mike Ewing]: Well, actually the policy is not exactly as you think it is. The policy has been to disseminate the news a little more slowly and a little more carefully than usual because of the nature of the situation.

[Caller 5]: One thing that I’ve heard–

[Mike Ewing]: Ok.

[Caller 5]: I’m on the faculty by the way.

[Mike Ewing]: Good. Ok.

[Caller 5]: One thing that I heard, at least the police think that a National Guardsman has been killed. If simply that statement gets out by the way, well, they’ll assume students did it. Whereas our information on rebellions and riots of this kind is that the police and National Guard generally kill themselves.

[Mike Ewing]: Well, as a point of interest, right here at this point we have what they call a rumor control center, which people can find out whether or not this is true, by calling 672-2480.

[Caller 5]: Well, I’m not going to–I don’t care to pursue that point at this point.

[Mike Ewing]: Right, well it was on the air so I think we ought to clarify that it is not definitely confirmed. Am I correct?

[Caller 5]: Ok, well I certainly hope it’s not true.

[Mike Ewing]: I do too.

[Caller 5]: I think also that if the rumor gets out it will be assumed that students did it and our evidence is that this is, in general, not the case. I would also like to point out that the President White has been really very derelict in this matter. He had an opportunity to meet with faculty members this afternoon and chose not to meet with them. We could have done something about this situation tonight, but he just chose to let it go and let–live with the National Guard situation. You know, he’s another one of those who may be just grand as an individual, but he is really irresponsible in terms of leading the community in a moment of crisis. I mean, we faculty were prepared to meet with him. Instead he comes on with a really, I think, shortsighted and myopic kind of press report this afternoon without any consultation on the part of the community that he’s supposed to represent and then refuses to meet with us later.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, well I’m not sure if this is right or not, but I believe that President White was confined to his home for a matter of safety. He’s under house arrest. You explain, you know more about this than I do.

[Carl Moore]: Let’s not generate rumors, either, of the sort about National Guardsmen nor the sort about President White. It is true though, as far as we know.

[Caller 5]: What rumors am I generating?

[Carl Moore]: The thing about the National Guardsman.

[Caller 5]: What about it?

[Carl Moore]: Well, we simply don’t know. I agree–

[Caller 5]: Listen, wait a second. Hang on a minute. I just tried to get to my class–get to my office on campus. Right?

[Carl Moore]: Right.

[Caller 5]: I was not allowed to go there. I was told to go to the sheriff’s department in Ravenna. I went to the sheriff’s department in Ravenna and they would not give me a pass. Notice the language I’m using. Ok? This is the language we use in Russia, right? They would not give me a pass to go to my office. They did say that the National Guardsman had been killed. Now among policemen, that sort of a rumor is dangerous.

[Carl Moore]: Indeed.

[Caller 5] Because this incites policemen to riot.

[Carl Moore]: It does.

[Caller 5]: Ok?

[Carl Moore]: Yes.

[Caller 5]: So, what I’m telling you is not something that you need to tell me about, you need to take it seriously because you’re the mass media.

[Carl Moore]: Yes, well, in this situation we can only reiterate that it’s necessary for people on campus to stay out of the way of the Guardsmen and the police, and to reiterate also our contention, or at least my contention that the presence in numbers and in these situations has become very inflammatory.

[Caller 5]: That’s right. I would say primarily because the people who were supposed to be responsible in this kind of a situation have chosen to confine themselves to their own heads or basements or wherever they are.

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah, well, in this situation with President White the point that Carl was trying to make or was about to make was that our information, that is, as members of the faculty, we were told that President White was effectively confined to quarters. Now that doesn’t mean that he’s being held, but that the National Guard and whoever else is involved feel that he should stay close to home for a variety of reasons. Now unfortunately–

[Caller 5]: [Unintelligible] in his home.

[Tom Dubis]: Well, indeed. I was going to say because of the general lack of communication between the broad masses of faculty and certainly students and the upper levels of the administration, we are to this point where we don’t know what’s going on and the president is a figure above and away from us that we can say very little about so that mass media here are not–

[Caller 5]: You’re pinpointing precisely the point that I’m trying to make! That the president is out of it! He is not being responsive to the community that he’s supposed to be representing!

[Tom Dubis]: Exactly–I’m not taking issue, I’m just–

[Caller 5]: Well, I am taking issue and I’m saying the man should be representing the students and the faculty who are concerned about what’s going on in this country!

[Tom Dubis]: That certainly is a reasonable contention.

[Caller 5]: Right? Instead he makes a press statement at 2:30 this afternoon that has no bearing, you know, is completely irrelevant to the community that he’s supposedly leading.

[Tom Dubis]: Well at this point, at this point, people interject and I think with a certain truthfulness since, afterall, this campus is occupied by the National Guard, that the Governor’s commander of the National Guard, that the president of this University is not effectively able to function as president of the University. Now the question of–

[Caller 5]: What does he do, sit down at that point and say, “I guess it’s all over, gang?” Just let Governor Rhodes intercede. Faculty and students have something to say about who’s in command of this campus!

[Tom Dubis]: Yes, well–

[Caller 5]: This is our community.

[Tom Dubis]: This is the time, I think, that one needs to talk to President White–

[Caller 5]: And perhaps that’s so. We tried to talk to him this afternoon and he could not see us.

[Mike Ewing]: I imagine President White will come through with a statement very soon. Possibly tomorrow.

[Caller 5]: How is he able to make a statement if he doesn’t have any information at his disposal from the community that he’s supposed to represent?

[Mike Ewing]: Good question.

[Caller 5]: Ok well–

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you for calling. Ok. This is Operation Quell. The Operation Quell number is 672-7997. And, right at this point we have to–are we off, or are we on? We’re on, but we have–

[Music playing]

[Mike Ewing]: Ok, we’re back on Operation Quell. The number is 672-7997. Or if you’re on campus it’s just 7997. Would you pick up the telephone please? Thank you very much. And right now it’s seven minutes before twelve o’clock. And I believe we have a caller waiting on the line. Do we? We can go. Ok.

Hello, Operation Quell, you’re on the air.

[Caller 6]: I’m a member of the Kent community and the University community. After hearing the last gentleman, there was a member of the faculty, I felt that I would like to call too.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, go ahead, dear.

[Caller 6]: I think that he is very much misguided as to who the president of the University represents. I think the president is there in the interest of the students and the taxpayers. I don’t think that the faculty is really expected to be running the University. I think they’re to be running their classrooms.

[Mike Ewing]: Would you like to comment? Yes? We’ll go with Carl Moore first.

[Caller 6]: Well, I just felt that I wanted to call after hearing that one gentleman call who was on the faculty because I think our University would be much better off without members of faculty like this.

[Carl Moore]: I would really like to respond to your statements on this, and the reason I would is because this is something I’m personally most concerned about. I think as initially conceived, the university is designed to function between two primary bodies: the student and those who teach the student. In other words, the faculty and the students. And for most of the history of higher education those have been the two predominant elements in the educational process. Given the occurrence of the rising of the large universities, the third element has had to come to play, and that’s the administration of the university, but that still doesn’t–and it’s most necessary, I would never deny the need for administration, but I don’t want the tail to wag the dog. I don’t want the administration, whose function is to serve the faculty and to serve the students, to direct the faculty and the students in the way that the faculty and the students do not want to be directed, because they are still the primary elements of the university. So I guess my response to your question is, is that there has to be perspective. There has to be perspective in that students and faculty must still have a vital role to play in the functioning of their university.

[Caller 6]: Don’t you think that the taxpayers have an interest too?

[Carl Moore]: They certainly do.

[Caller 6]: While I have no children in college now, I am a taxpayer who supports the University, I have young children who will be attending the University I hope, and I certainly don’t want to see the University deteriorate to the point where I don’t want my children to attend them.

[Carl Moore]: Nor do we. Nor do we. But just the fact that students and faculty may have a say in the voicing and the running of the university does not necessarily mean the universities will deteriorate. Hopefully to the contrary.

[Caller 6]: Well, I realize that, but don’t you think we need a better grade of people teaching our students? Who are not going to condone the type of behavior that’s been going on in the past weekend?

[Carl Moore]: I don’t not think it’s a reasonable conclusion to draw that the faculty and students condone actions which are counterproductive to the operation of the University. I don’t think that conclusion can be drawn as a result of the actions on campus.

[Caller 6]: Oh, definitely not the majority of the students or faculty. The majority of the students are kids who are there for the sole purpose of getting an education, and the majority of the faculty is there for the purpose of giving those kids a good education.

[Carl Moore]: I agree. I agree. I think there’s somebody else on the panel who’d like to respond also.

[Chris Kobrak]: My name is Chris Kobrak. As a student who has been involved in student government for a year and a half, in two years I can tell you that by unanimous vote of the highest legislative body of students on campus, they voted to condemn the action that was taken by students last night, and I’ve seen the same sort of response by the faculty, as again to reiterate what Mr. Moore just said, I think it would aid the University in performing its function, as you agree, of educating students to allow the people being educated, to allow the people doing the educating, to make some decisions.

[Caller 6]: The gentleman was criticizing President White, who I’m sure today was a very busy man, and to say that simply because he refused to meet with, or couldn’t, wasn’t able to meet with the faculty today, that they could have taken care of this situation if he had just talked to them.

[Tom Dubis]: Well, that isn’t the logical conclusion to be drawn from the gentleman’s suggestion. But he was indeed making the point that the president, for whatever reasons, did not communicate with his faculty, and he was underlining the points I think that Carl made before. Ma’am, I wonder if I could ask whether you’re personally acquainted with either President White or the Mayor of Kent?

[Caller 6]: No, I am not.

[Tom Dubis]: Well, neither am I, and there are so many of us in that position at the moment, and so many in a position where even the personal relations, you know, on a much lower level and very broadly throughout the University and the community, and I think that, to make a postmortem, that is one of the reasons why we have reached this situation. And I think the gentleman who called before was trying to emphasize, underline, very strongly. Afterall, it is the position of leaders to lead, but with the advice and consent of those in his community, and that has been the question that has been raised about how various public leaders have been conducting themselves. And it’s a legitimate question to raise, I think, a fundamental question to raise.

[Caller 6]: Well, I would say that he was probably a very busy man today. I think it’s unfair to criticize without knowing any reasons why he could not meet with them. Don’t you think?

[Tom Dubis]: I agree that unfair criticism is wrong and is malicious, but I’m not entirely convinced that this criticism was unfair. There are so many busy people in this society and in this community that it’s absolutely amazing at times. This busyness is of course a matter of selecting what you do and how you spend your time, and I think many of the community here on campus are beginning to seriously question, and particularly as a result of the situation coming to this point, as to how leaders, how administrators, how faculty, and how student leaders, how all of those people in the upper echelons of the hierarchy, who are not the common man, how they are conducting themselves, and how they are relating to the people who they are supposed to be representing and supposed to be offering leadership to. Well, would you care to comment on that? And then I’m getting a signal we should–

[Mike Ewing]: Yeah, we should try to get some more callers.

[Caller 6]: No, I just thank you for giving me a chance to say something.

[Tom Dubis]: Well thank you for calling.

[Caller 6]: Bye.

[Mike Ewing]: Goodbye. Right now it’s 12:01 in Kent and this is WKSU AM and FM, Kent, Ohio. Just blew your ears out, right? Ok.

This report has just now confirmed that 15 arrests have been made as a result of curfew violations. Students are now roving in small bands around the KSU campus. Only minor disturbances have been reported. The National Guard is preventing any large groups from gathering on campus. I’ll read that once again. 15 arrests have been made as a result of curfew violations. Students are now roving in small bands across the campus. Only minor disturbances have been reported and the National Guard is preventing any large groups from gathering on campus.

We had a caller earlier who stated–this is two calls ago–that a National Guardsman was killed. This is not confirmed. This may be only a rumor. It may not be true, we’re now checking on it. We will let you know as soon as we find out. That’s in reference to the earlier caller who suggested that a National Guardsman was killed. We do not know if this is true. I would take it for a rumor right now. We will confirm it as soon as possible.

And we have a caller. Operation Quell, you’re on the air.

[Caller 7: Mike Alewitz]:  Yeah, Mike?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Mike Alewitz]:  This is Mike Alewitz.

[Mike Ewing]: Hi Mike, how are you?

[Mike Alewitz]: I’m fine.

[Mike Ewing]: What do you know about this whole thing?

[Mike Alewitz]: Well, I don’t really know that much. I must be honest.

[Mike Ewing]: I’ve been trying to get you on the phone for about two days.

[Mike Alewitz]: Yeah, well.

[Mike Ewing]: Can I identify who you are?

[Mike Alewitz]: Yeah, go ahead.

[Mike Ewing]: Mike is president, right? Of the Young Socialist Alliance?

[Mike Alewitz]: Right.

[Mike Ewing]: Ok, go ahead Mike.

[Mike Alewitz]: First of all, the name of the program: Operation Quell. Why is it named Operation Quell? I think it would be much better to be named Operation Information. Or Operation Action, or something of this type, cause I don’t think that there’s any need to quell the unrest that’s going on.

[Mike Ewing]: Well, if we disseminate information we hope that that will help to quell the problem, if people can understand what the problem is a little better.

[Mike Alewitz]: Well, you see the problem is an expanding war in Southeast Asia and other things. Trying to quell and stifle a popular movement certainly is doing nothing to help things.

[Unknown speaker]: Very true.

[Mike Alewitz]: It’s a very bad name.

[Mike Ewing]: Right, ok well we can change the name at this point if you’d like.

[Mike Alewitz]: Yes, why don’t you change the name.

[Mike Ewing]: What would you like me to call it?

[Mike Alewitz]: How about Operation Information?

[Mike Ewing]: Operation Information. Alright that’s sort of open-ended and not very specific, but we can use that if you’d like. It was a good point, well made.

[Mike Alewitz]: Now, I’ve been listening for a little while here, and this lady called up and said, “What about the taxpayers?” and this type of thing.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Mike Alewitz]: Unfortunately it’s not in the taxpayers’ interests to have the National Guard on our campus. Taxpayers do pay National Guard. Unfortunately, the National Guard, because they take their orders from different sources, are not acting in the interest of the taxpayers who live in the Kent community and the rest of the state, for that matter, any more than they’re acting in the interest of the students.

[Mike Ewing]: Whose interest do you believe they’re acting in?

[Mike Alewitz]: Well, you see, I think that Governor Rhodes, for instance, is not representative of the people of Ohio, and I don’t think that the people of Ohio who have shown that they’re against the war in Vietnam and against the expanding war, are happy to see National Guardsmen come on campus to quell, to use that word, disturbances against that war and demonstrations against that war.

[Mike Ewing]: But does–do you–I can justify some kind of, you know, a demonstration. But I can’t justify breaking of windows in downtown Kent, and I can’t justify burning of the ROTC building. Although maybe I could justify the ROTC building a little more than I could the downtown windows.

[Mike Alewitz]: Yeah, well, it’s unfortunate that the people who scream about violence and the people who are really down on students who are demonstrating and do this type of thing–I wish–these are the same people who are responsible for genocide. And when you think in those terms then you realize that what the hell’s a few windows? Or what the hell’s a ROTC building, for that matter? And people like Chris Kobrak, for instance, who’s running the show now, people who scream about that certainly don’t scream about the war in Vietnam. And that’s very unfortunate.

[Chris Kobrak]: Mike, am I responsible for genocide?

[Mike Alewitz]: No you’re not.

[Chris Kobrak]: You just said, those people who scream about the violence downtown and scream about the burning of the ROTC building are responsible for genocide.

[Mike Alewitz]: No, you see, the people who do scream about that are responsible. Now if you wish to scream along with them–

[Chris Kobrak]: I don’t like it. I don’t like it and I’m sort of in sympathy with people who want to see it stop. Not–sort of–in sympathy with the National Guard who are trying to stop it, Michael.

[Mike Alewitz]: You are in sympathy with the National Guard?

[Chris Kobrak]: In sympathy, yes.

[Mike Alewitz]: Well, I’m not in sympathy with the National Guard. I’m in sympathy with National Guardsmen, because I feel that they are forced into the National Guard also. I’m not in sympathy with the National Guard being called onto this campus.

[Chris Kobrak]: With the action? I don’t like the fact that it happened. But I view it as sort of a necessity, regarding the alternative. I don’t want to see the alternative, and that is possibly other buildings being burned down, the chance that innocent people–

[Mike Alewitz]: Well, will you be satisfied when the alternative turns out to be a lot of students arrested, and gassed, maced, or shot, or bayoneted as may have happened already?

[Chris Kobrak]: But, see, yesterday, without the National Guard, for instance, a fireman had the hell beaten out of him.

[Mike Alewitz]: Well, you see if the fireman hadn’t gone near the building that wouldn’t have happened, would it?

[Chris Kobrak]: Yeah, but he was just doing his job.

[Mike Alewitz]: Well, so were they doing their job in Nazi Germany, ok?

[Chris Kobrak]: I don’t think putting out the ROTC building is any way comparable to killing 6 million Jews, Mr. Alewitz. And if you don’t see the distinction, I’m sorry.

[Mike Alewitz]: Well, if you don’t see the distinction between taking a moral stand on something and–

[Chris Kobrak]: I know what a moral stand is, Mr. Alewitz, and I also know what a cognitive matter is. And it’s just simply a cognitive matter to know that the two are not the same. If you want to view that fireman as Adolph Hitler and Eichmann, or any of those stooges who are torturing helpless Jews and other Europeans, then, you know, your cognition, your ability to perceive things is somewhat warped.

[Mike Alewitz]: No, on the contrary, see, I can’t really blame that fireman. What I’m saying is this, alright, when you attempt to use that type of excuse, “that I’m only doing my job,” and this type of thing, and we’re getting away from this which I don’t want to do. That’s bad.

[Chris Kobrak]: I’m sorry my examples are–

[Mike Alewitz]: I wish you would be as vocal.

[Chris Kobrak]: Mr. Alewitz, how many times did you come to Student Senate, for instance, and ask for money for the anti-war movement,and how many times did myself, and how many times did I and other senators support that sort of action?

[Mike Alewitz]: Once.

[Laughter from panel]

[Chris Kobrak]: Once. And, how much money was given to the anti-war movement then?

[Mike Alewitz]: Well we’ve had–there was some money allotted, we haven’t gotten it yet.

[Chris Kobrak]: Oh, I see.

[Tom Dubis]: But, that’s a lot of jive, I mean that’s the old argument about, “We gave our kids everything and look what they’re doing.” The point is that when you phrased it, that you’ve got to come, when you came before the Student Senate, this [unintelligible] body, that all of a sudden is divided on hierarchical lines just like the rest of the society, the corporate elite of the underclass in the university. The high men in the low position on the totem pole. I mean, it was good, it was nice, but the left organizations have never been able to get cooperation from the administration of the sort that they thought was appropriate, the sort that they thought was equivalent to other organizations. I’ve heard that grievance expressed a number of times.

[Chris Kobrak]: I have some information on that point. I mean the support that the administration has given to the new left, to the anti-war movement, I haven’t seen very much evidence of that. For example, when Michael once came to Student Senate asking Student Senate to investigate why Frank Frisina had not allocated him an office. I personally was responsible for checking this out. I found out that he was in fact offered an office, but refused to share it. Frank only had four–

[Mike Alewitz]: Let’s be a little honest, ok? In fact, it was explained quite clearly that we were not given an office. We were offered a place where we could put a typewriter in an office. It was already being used by three other groups. We were not satisfied with that. That’s true. We wanted an office. Even if we had been willing to share an office. Not a corner in an office. And you knew that quite evidently, and you refused to do anything. I guess it wasn’t politically beneficial. That’s unfortunate.

[Tom Dubis]: For the larger community, this is the sort of knocking of heads and the disagreements that go on in our community, that so far at least, the channels have not been successful as they’re supposed to be in resolving. Look, Mike, you want to say anything else because there are a couple people on the line who want to get in.

[Mike Alewitz]: No, I’ll just close by saying that–well, nevermind.

[Tom Dubis]: Ok, thanks.

[Mike Alewitz]: That’s all.

[Tom Dubis]: Alright.

[Mike Ewing]: This is Operation Information, we changed our name as of twelve o’clock tonight. The number here is 672-7997 if you’re off campus. If you’re on campus the number is 7997. My name is Mike Ewing and with me are Chris Kobrak, Carl Moore, Mr. Tom Dubis, and Jackie Stewart. All concerned people, either students, faculty, or grad assistants, as may be the case. We’re [lousing] things up here. Doctor, oh I’m sorry, Dr. Thomas Dubis.

[Tom Dubis]: No, just Tom Dubis.

[Mike Ewing]: Just Tom, oh, ok. Just Tom Dubis. That’s groovy. Alright we have a caller. Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 8]: Hello. I am a resident of Kent and I would like to know how and why can you justify the burning of the ROTC building?

[Carl Moore]: Let me answer that.

[Mike Ewing]: Yeah, go ahead Carl.

[Carl Moore]: Nobody on the panel has tried to justify the burning of the–

[Caller 8] No, he said that he could more justify the burning of the ROTC building than he could the breaking of the buildings. How can you justify the burning of the ROTC building?

[Carl Moore]: Nobody here’s trying to justify that to my knowledge.

[Unidentified speaker]: You’re referring to the call.

[Mike Ewing]: That was my comment–

[Caller 8]: Yes, he did make a comment like that.

[Mike Ewing]: I made the comment so maybe I ought to answer. I’m not justifying either one, frankly, but I can see more of a reason for one than the other. I can’t see breaking the windows of downtown merchants who work very hard for a day’s living, but yet I can see the reasons for burning of the ROTC building because they want to get ROTC off campus and they’ve been trying to do it for quite a while.

[Caller 8]: Why?

[Mike Ewing]: Why do they want it off campus?

[Caller 8]: Yeah.

[Mike Ewing]: Because students of Kent State University–well maybe I shouldn’t say all of them but many of them do not support the war in Vietnam and ROTC represents the military and therefore support of the war.

[Caller 8]: I know ROTC is military but where would you be if we didn’t have military?

[Mike Ewing]: I’d be right here.

[Caller 8]: Alright. Well, I have a son right now that is in Vietnam in the Cambodian bush, now how do you this makes me feel to see these kids that have the opportunity of going to college and are doing things like this and running around and doing things that they shouldn’t be doing and he’s giving his life, or may give his life, for them?

[Carl Moore]: We don’t want them there.

[Mike Ewing]: We don’t want them there my dear. I don’t want to go either and I may go in a matter of months. I don’t want to go any more than your son wanted to go, but I don’t believe in this war.

[Caller 8]: [Unintelligible]

[Mike Ewing]: We shouldn’t be in Vietnam, and it’s people like you who should speak up and say, “No I don’t think we should be in Vietnam and I don’t think my son should be fighting in Cambodia right now.”

[Caller 8]: But do you think the burning of the ROTC, that took our money, my money to help build this building, is going to stop that war in Vietnam?

[Mike Ewing]: There are a lot of people who, on this campus, have tried to get that ROTC off campus. Now there’s no reason why ROTC has to be on campus. It can be off campus. There’s a lot of students who are very dissatisfied with the fact that ROTC is on campus. They’ve tried to view their points and they haven’t been given the correct channels and they haven’t been given any satisfaction, so consequently I guess they’re going to burn a building. But the group who burned the building, I would imagine, was instigated by a small group of students so I would appreciate it, and I don’t know if you’ve done this, but I would appreciate it if people would not generalize this to the entire student body.

[Caller 8]: No, I know that. But I mean, I don’t think it’s fair that these students should be allowed to do things like this.

[Carl Moore]: Right. And Mike in his statements is not condoning the action. He was simply saying that this was an action, the result of frustration on the part of some students. It happened. We’re not condoning it.

[Caller 8]: Well I hope not.

[Mike Ewing]: Definitely not, I grant you that. Thank you.

[Caller 8]: Because I feel terrible to think that my son had to give his life up for them.

[Mike Ewing]: My dear, I would do anything to get your son back here tomorrow morning.

[Caller 8]: I would too, believe me. He’s been there 8 months. He should be back.

[Mike Ewing]: He certainly should. He shouldn’t have had to go in the first place.

[Caller 8]: That’s right, he shouldn’t have. But he’s there and he hasn’t complained one bit and he’s doing his part. And he’s not doing things that he’s not supposed to be doing.

[Mike Ewing]: Right. Thank you for calling.

[Caller 8]: Mmhm.

[Mike Ewing]: Goodbye.

This is Operation Information and the number is 672-7997, if you’re on campus. It’s 7997. Does anybody have a comment to make along here while we’re waiting for our screen?

[Tom Dubis]: This is–there seems to be a certain quality of, what shall I say, personal and a very immediate jibe. That is to say, a kind of talking around issues. There is no member of this panel and I think few members of the student body, the most radical perhaps the most of all, who want to see people hurt, who want to see our soldiers shot, killed, who wanted to see the situation at the University come to the place where it is. Those personal regrets and the recriminations that tend to grow out of personal pain in a kind of situation like this are important to voice and it’s good we’re on the air to get them out of peoples’ systems. But we’ve got to focus on this question of issues and what is going on, and I think it was well put by both of you gentlemen that there is a connection between what is going on here, and what is going on across the country, and finally what is going on in southeast Asia in particular.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you, Tom. Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 9]: Hello?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, you’re on the air.

[Caller 9]: I’d just like to say, in regards to the burning down the ROTC building is that, I think that actually it’s not furthering the ends of the ones who did it because ROTC more or less is a liberal element, it works against the military establishment in that it gives the army an influx of officers with a liberal education that they get while they’re in college, and if there wasn’t a ROTC, they’d have to get all their officers from either military universities like West Point or the Air Force Academy, where they just get them from guys going through the ranks. And neither of those–that would provide much more like a warmonger, militaristic army on high command.

[Mike Ewing]: That’s a good point. Go ahead Tom.

[Tom Dubis]: Well, that certainly is a good point and to pick up on it a little bit, this idea of a volunteer army, a professional military force, which has been bandied about, is another dimension of this business that was brought up before about the militarization of the society, but I think we’ve got to examine the mechanisms, in other words, why such a big army? You know, why do we need all these officers? Why do we need all of these cadres? And what was the point of it?

[Caller 9]: Perhaps the great number isn’t necessary. But in proportion, if they have to–if there is going to be a need for officers, they have to come from somewhere. ROTC’s just one of the areas in which the officers–where they come.

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah, well, I think that in focusing on ROTC and the reason that it’s on campus and its size, we got to make the connection the other way to why that big army? Why all these military activities?

[Caller 9]: See, but still, anything working against ROTC is actually working for the militarization of society because it’s stopping any liberal influx into the army, into the army high command. What ROTC’s doing is taking civilian guys like myself and you and putting us in the army. That way you have your liberal education and you just had your ROTC training. Well, the other way, if you weren’t getting guys from ROTC you’d get guys that worked through the ranks and are totally oriented towards the army. Towards the military establishment.

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah, I’m not sure. I agree with the sentiment of what you’re saying. I’m not sure it’s been empirically verified. I realize that sounds like a cop-out, but I would like to see some evidence before, first of all, I would accept it. But like I said I tend to agree with what you’re saying. But one point that I would like to make: I think we could move even further in that direction. If ROTC had to exist on a campus, were to exist on a campus, if it were to come under the jurisdictions that the other academic units have to come under on a campus–in other words, the appointments of those people who would teach in ROTC came under the inspection or the verification of the academic units of the University, the textbooks that were used by ROTC were reviewed by the University as they are in other situations. In other words, what we would ask of ROTC is what we ask of any other element in the University, and perhaps that would have even a more humanizing element on ROTC.

[Caller 9]: The humanizing element isn’t on ROTC itself, it’s the humanizing element of ROTC on the army establishment. I’m sure there are certain facets of the ROTC program that could stand to be looked into. I’m sure there’s change that is necessary. Then you just get back to this is a little extreme step. And they’re not advocating change in the ROTC program. They’re advocating abolishment of any type of ROTC program.

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah. And for a variety of reasons, and really I’m not sure that we’re competent on this panel right now to discuss that variety of reasons. Okay?

[Caller 9]: Okay.  

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much for calling.

[Caller 9]: Okay, thank you.

[Mike Ewing]: Operation Information number is 672-7997.

[Tom Dubis]: I’d like to say something and that is that, we here on the panel are here rapping because we’re interested in what’s going on and we’re trying to give people an outlet to talk. By no means are we authorities on all the things we’re saying and please don’t make the assumption that we are. You’re getting very personal, opinionated judgements, simply to give people an outlet to talk about these matters. Don’t take what we’re saying as gospel. We’re just saying, at a very personal level.

[Mike Ewing]: We’re providing a means of communication which we feel is very necessary.

[Tom Dubis]: At least that’s what we call it.

[Mike Ewing]: Right. Operation Information, you’re on the air. Hello? Hello?

[Caller 10]: Hello?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, you’re on the air. You may have to turn your radio down because it will tend to mix you up.

[Caller 10]: Hello. I’m calling to ask about the ROTC being–

[Mike Ewing]: Could you turn your radio down first?

[Caller 10]: Right.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much. Right now it’s twenty two minutes after twelve o’clock. If you do call in, turn your radio down because we are on what they call a seven second delay and everything you hear over your radio is seven seconds after it actually happens. Hello?

[Caller 10]: Ok, I’m calling to ask about the ROTC being on campus. Don’t you think it’s a symbol of the military, and exactly the same military that’s firing tear gas at students who’ve paid tuition to come to a campus and they’re just walking around tonight? And it was probably destroyed–the ROTC building was probably destroyed because it was the symbol. It was the symbol of the same organization that has existed after the last world war in an immense number, in an unreasonable number. As long as you have that large of a military force you’re going to find something to do with it. Governor Rhodes sure found a lot of things to do with it in Ohio. He put down the Teamsters strike, he’s working on the–he’s in the mail strike thing, now he’s on Kent State, with all these National Guards. Who asked for them? Were they asked in here by the students? They didn’t ask for them here, they didn’t ask for ROTC. What’s going on?

[Dave Kritzer]: My reply to it is sort that–are the fires of the trees by Taylor Hall a symbol of the military? And are the fires at the tennis shack near the Engleman tennis courts a symbol? I just–

[Caller 10]: Are the fires near Vietnam of villages and things a symbol of peace? A symbol of the United States? A symbol of us liberating them? Don’t you think there’s a little bit of ethnocentrism involved? Where we feel that we’re right, so we’re going over there to tell them that we’re right and we’re saving them! When as you said earlier today, we don’t have the support of the people of Vietnam. What are we doing over there? I mean, we’re–the domino theory, you brought that up earlier. That’s really funny. You get into Cambodia now. That’s supporting your domino theory, only you’re losing. You’re going into Cambodia because you’re losing! If they’re in there to win, why don’t they win and get out or whatever they’re going to do instead of playing a limited warfare, where students and people from the United States are sent over there to be killed at a set rate? And then they keep justifying it with so many committees and they say, “Oh, wow, this is–”

[Unidentified panelist]: But you seem to be justifying the burning of the ROTC building because there’s violence over in Vietnam. I can’t justify violence on the Kent State University campus on the basis of violence anywhere else.

[Caller 10]: Ok, don’t you think that the National Guard being here is precipitating violence?

[Dave Kritzer]: I’m pretty glad they’re here, because–

[Caller 10]: If you see someone aiming teargas at you, what are you going to do?

[Dave Kritzer]: I guess I’d run.

[Caller 10]: The immediate reaction is to defend yourself and then to retaliate, that’s an animal instinct. If you’re going to reduce students to animals they’ll react that way every time.

[Dave Kritzer]: My question is, why aren’t students in dorms?

[Caller 10]: What? Oh, that’s their fit place, right?

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah, that’s the rabbit [unintelligible].

[Caller 10]: Yeah, that’s where they shove everyone, see? Now, you do what we say and you don’t dissent at all, you know? It’s like the moratorium where Nixon tried to get a thing passed saying that it was illegal to say anything against the government during that week. What kind of right to dissent is that? What ever happened to Thomas Jefferson and his revolution every 30 years, you know? What happened to those things? Why is it that whenever there are any social problems, whenever there are any questions, they don’t get through the channels which is a bunch of bureaucracy in which they just pigeon-hole now, you know? They say, “Oh, well, go see this committee, and this committee, and this committee,” and somewhere along the line your problem will get assigned to limbo. Nothing ever gets done on the committees, it’s just a system to get rid of the people who come in and ask questions, right?

[Tom Dubis]: Well, they do and the very fact that we refer to leaders as “they,” it seems to me, is an ominous kind of thing. I’d like to suggest something to you. Some people have–a point you made before was made by Ralph Nader when he spoke here a couple weeks ago, talking about drawing up a list of the great social issues of the day. And then he said, “look what the diagnosis from public officials has been.” That it’s the hippies, the yippies, the malcontents and the discontents who are at fault. And, he said, compare that with the list of problems and it doesn’t make any sense. Except, of course, if you have a perspective on our government that says it’s no longer representative.

[Caller 10]: Don’t you think it’s very ironic that students and young people in America today are leaving this country for the very same reason that their ancestors came to this country: to escape constriction? What does that say about our level of freedom now?

[Tom Dubis]: Well, I would agree with the point you’re making except I would say that the word is not irony, it’s tragedy.

[Caller 10]: Well, it’s both. I agree with that.

[Tom Dubis]: And, let me say also that what’s happening on this campus is in some ways an incredible kind of analogy to our policy in Southeast Asia, in which in the name of peace, escalation has occurred. In the name of pacification, provocative violence–provocative presence has occurred. And that, as some commentators have suggested, our campuses are becoming slowly but steadily Vietnamized, and I think there’s a similarity. A great similarity to what’s going on.

[Caller 10]: Exactly, that’s exactly right. People come on this campus and see this microcosm of the world and they say, “well, here’s a social atmosphere in which we have young people,” and, “oh, well they just don’t really understand what’s going on in the world.” And maybe some of them understand quite a bit more than the other people who are actually in the world who are working day to day and don’t really have time to study what’s going on in the world. They can’t compare things with history where they have views of people being controlled with thought police essentially, which is what’s going on right now. I mean, you can’t get out and do what you want to do, you can’t get out and say what you want to say anymore because you’re going to be punished for some reason, you know? You just can’t do it. It’s come down to a system of justice where you’re guilty until proven innocent. At any moment now, someone could be picked up on campus and charged with something. He would then be sent to jail and then he would have to prove that he was innocent.

[Unidentifiable panelist]: Exactly.

[Caller 10]: It’s really ridiculous. What kind of a justice system is that?

[Chris Kobrak]: Dale, what sort of conceivable effect do you think destroying the University would have on ending the war in Vietnam?

[Caller 10]: I didn’t say “destroy the University.” You said that. By the way, you said something to me earlier today which I can’t really repeat on the air, but it was really stupid. You said, “something the people–the people are irrational.” What kind of a student–oh, I’m not even going to get it right now. But, it’s really amazing coming from a student leader. Really irritated me. I mean, if someone’s going to represent the people they should try to understand the people.

[Chris Kobrak]: Dale? Do you think what’s going on on campus now is irrational and meaningless?

[Caller 10]: Yes, I think the National Guard is very irrational and very meaningless.

[Chris Kobrak]: And, that’s what I said.

[Caller 10]: I hear people–wives, calling in and saying, “My husband doesn’t want to be there.” Well if he doesn’t want to be there, what’s he doing there? “Someone told him he had to go there.” Why did he have to go there because someone else told them they had to go there? Because someone else–and it keeps going on up to a hierarchy, and one guy gives the command or some sort of hierarchy gives the command, they say, “Hey, this is wrong.” So we say, “Hey, we’ve got to get Vietnam right,  you know, we have to straighten them out. Let’s go over there and tell them like it is!” You know, that’s really stupid.

[Mike Ewing]: Excuse me, I have to interrupt for a minute here. You’re listening to WKSU AM and FM, Kent, Ohio. Continue, gentlemen.

[Tom Dubis]: I don’t mean for this statement to sound like a copout and it probably will so I apologize in advance. There are a lot of things in this world to be indignant about and I share your indignancies about most of them. A lot of things upset me, a lot of things get me uptight. But I’m not real sure that we’ve got to call to the floor all of those things right now. It doesn’t mean to cut you off, but just the fact that we often have to quell how upset we are about the world to focus on what can be done in a very specific situation such as that with which we are faced now.

[Caller 10]: Do you think bringing the troops on is going to solve anything?

[Tom Dubis]: Personally–

[Caller 10]: It seems like you’re trying to submit them.

[Tom Dubis]: No.

[Caller 10]: It’s like grabbing a person and submitting them. And they’ll fight you to every–

[Tom Dubis]: I personally do not condone the bringing on of troops so it’s hard for me to respond in a negative way to what you’re saying. Okay? All I’m just saying is, let’s try and focus on really what we can do to get these troops off the campus, because that’s really what I want.

[Caller 10]: Who gave the order to bring them on?

[Tom Dubis]: That’s in confusion right now. To the best of our knowledge, and this is just hearsay, it’s a man, I don’t know his name but he’s running–

[Caller 10]: Ah the grand omnipotent [unintelligible]–

[Tom Dubis]: –but he’s running for United States Senate, okay?

[Caller 10]: Yeah.

[laughter]

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much for calling.

[Caller 10]: Right.

[Mike Ewing]: Okay? We have to go on to other people. Thank you. Right now it’s 28 minutes before the hour of one o’clock in the morning. Our number is 7997 if you’re on campus, or 672-7997 if you’re off campus. This is Operation Information and my panelists are Chris Kobrak, Jackie Stewart, Dave Kritzer, Tom Dubis, and Carl Moore.

Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 11]: Just wanted to make a comment on some of these comments that I’ve been listening to on your program here regarding the troops being present on Kent, which, when I look at the situation and hear about it, I think that this is probably the only recourse and more than likely the only thing that we can do to prevent anything serious happening.

[Jackie Stewart]: From what perspective are you looking at the situation?

[Caller 11]: Just a minute. Turn that down.

[Mike Ewing]: Could you repeat your question?

[Jackie Stewart]: Yes, from what perspective are you looking at the situation? You said as you see it, it’s the only thing that could have been done.

[Caller 11]: Well, when I got home from work Friday night it was about two o’clock in the morning and I wasn’t aware of anything going on at that time.

[Jackie Stewart]: You live in Kent?

[Caller 11]: I do.

[Jackie Stewart]: And you didn’t see any troops at all?

[Caller 11]: Well, not Friday night. I came in through a southern entrance to Kent here up by Lamson Sessions, came right home from there, from that direction, and I wasn’t aware that anything was going on. When I got home, of course my wife told me what was going on, and you know, things were in turmoil in Kent. When I got up in the morning, I had to go to downtown Kent and I saw the number of broken windows, storefronts, etcetera. I talked to a few of the merchants myself because I had business right down in that area, and it was disgusting to say the least. Recognizing that it was a minority group creating the problems, my immediate reaction was that I’d like to grab a couple of those people and–

[Jackie Stewart]: Resort to violence?

[Caller 11]: I said reaction, and that’s all it was, but the point is that this was not a controlled protest or whatever you’d want to call it. I certainly grant anyone the right to protest, or demonstrate, or whatever else they feel like doing as long as it doesn’t interfere in any way with other people or other people’s rights. They certainly–the people involved in this or initiating this and–another comment, one of the merchants in the vicinity, fortunately his store front wasn’t touched. His reaction was, “professional antagonizers,” was the term he used. This isn’t the first time I’ve heard this referred to Kent State University and other university students there for the express purpose of creating this type of disturbance.

[Mike Ewing]: Well of course it isn’t conclusive–

[Tom Dubis]: That’s wrong.

[Mike Ewing]: It isn’t conclusive at all who caused the problem. Would you like to comment? And then we have to wrap up so we can go on to more callers.

[Tom Dubis]: I would like to really dispel this conception that the governor is broadcasting about professional agitators and professional violence. What–the difference between people getting together and talking about something, if in fact they did, and professional organizers and a conspiracy statewide is vast. There’s a gulf there that I really don’t understand, and that was what so appalled me about the governor’s remark and about the use, loose, the loose use–excuse me, we’re all rather tired–of this idea from the president it seems, and the vice president of the country, on down, that you know, everything’s alright, they seem to be saying, it’s just if we could find these professional agitators and this conspiracy theory. As you look back at American history, before the students it was the labor movement, and there were–that’s where the conspirators were, and before that it was the farmers, and you follow all the way back you know to the revolution, I suppose the British were saying there was a conspiracy too.

[Caller 11]: I doubt if there–even if they are present–if they’re even identifiable. Are you one of the gentlemen that are a member of the student senate?

[Mike Ewing]: No, he’s not. There is a gentleman here who is. Could you make your–

[Caller 11]: A comment was made the students could handle this or the student senate or the control groups–

[Jackie Stewart]: Faculty Senate.

[Caller 11]: –within the student body. I question this at this point. If they could have controlled it, it never would have started. I think the troops should be there, and if necessary, in stronger force.

[Mike Ewing]: Well, the idea of student control is rather idealistic I suppose. How about a senator? Commenting on that?

[Caller 11]: Well, you know–

[Chris Kobrak]: That’s not what I said. I said that idealistically the University should be not run, but the people who should be influencing the decisions to a great degree are the students and faculty. I would agree with you, the situation last night got so out of hand, I mean, it’s obvious that students going around trying to evoke reason would have been very, very unsuccessful. Students, faculty, I think, you know, that’s the general agreement. I personally feel that my sympathies with Mr. Rhodes are very few and far between, but I think at that point it was a wise decision to bring calm to the campus to not, you know, as many people say, just to save property, but also to save human lives and possible people from being injured.

[Caller 11]: I agree with you. I think the one thing I don’t think has been put strongly enough is that I think the solution to this problem is with the student body.

[Mike Ewing]: That’s what I just was–

[Caller 11]: And I think if the student body can’t control it, the University should be closed.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, well that was just what I was going to say, I think it’s the hope of this panel here that the student body is listening tonight and is considering very seriously what they as individuals can do, or rather as a group, can do to quell the problem and eliminate the problem completely within the next coming weeks. Thank you for your call.

[Caller 11]: Thank you.

[Mike Ewing]: Ok, goodbye. This is Operation Information. The number is 672-7997 if you’re off campus, and 7997 if you’re on campus. Right now it’s 21 minutes before the hour of one o’clock in the morning. I don’t know how long we’re going to go with this gentlemen, we seem to have a lot of callers, but I would like to request that we move the calls a little bit faster because I know there are a lot of people trying to get in and they’ve called in on other numbers and asked if we’d move a little faster and I feel there’s a need for this. Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 11]: Hello?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, you’re on the air.

[Caller 11]: I happen to be a mother of one of the freshman students, and my son was not there Friday night, as he plays in a band and has long hair.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Laughter from panel]

[Caller 11]: So he was playing in town, in Cleveland–

[Mike Ewing]: Right.

[Caller 11]: –and, he got into campus about three o’clock I imagine, went to bed, and then he came home about three in the afternoon on Saturday. And I said, “Gee, what about all this rioting at Kent?” He said, “What rioting?” So then I said, “Well it was all in the papers and I was quite worried about you and everything. He said, “Well I didn’t see anything, Mom.” But now he’s playing again tonight and I called up there to find out whether he should be sent–whether he should go in or not. So they informed me that he better not come in, but he has a class at 7:45 tomorrow morning.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Caller 11]: And I, personally, from hearing what I’ve heard–I’ve been listening all evening and trying to get in on the call, and I kind of feel that the problem is there’s not a strong enough leader to handle all these situations. Like when Roosevelt was president, he talked to the people. You see what I mean? And here it just seemed everybody jumped the gun and there isn’t a strong enough leader to settle a lot of this stuff that’s going on.

[Mike Ewing]: That’s a very good point. Before we get into your conversation here I have two questions for you. One, is your son planning to return to Kent State University tonight?

[Caller 11]: No, I told him I won’t let him go in and I don’t know–

[Mike Ewing]: I don’t think he’ll get in, that’s what I asked you that question.

[Caller 11]: Yes.

[Mike Ewing]: My second question is where are you calling from?

[Caller 11]: From Cleveland.

[Mike Ewing]: From Cleveland, fine. Alright, now, let us pass the phone around to our panel because you’re a long distance caller, you deserve some time.

[Caller 11]: Thank you.

[Mike Ewing]: Carl Moore, you want to go first?

[Carl Moore]: I agree, no response.

[Mike Ewing]: Everybody agrees. We need a stronger leader. I think we need a stronger leader on this University, too.

[Caller 11]: Well, you know what I thought when that man was speaking about the president, I mean the president of the University? I felt if I was a student I would like to have heard something from him to know that he really thought about these students that were there, am I right or wrong? It was just the backing that, these kids that didn’t even know what was going on, that somebody was there with them.

[Tom Dubis]: Well, you made the point before about the thing that endeared president Roosevelt to a lot of the public was the fact that he spoke constantly and tried to explain and in fact many of the most prominent and successful political leaders have indeed been those who, what shall I say, communicated with their people and it was a two-way communication that went on.

[Caller 11]: Right.

[Tom Dubis]: It’s a very important thing.

[Caller 11]: I think this is kind of missing. Being a mother I just feel that–I don’t hear anything from the students that are there and I’m just wondering how some of those younger ones, especially the freshmen feel about all this that’s going–this is the first time they’re exposed to all this you know.

[Tom Dubis]: Well, there are a lot of people on campus, from freshmen to senior faculty at this point, who are trying to sort out in their minds what has happened and to try and understand why, and to try and figure out what to do about it in the short run and what to do about it in the long run. As you said, very often, one does not hear the voice of the student at large in the University. And in some ways one can say that what’s going on at KSU is an expression of the voice of some people who can no longer contain their frustration, rage, anger, and fear about what’s going on in the world.

[Caller 11]: Well, I agree with you there. I understand that, because I do feel that I don’t want my son to go to Vietnam or anything and I feel just–I think it’s just too bad that all this had to happen. The president’s speech, and then–and I do agree that Rhodes was a little too fast in moving in there, and I’m thinking twice about voting for him on account of this because I don’t think he should have came in so fast with all of this. I’m sure that half of that wouldn’t have went on, you know, that has happened.

[Tom Dubis]: Well, as your son suggested, you know, there was calm on the campus after the initial situation, and again, perhaps because we don’t have the kind of community that we want and ought to have, that we haven’t–we weren’t able to take advantage of that calm and now it’s out of our hands.

[Caller 11]: Yes. Now, I’m wondering, are there–should he come in tomorrow morning? In my heart I’m a little hesitant about sending him to school tomorrow, to tell you the truth. I’m wondering if I shouldn’t just–I know he’ll want to go and he probably would object to me even calling, but I have a feeling, “Gee, do I want him to be exposed to all of this right now?” or should I wait ‘till it calms down or–and then he’ll miss his test and have a fit.

[Tom Dubis]: Yes ma’am, well, all I can say is, to quote from a statement that was sent out over the signature of Vice President Matson and Frank Frisina, President of the student body, that’s dated May 3rd. It says, “We plan to resume our normal class schedule on Monday with the exception of classes scheduled for the floor of Memorial Gymnasium where currently the gym floor is being used to provide barrack facilities for the National Guard troops. I believe that from our observations yesterday and today that it seems likely that things will be safe and be quiet, but no one can guarantee that.

[Caller 11]: Well, I’ll keep listening to the station and see what happens.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much for calling.

[Caller 11]: Alright.

[Mike Ewing]: Alright, goodnight. The number is 672-7997, or if you’re on campus, 7997. Right now it’s 15 minutes before the hour of 1:00 in the morning. This is Operation Information. Very soon we’ll be coming up with an update on what is happening on the Kent State University campus at this very moment. As I know from the information I’ve gotten earlier, there are small groups of students out. This may not be true anymore. The National Guard is very much down on the students who are out and they will be arrested if they remain outside. So if you are outside you better get inside fast! Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 12]: Ok, Mike?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Caller 12]: I’d like to respond to several people that you had on, and please make this shorter, there’s a room full of people listening here, and the comments are interesting, the panel’s interesting, so, you guys are making it too long.

[Mike Ewing]: Okay, we’ll speed it up for you.

[Caller 12]: I’d like to respond to this woman that said that her husband was in the National Guard. Well, about 96% of the people that are in the National Guard are there because they don’t want to serve full time.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, very true!

[laugher from panel]

[Caller 12]: And, they are not trained. They are not trained. Ok?

[Mike Ewing]: Right.

[Caller 12]: And the other thing is, we have had no word from the administration, or anyone as far as the leadership goes. And, second of all, I’d like to direct this to, I think, it’s Dr. Moore? Why does it take violence before these people become aware? Now everyone’s concerned, everyone’s interested, everyone’s willing to help? What happened before?

[Mike Ewing]: Carl?

[Carl Moore]: It’s not really a question of why does it take violence before they’re concerned. Well, I hope it’s not a question of that. I think rather, the violence puts the focus on the problem. And once you have the focus on the problem, if the remedy doesn’t exist it’s most apparent, ok? And so,  you’re most aware of the problem at that point. I guess the only way I can respond is, it would be ideal and certainly desirable if we were able to conduct ourselves that we could predict all problems before they did indeed occur. You know, we’re human, we’re frail, we don’t predict too well. Hence we don’t take care of the problems as well as we might. Now, there’s some who argue that a condition does not exist which really is solution-oriented, that does think about what the problems will be before they occur, find out ways of dealing with them which are true and human and proper and in perspective. The only way I can respond to you is, I think violence puts a focus on the problems, hence we’re most aware of the lack of remedies that exist. If we don’t solve them in times of quiet, in times when we don’t have to respond to an emergency situation, it’s one, only because, I think we’re frail. We’re capable of not seeing things before they affect us.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, make it fast alright?

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah, to speak to that, I appreciate the arguments based on human frailty because I think it’s important that we examine ourselves and know ourselves and try harder and all the rest of the things, but I can’t let that pass without suggesting that the way we have structured this society, the kinds of organizations we have created only make this kind of situation, it seems to me, inevitable. This lack of communication, that all of the things that psychiatrists and psychologists and social commentators have been saying now for two decades about–they’ve been saying it for longer than that, they’ve been saying it for a hundred years–about alienation of men and so forth and wringing their hands, and not looking at the mechanisms. The viewing of the world as some kind of great marketplace where everybody competes, a sort of drawn sword ideal, or the social Darwinist philosophy of root, hog, or die. This kind of sense, if it existed in families, and sometimes it does, would and does destroy them, and I think we’ve seen a larger kind of thing in the university and in, unfortunately, our nation.

[Caller 12]: And the second thing is, Rhodes’s coming here–I saw no point in it. I saw no point. He came here, looked at the rebels, and then he left. He just polarized the students. I feel that the students could have handled it. Not that I’m agreeing with the violence, I don’t think anyone is. That he just comes here, then he leaves, and he brings the troops in. The troops which claimed they don’t want to be here. So why are they there then? They’re as bad as this woman that calls and said she didn’t want her son to be in Vietnam, she didn’t want this, she didn’t want–what is she doing about it? She isn’t doing anything about it. You see? And then everyone says well it’s because of the structure, it’s so big, it’s so big, it’s so big, and therefore the only way you can be heard on this campus is if you belong to an organization. And I think that’s a bunch of baloney. That has nothing to do with education whatsoever. That you must belong to a group, that you can be heard.

[Tom Dubis]: On the contrary, it’s everything to do with education. We’re educated to believe that we should turn things over to leaders and then forget about them. We’re educated to believe that channels and writing everything down on paper and working in prescriptions that are given to us from above are the way things are going. So in that sense, people who say the educational system is not working are wrong. It’s working all too well. The problem is that we want and need, desperately now, to change the way that system works.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much for calling.

[Caller 12]: Thank you.

[Mike Ewing]: Alright, goodbye. Right now we’re going to switch to Greg Benedetti with the latest report on what’s going on on the Kent State University campus.

[Greg Benedetti]: Officials at the University Health Center have treated four students and one National Guardsman for injuries as a result of a third night of violence on the Kent State Campus. No apparent serious injuries are reported although the Health Center sent a girl to Robinson Memorial Hospital for a precautionary examination. Police report 15 arrests have been made thus far mostly stemming from curfew violations. Since the curfew went into effect, unauthorized persons roving about the campus are subject to arrest. After a calm day on campus, students confronted National Guardsmen Sunday night. Teargas was used to disperse the crowd violating curfew regulations. Early morning activity finds scattered groups roving the campus area with guardsmen and police officers trying to quell the disturbances. WKSU Radio will remain on the air until the situation has subsided, with detailed information. From the University News Service and Department of Internal Communication, this is Greg Benedetti reporting.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much Greg. That’s the latest information on what’s happening at the Kent State University campus. You’re tuned to Operation Information over WKSU AM and FM in Kent, Ohio, and we’re taking calls at 672-7997, and if you’re living in the dorm you only have to call 7997.

Hello, Operation Information you’re on the air?

[Caller 13]: Hello, I’d like to make a comment. The man who just called said something about the National Guard being just people who wanted to get out of the service and didn’t want to have to go in at all. It just so happens that they’re on call for six years, and they have to go to a monthly meeting every month of the year, and they’re in for two weeks every summer. I think they’re putting in just as much time as anyone who’s going in for a full two years when they’re drafted. And also, he said that they’re not trained. And it so happens that every person in the National Guard is required to go through Army boot camp and AIT training.

[Mike Ewing]: Yeah, I think most of us here are aware of the fact they are trained and also I’d like to leave you with one statement as we close the call and that is that, would you rather be in Vietnam or in Kent, Ohio now?

[Caller 13]: Well I think someone has to stay here to protect everyone.

[Mike Ewing]: I agree with you but, you still avoided the question; would you rather be here in Kent with the National Guard or over in Vietnam or Laos or Cambodia?

[Caller 13]: Sometimes with things happening around here you wonder.

[Mike Ewing]: Well, thank you for calling, dear.

The number is 7997. 672-7997, this is Operation Information. I was going to try to speed the calls up a little bit, I wasn’t meaning to cut her off, only to keep the calls moving because I know there are a lot of people who want to make a lot of comments. And her comment was well taken.

Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 14]: Hello?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, you’re on the air.

[Caller 14]: I’d like to make a comment about things that I’ve seen today and the other days that I’ve been here, and that is that I am amazed at the amount of dehumanization there is among the students here. I know there’s a lot of friends that I have been observing with and they have actually come out and said that they would rather see some of these kids shot than buildings burned, and things of this sort. It really amazes me, and I think that’s part of the problem that we have in our society today. And that’s about all I can say. It’s really frightening sometimes, that these kids are trying desperately to express their opinion about something that they find is very hard to express their opinion about, and it’s really frightening.

[Mike Ewing]: Jackie, would you like to comment?

[Jackie Stewart]: Yeah, you’ve raised two questions, one of which we’ve already discussed: that of communication. The second one is the one that seems to get too little discussion and that is the value of human life over property. I think the priorities have been completely turned upside down there, and I agree with you completely.

[Mike Ewing]: And also over political dogma, too. Matter of fact. I think.

[Carl Moore]: As a certain sage in Ohio has repeatedly said, profit is not a dirty word in this state.

[laughter from panel]

[Caller 13]: Well, I have my doubts about that.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you for calling. Ok, goodbye. 7997, 672-7997, this is Operation Information from Kent State University. We’re taking your calls as long as you have calls. And, with me tonight are Chris Kubrick, Carl Moore, Tom Dubis, Jackie Stewart. Are we go?

Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 14]: I’d like to comment on the people that have been showing up at the different things that are–am I on now?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, you are. Your radio, if it’s turned up, you better turn it down because it will mix you up.

[Caller 14]: Fine. The people that have been coming, not particularly to do anything, but just to see what’s going on so they can report to their friends, I mean I think they’re getting in the way and there’s a good number of them that are involved in that, and that they should just stick in the dorms.

[Mike Ewing]: Yeah, that’s a good point, we’ve been trying to make that point over and over again I think. And the National Guard has a definite strong curfew on people and they’re being arrested if they’re not in their dormitory. So I think that’s being taken care of.

[Caller 14]: Yeah, I just wanted to make that point. Also, I’d like to agree with the people who called earlier about the fact that Governor Rhodes being here and also President White’s silence, which is, I think, detrimental. I think he could even come out on campus and make an appearance and speak. I think he’d be in a lot better shape as far as public relations are concerned.

[Mike Ewing]: I think he’d be arrested for breaking curfew, was a comment we just had. But I feel that President White, perhaps, is in a position where he could polarize the students a little better than most. I would hope, being the president of the University, rather than some outside force.

[Caller 14]: Well I think it’d be better, as far as Rhodes is concerned, I don’t think he has too much support on the campus. I don’t know whether or not he realizes that.

[Mike Ewing]: Yeah, go ahead.

[Tom Dubis]: I don’t think he’s running, you know, for the Senate with the campus constituency in mind, I think he’s attempting to appeal to what I suspect is fundamentality constituency that isn’t there, but which he is trying to help generate by hysteria and fear and by provocation.

[Caller 14]: It’s obvious that he doesn’t want any more than one term in the senate then, because most of us will be voting by the time he’s up again.

[Mike Ewing]: Right, very true. Thank you for your call.

[Caller 14]: Ok.

[Mike Ewing]: Ok, goodbye. Operation Information, it’s 672-7997 or 7997 if you’re in the dormitory. And, we have another caller. Go? Ok.

Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 15]: Hello, I wanted to comment, just let me turn the radio down.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, fine. Right now it’s two minutes before one o’clock.

[Caller 15]: I wanted to comment on this woman’s statement about the National Guard being trained. I don’t think that anybody really is trained to deal with the politics of confrontation and the type of civil disturbance that is occurring on the campus right now, and that a whole new era in training of the keepers of the civil peace needs to be done. As witnessed in Chicago, the police, were not trained to deal with the situation there, and certainly calling in the military with the weapons and the tactics that are used on the battlefield has no place in a community–a peaceful–what I’m trying to say is, this is not a battlefield.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Caller 15]: We, America, desperately needs to work out some sort of tactical force for dealing with this kind of situation in which you don’t have men who are supposedly trained for battlefield conditions with an enemy who is also trained for battlefield, in other words–

[Mike Ewing]: We need a giant Peace Corps.

[Caller 15]: Pardon?

[Mike Ewing]: We need a giant Peace Corps. Is that what you’re driving at?

[Caller 15]: Well we need some sort of whole new police force for dealing with confrontation because this certainly–as somebody was saying on the program earlier–it just antagonizes people. I think it antagonizes not only students, but I was antagonized to go downtown and see these people on the streets, as though this was–we were expecting a bombing raid or something. I mean this is totally uncalled for.

[Tom Dubis]: Yes, well, I think you’ve expressed–

[Caller 15]: This is an example of using the tactics of war to deal with a non-war situation. It’s totally inadequate. There’s no comparison between the students roaming around and burning down this one particular building and then bringing in this, you might say, foreign–these people who are totally foreign to the situation. They have–

[Tom Dubis]: Exactly.

[Caller 15]: –those National Guardsmen. This one officer, for instance, that I talked to, I told him I wanted to get to my home and he was completely out of the–he didn’t know anything about the town, and he wasn’t even acquainted with the situation whatsoever. He was a foreigner in town here trying to deal with, you might say, domestic matters.

[Tom Dubis]: Yes, well, two points. I think your comments are very appropriate and other people who have called in and expressed a similar point of view: one, the fact of the army tactics, it’s possible to argue I think if you send in–

[Caller 15]: I can’t hear you, you’ll have to speak up.

[Mike Ewing]: You have to pick up the phone.

[Tom Dubis]: Oh, I’m sorry. If you send in an army into a place that–it has a tendency to militarize a situation which might be handled otherwise. People have said the National Guard is the only recourse. It’s simply the only recourse because we’ve been so fundamentally lackadaisical in creating other possibilities. For example, this would be the second point: on campus here for a long time many faculty and many students have been distressed about the fact that the police force wears weapons at all times and conduct themselves like a security force that was inappropriate to the campus. I don’t know whether the possibility has been explored of a non-armed but trained, student police force.

[Caller 15]: Yeah, well I wasn’t thinking of that but I was thinking, for instance, in connection with what happened in Chicago, somebody at a political [unintelligible] made a suggestion that the police need to be trained to protect the people who want to demonstrate and protest peacefully, the police have not been really able to discriminate–haven’t been trained to discriminate and that their purpose is to protect the rights of those people who lawfully want to peacefully assemble and protest.

[Tom Dubis]: Your point is extremely well taken because we’ve been trying here this evening in part to indicate that the enemy is not some conspiratorial group, but the enemy is violence and the kind of climate that gets established and that teargas and guns and armed soldiers does not help. Thank you very much.

[Caller 15]: Certainly, thank you.

[Tom Dubis]: Ok.

[Mike Ewing]: 7997 is the Operation Information number and if you’re calling from off the University campus, the number is 672-7997. Right now it’s four minutes after the hour of hour o’clock.

Hello, Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 16]: Hi, am I on the air?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes you are.

[Caller 16]: Ok good. I have several questions to talk about. The main thing is, there was a lady who called earlier and she said that–oh, the radio is confusing me.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, you must turn your radio down.

[Caller 16]: Yes. She said that she was tremendously concerned only with the taxpayers’ money. And nothing else. That faculty has no place in a university. I’m tremendously confused by a statement like that. Do you have anything to say about that?

[Mike Ewing]: Would you like to comment, Tom?

[Tom Dubis]: Well only that I think she saw the faculty as–

[Caller 16]: I can’t hear you.

[Tom Dubis]: Oh. In this particular context she saw the faculty as employees and, as Carl explained, the concept of the university that we all–at least many of the faculty operate under–the ideal of the university is that it’s a community of students and faculty, that the administration helps that community and administers it, but that the administration is not finally the only place where decisions ought to be made.

[Caller 16]: Looking at faculty as employees is a very military point of view towards a society. It’s a very totalitarian point of view. Because you can’t possibly look at faculty as merely employees.

[Tom Dubis]: I agree.

[Caller 16]: Nor can you accept students as mere soldiers.

[Tom Dubis]: I agree.

[Caller 16]: And administrators who have no idea of what education is about most times–

[Tom Dubis]: When they don’t talk to the other two portions of the community.

[Caller 16]: Right! The gentleman who said that what is happening here, that he wanted to go to his office and had to go get a pass and he was refused it. At a juncture like this, if the president of the University keeps quiet and is worried about his own safety and not about the community, I’m tremendously weary of what would happen in a situation like that.

[Tom Dubis]: I think we all are. We have to take a break now. So–

[Caller 16]: I would like to hang on.

[Tom Dubis]: Ok.

[Mike Ewing]: Excuse me for a minute, I must intervene for a moment for the Federal Communications Commission. This is WKSU AM and FM, Kent, Ohio. And you’re back.

[Tom Dubis]: Yes, you’re back.

[Caller 16]: Now, another thing is that–another question is directed towards the panel. This is supposed to be a place where people can get information, and you’re trying to give information, but I heard the panel or the moderator make a statement that “we are giving only personal point of views, personal opinions.” And I don’t think any information can be gathered from personal opinions if that is the situation. Do you understand what I’m saying?

[Tom Dubis]: Yes, I understand what you said. Let me say only that one of the reasons that we’re on the air now is to get information and to transmit it. The problem is that, once again, the channels of communication, because of the situation going on–

[Caller 16]: Then let’s not call this communication.

[Tom Dubis]: What can we call it?

[Caller 16]: Nothing at all.

[Tom Dubis]: We’re on the air. That’s it.

[Caller 16]: Yeah, but it’s just a big joke.

[Mike Ewing]: May I speak to this gentleman? Don’t you believe that discourse between people is important in a democratic society?

[Caller 16]: It is very important, but it should just not be merely opinion. You’ve got to welcome information, you’ve got to welcome facts.

[recording cuts out for 5 seconds.]

[Bill Eames]: –snipers in the library, there were students up there studying who were trapped because of the action in the library. National Guard checked out the library and there were simply unarmed studying students minding their own business. There were no snipers anywhere reported on campus. There were several reports of National Guardsmen being hurt, killed, shot, wounded. All information of this sort is false. Absolutely no National Guardsmen have been hurt, with the exception of one who got punched in the mouth and kicked in the leg, and he’s in the Health Center. That’s the complete extent of all injuries to National Guardsmen. Any rumor that there were people killed is completely erroneous. There are reports that the national television stations in Cleveland are saying that there are 2000 students gathered on campus, that the entire campus has been taken over, that there are no classes. All of these are also erroneous. At this time there are no students on campus with the exception of maybe one or two people wandering around with proper identification. The National Guard has mostly cleared out. There were no helicopters overhead and there was no action taking place anywhere on the campus. At this time, all is completely quiet.

There was one injury which has been confirmed. A girl has bayonet wounds. People say it’s the National Guard that caused this; that’s a logical conclusion, but it has not been said. Someone with a knife could have stabbed the girl. She’s in Robinson Memorial Hospital in satisfactory condition at this time. And we’ll have more information on her with a full name and address at a later date.

Classes are scheduled as normal for tomorrow, at this time we have no information on classes being canceled. So students should be expected to go to classes at their regular time tomorrow. Once again I’d like to say that WKSU AM and FM is the only official news source of Kent State University at this time. All information we are sending out over the air has been confirmed and double checked. There are reports that our news is being censored by the University. This is not true. News is coming mostly into WKSU and then being fed to the University which is confirming it. So, that’s the latest report of news at this time. Once again nobody has been hurt and nobody’s been injured and we return you now to our special show, this is the latest news from WKSU AM and FM, Kent, Ohio, Bill Eames reporting.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much Bill. Right now we have a long distance caller on the line. Hello, Information Operation. Operation Information. Hello?

[Caller 17]: Hello?

[Mike Ewing]: You’re on the air. I’m sorry to keep you on so long, I know you’re long distance.

[Caller 17]: I can hardly hear you.

[Mike Ewing]: You can’t hear me. Can you hear me now?

[Caller 17]: Yeah, I can hear you much better.

[Mike Ewing]: Alright, where are you calling from?

[Caller 17]: Hudson.

[Mike Ewing]: Hudson. I’m sorry to keep you on the line. Go ahead.

[Caller 17]: That’s ok, it took quite a long time to get on. First of all, to Tom, right on brother. That’s the voice of your conscious speaking. Tom?

[Mike Ewing]: Tom? Tom just stepped out.

[Jackie Stewart]: He’s out of the room for a minute.

[Mike Ewing]: He’ll be back shortly I’m sure.

[Caller 17]: Ok.

[Mike Ewing]: Yeah, go ahead.

[Caller 17]: First of all, the thing about the violence that you’re talking about. Governor Rhodes sent the National Guard onto the campus when there was really no need for it. The building was already up in flames and there were police there shooting gas and that sort of thing, and there was no need for the Guard, and his overreaction is simply an attempt on his part to win the election on Tuesday so that he can continue to take on the people of Ohio through the U.S. Senate instead of just simply from the governor’s chair. And if anybody gets hurt, if any guardsman is injured, they can lay that injury right at the doorstep of Jim Rhodes.

Second of all, about this pig rumor going around that they’re SDS, Weathermen, that sort of thing? That’s all a lie. This was an attempt by the same sort of people to divide the student body and to single out individuals and it’s just a co-opted attempt on his part to throw a scare into people and bring in a law and order issue.

[Mike Ewing]: Was this not a statement made by Governor Rhodes? I heard that it was.

[Caller 17]: Hm?

[Mike Ewing]: I heard that Governor Rhodes had made the statement that he believed or he had conclusive evidence that Weatherman were involved.

[Caller 17]: Well, Governor Rhodes ain’t hip to all the information that’s going down and he’s laying the thing on the people of Ohio and the students at Kent State to try to frighten them. And that is all. It’s an intimidating and coercive step. The same as bringing the National Guard in, it’s just a pig rumor, it’s a lie.

[Mike Ewing]: What’s your source of information?

[Caller 17]: I’m sorry I can’t divulge that.

[Mike Ewing]: Ok, fine, would you like to talk to Tom?

[Caller 17]: Sure, put Tom on.

[Mike Ewing]: Yeah, ok.

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah, hello.

[Caller 17]: Hello?

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah.

[Caller 17]: This is the voice of your conscience.

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah, uh, thanks. I need to hear a clear voice.

[Caller 17]: You’re beautiful brother, right on.

[Tom Dubis]: Thank you, thank you.

[Caller 17]: I want to talk about this thing that is going on. And there’s–just really drive home the point that there is no organization going on. There’s no organization behind this, there are no individuals. There have been attempts to imply that the people who were released from jail here recently have some sort of–had something to do–they had absolutely nothing to do at all with what is going on. And the vast majority of the people who are out in the streets are very ordinary, very straight KSU students who would normally be cheering a football game or something of that sort, but have really had a gut reaction to pig Nixon’s sending the troops into Vietnam and no student, no person, no human being, no man, no woman, no nothing, is going to Cambodia. The Cambodian people are going to win, and the Vietnamese people are going to win, and American students just aren’t going to put up with this that’s coming down.

Another thing, on the news they always show shots of the street corner downtown, they’re showing Revco, and they’re showing Morton’s Shoetique, and the likes of that, and they aren’t showing that every bank in Kent had a window trashed, and the Home Loan Association’s, and the Monopoly Utilities, the gas company, and the telephone company had their windows trashed too. They aren’t showing that. The reason for that probably is because they want to get a sympathy thing going for the poor merchants of Kent who are just making a living doing an honest day’s work. Well, that may be true, and it certainly is regrettable that people who make an honest day’s–who do an honest day’s work for an honest day’s living have to suffer when a thing like this goes down. Everybody suffers when there is a thing like New Haven, Connecticut, when a man like Bobby Seale is in jail and is on trial for his life, and when young men are expected to go to foreign shores to fight for nothing, except the continuation of American Imperialism.

[Tom Dubis]: Hear, hear.

[Caller 17]: It’s really blowing my mind listening to my voice come feeding back at me from the radio even though it’s turned down.

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah, it’s appalling.

[Laughter from panel]

[Caller 17]: The youth will make the revolution, the youth will keep the revolution, and there’s no turning back now. It’s a beautiful thing and it’s a good thing and we’re all in it together. So, right on. All the way.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much for calling.

The number here at Operation Information is 672-7997, if you’re on the Kent State University campus that number is merely 7997. My name is Mike Ewing and we’ll be here for a little while longer. I don’t know when people plan to break up here–what the thought is, but we’ll keep going.

Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 18]: Ok, I can’t hear you quite.

[Mike Ewing]: Can you hear me now?

[Caller 18]: Yes, that’s fine.

[Mike Ewing]: Are you long distance?

[Caller 18]: No, I’m not.

[Mike Ewing]: You’re not.

[Caller 18]: I’d like to make a few comments, first of all about some of the information that’s been spreading around. As one of the callers made the comment that it was a lot of opinion, I understand there is a problem with opinion. But I would like to mention one fact. When you’re relating this business of Ho Chi Minh, you’re talking about 1954, 80%, that’s a true figure probably. However, remember that, we’re talking 15 years later and his popularity had waned somewhat in the south, at least, there’s quite a few indications that that was true. And one of the reasons why he was popular back in ’54 was not because he was a Communist, but because he was actually a major leader who was fighting–

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, he got the French out of Vietnam.

[Caller 18]: Right, exactly. So it’s an entirely different situation of his popularity and the time element. Another point–

[Mike Ewing]: But our original involvement was back at that time.

[Caller 18]: Well, not as far as the US was concerned. Not as far as the Communists were concerned, against the non-communist elements.

[Chris Kubrick]: I’ll grant you that the situation is not exactly the same. The point was made to indicate that our original involvement was not–I don’t want to call it altruistic beliefs, but simply to see that the Vietnamese did not elect a person that was disfavorable to the United States–hardly construed as altruistic. I don’t personally think that the situation has changed that significantly as far as the feelings of the South Vietnamese, I don’t know for sure, but I think they don’t–it hasn’t. And also, I agree with you, I doubt very seriously that Ho Chi Minh would be elected now, considering he’s dead and all–

[Caller 18]: I mentioned 15 years, in other words, we’re talking about ’69 and not the present time. But I was trying to put that in a time perspective. As far as anything I’d have to say about it now would have to be opinion.

Another point as far as some of the ideas saying that President White has been unconcerned. Now, I’m not sure how many–does anyone have any information on how many public reports he gave today or public statements? I heard one at 4:00 on WKSU, and I think there was something at 2:30.

[Tom Dubis]: There was one statement, at least that we have a copy of, signed by President White, or coming out as President White’s statement.

[Caller 18]: I see, that was the one that was on at four o’clock?

[Tom Dubis]: I assume so.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, that’s correct.

[Caller 18]: Ok.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you for calling.

[Caller 18]: Ok.

[Mike Ewing]: Goodbye. Right now it’s twenty one minutes after one o’clock on Operation Information. We’re going to be on the air until 1:30. We are all very tired and I think we’ll wrap it up after a few more calls. I hope we have served some purpose. I think we probably have. We’ve gotten a lot of different opinions about what’s going on here at Kent State University and we’ve also tried to give you all the information that we have about the present situation, which, presently, seems to be pretty good.

Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 19]: Am I on?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, you are.

[Caller 19]: Ok, a girl just talked about Rhodes making about Weathermen and everything.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Caller 19]: I’d like to say, anytime Rhodes sees an outburst of violence, he blames SDS, Weathermen, or something that’s got a bad label. You know, and like, he doesn’t know. And, the thing is, this is just students down there. I mean it’s just one car. And they’ve been wanting ROTC off campus for a couple years, and the thing is, it’s a military machine. It’s the idea that they’re training men to go kill. How can people in our society say they’re so high morals and all this kind of stuff when they justify killing over there, and now they’re crying about this violence over here.

[Mike Ewing]: You made the statement that you felt they weren’t SDS or they weren’t any organized group, but rather just students.

[Caller 19]: Right!

[Mike Ewing]: Were you downtown or on campus last night?

[Caller 19]: Yes.

[Mike Ewing]: You were. Were you involved in any of the activities or not?

[Caller 19]: Yes.

[Mike Ewing]: You were. In what way?

[Caller 19]: What?

[Mike Ewing]: You’re anonymous so you can talk about it, you don’t have to worry about–you know unless everybody knows your voice. You could tell us, maybe relate to us what part you had in it if you wish to.

[Caller 19]: Well, I was there on the Commons you know, and they–grabbing of the hose and everything, pulling it and helping the–I didn’t slice her or anything but like, I was holding and pulling it and picking up rocks now and then. And then tonight what went on? Like you know, down while we were at front of campus?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Caller 19]: What was that click?

[Mike Ewing]: I don’t know, but you’re still here.

[Caller 19]: Alright. When we were down in front of campus, they gave us five minutes to get out of there, and everybody was moving. And about a minute went by and all of a sudden the Guards start moving in and we’re already up against the police. And here comes this tear gas at us. You know, so they really told the truth. They just rushed us, they didn’t–and the kids, the kids listened to them. They said, you know, “You can get out,” and they were moving out. And then they did the tear gas. That’s what causes it.

[Mike Ewing]: It added to the hostility in other words. It was already there.

[Caller 19]: Right. You bring this on. Right, you bring this on by doing that. That’s the whole thing.

[Mike Ewing]: What was the reason for breaking the windows in downtown Kent? Were you involved in that at all? Or, were you down there?

[Caller 19]: I was down there. I don’t know, I think it was just a spontaneous thing. It wasn’t organized. The thing was, I think the police stopped coming by after a couple bottles went over their roofs, and they decided they’ll just let the crowd disperse and go back home. And then the thing was that they were going to, I don’t know–like, you know, they were just going to wait it out. And then the kids got tired of this and they just went down and started breaking windows. It was so much stuff in the air, I mean it wasn’t just the Cambodia crisis, it was Nixon, it was Agnew, it’s everything that’s been drilled into us for so long, you know?

[Mike Ewing]: Right, Ok.

[Caller 19]: And, all this is coming into our head right now, warm weather and everything, and people are starting to speak up, and it’s good, it’s good it’s happening.

[Mike Ewing]: Well, it’s good in a way, and it’s not in another. Look we got to move on to another caller, alright?

[Caller 19]: Alright. Thanks a lot.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you for calling.

Right now it’s twenty five minutes after one and the number here is 672-7997, this is Operation Information and we’ll be on the air for about another 5 minutes.

Hello, Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 20]: Yes, I’m a KSU student, I just got back off of the campus. I’ve been there all week. I’ve been in the front lines, I know what’s been going on. I think one thing that should have been considered that hasn’t been tonight in this discussion is not necessarily what’s happened tonight and what’s happened the last couple nights, but what’s going to happen tomorrow, and the next day, where is this going to lead? I think if we’re going to be realistic about it we should consider the fact that some of the self-appointed spokesmen this evening directed their comments at President White and made several demands. I think the students intend, tomorrow, to gather onto the campus and direct several similar demands at President White. This, I believe, is naïve, in that President White no longer has the political power. The political power now is in the hands of Governor Rhodes. Governor Rhodes has been in the political power since Friday. Governor Rhodes is very interested in what’s going on on this campus. I think also the caller that said that Governor Rhodes was not interested in the voting constituency of this University was also naïve, in that he is very much considered with the financial aspect, the parents of these students, and the strategic location, the industrialized money location of this University. I think people should expect tomorrow to see possibly 5000 students on the Commons. I predict this because there’s going to be all the people that were there tonight, there’s also going to be all the curious people, and there’s also another consideration: that it has not been organized. I think this is very evident by the way it’s been handled in the last two days. The people that I’ve talked to that could have organized it had not yet wanted to do so because police are very on the guard for anybody doing any such organization. These people will be arrested. However, I think, tomorrow on the Commons, when the people show up, there are going to be attempts by several organizations, and several groups, to direct the motivation, this snowballing effect, of interest that the students have. I do hope, however, they do not make unrealistic demands on President White. I think that this is almost idiotic, and that he can’t respond. I think his hands are politically tied. I think everything that ought to be demanded ought to be directed at Governor Rhodes since he is the political head at this time.

[Mike Ewing]: Do you feel there’s going to be violence tomorrow?

[Caller 20]: I don’t think so, I think what is going to happen is that it’s going to–after I’ve been on this campus for many years–the political ideas, the political motivations of the students is that they will present someone with a series of demands, supposedly to resolve the conflict that’s been this entire weekend. I hope they make rational demands. I would like to hope that they also point these demands, as I said before, at the right people. And I think to make irrational demands, as was attempted to do tonight at the corner of Lincoln and Main Street, directed at President White, is going to solve nothing, because he will of course turn around and not even respond because he cannot. And then people will violently, possibly then, move onto the campus, and possibly be violent. I think however the National Guard, I think Governor Rhodes, I think all the law enforcement people are very cautious at this point. I think the campus is going to be covered tomorrow with National Guard people. And I think all violence is going to be kept down in the daytime.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much.

[Caller 20]: Thank you very much.

[Mike Ewing]: Ok. Goodbye.

You’re listening to WKSU AM and FM, Kent, Ohio. And we’ll take one more caller and then I think we’re going to break for the evening because it’s been a long evening. I think we’ve gotten something accomplished though.

Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 21]: I’m on the air?

[Mike Ewing]: Yes, you are. You’re our last caller.

[Caller 21]: Well, it’s a good time to call, I’ve been listening to you and I think you’re doing a wonderful job. But I’m sick at heart to think that all this evening, all this criticism, and everything else, not one good thing has been said about this wonderful United States of America, and can you imagine what would have happened to this 2% if they attempted this in USSR, in Czechoslovakia, in North Vietnam? Do you want it to happen in Cambodia and Thailand and in the whole world and here eventually, too? Amen!

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you for your comment. We’ll take one more caller. I don’t know if we should end on that note or not. Operation Information number is 7997. 672-7997. That was kind of a wild statement.

Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 22]: Hello. I’ll make some sacrifice because I know there’s a lot of other people that would like to talk.

[Mike Ewing]: Well you’re the last caller!

[Caller 22]: Well, I guess it doesn’t make any difference then. First of all I’d like to say, wouldn’t it be possible to get Robert White on the air some night?

[Mike Ewing]: Wow, I’d love to. In fact, I’ve been thinking about it.

[Caller 22]: I know a lot of people have expressed their feelings that, you know, the terrible communications link, and I think that by getting President White on the air some night for a talk back, would provide an excellent link.

[Mike Ewing]: I agree with you and I’ll do everything in my power to have that happen.

[Caller 22]: And then, one last comment, don’t you think–or maybe we could just get the panel’s feelings on this–that the ROTC building could have been burned down just as easy by a few arsonists as well as a crowd like that? Don’t you think that a large crowd burning the building down was much more effective, though, than a few arsonists?

[Mike Ewing]: Would the panel like to comment?

[Chris Kubrick]: What do you want to affect?

[Mike Ewing]: Uh, start with Tom.

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah, I think the point is that if there was a conspiracy, a conspiracy could have been handled in a conspiratorial manner. The circumstances under which the ROTC building was burned down suggest strongly that it was something more widespread among students than the little clique of outside agitators, alternately students, who Governor Rhodes seems to have identified as his special culprits and devils. I’ll pass the phone around now for other people to comment.

[Jackie Stewart]: Well that’s reasonably obvious, if one is planning on participating in some kind of unlawful act, one does not do it in front of a large crowd. In fact, if they did not have the implicit approval of the crowd, they couldn’t have gotten away with it. No one has been arrested for setting fire to that building, and it is my feeling that no one will be. It was a symbolic act, and as such, had great significance.

[Chris Kobrak]: What did the students want to affect? That would be my question as to–I’d have to know that before I could tell you whether I thought it was much more effective.

[Caller 22]: Well, I think that it would show how many students were–

[Chris Kobrak]: I’m sorry, can’t hear you.

[Caller 22]: I think it would show how many students were for getting the ROTC off campus. Whereas, if just a few arsonists had done it, everybody would be more apt to put the blame on a few outside agitators, or a small minority.

[Chris Kobrak]: Then wouldn’t it be better, for instance, to take some sort of vote whether to abolish? No, seriously, if the significant part was that–

[Caller 22]: Yes, well, I think that would be great. But, no matter how the vote came out, do you think they would?

[Chris Kobrak]: See, then you could burn down the building, if you had 19,000 students, for instance, who are against the ROTC being there. Then one student could burn it down and then you could say it was justified because the 19,000 said it was alright.

[Caller 22]: Well first of all if you had a vote on it probably only 4,000 or 5,000 would vote.

[Chris Kobrak]: I see, so then the only–what was the good of having 500 people out there?

[Caller 22]: Pardon me?

[Chris Kobrak]: What was the significance of having the 500 people out there, then?

[Caller 22]: To show that some did not want to have the ROTC on campus.

[Chris Kobrak]: But wouldn’t the other do the same thing?

[Caller 22]: What others?

[Chris Kobrak]: I mean, the other alternative. You know, and it would be less danger, for instance, and people being injured and such, as the fireman was and also people being hurt because of the ammunition that was blown up. Wouldn’t the other alternative be sufficient?

[Caller 22]: I don’t think so because I don’t think it would be effective.

[Chris Kobrak]: Uh huh.

[Tom Dubis]: I’d like to make one comment on Chris’s reference to a vote. I think that people appreciate the significance of voting but they sometimes, I think, fail to understand how it operates in this context. That is, in order to vote effectively people have to have the necessary information to make up their minds, and they have to talk about issues. Too often, almost universally, in the campus situation and in the nation situation at large, the information and the way in which candidates have presented their positions or failed to present their positions, the way in which dialogue has been closed off before it starts, negates the true principle of polling the people by way of vote to decide an issue. Then in effect it becomes as the kind of choices that we seem to be faced with at this point in our own circumstance–the choices are incredibly, tragically limited because the exercise of the franchise is not simply the marking of a little box on a ballot. It’s figuring out how that ballot is put together, what the issues are on it, and most important of all, the open–full and open discussion of the issues and their implications. And I think perhaps that’s where the national administration, this national administration, has failed most miserably.

[Caller 22]: I agree with you. Completely.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much for calling.

[Caller 22]: Thank you.

[Mike Ewing]: Ok, goodbye.

We’ve had comments that we should stay on ‘till two o’clock. So those of you who would like to remain can. Those of you who feel you have to go because you have other obligations, feel free to go, but we’ll take calls until two o’clock. And at this point, not knowing who’s leaving, I’d like to thank Chris Kobrak, Carl Moore, Tom Dubis, Jackie Stewart, and Dave Kritzer, all for being on the program tonight. So, if you’d like to stay ‘till 2:00, you’re all welcome.

[Tom Dubis]: Thank you.

[Mike Ewing]: Ok, fine. Operation Information you’re on the air.

[Caller 23]: Oh, hello, I have a–well, it would take me too long to say how much that’s been said I think is wrong tonight because I really firmly feel that a lot of this has been sort of hooliganism, you know, but I have one firm question in a rumor nature, that I wonder if somebody could answer. Was Howie Emmer on campus last night and did he participate in the demonstrations?

[Mike Ewing]: Go ahead.

[Chris Kobrak]: I was following the demonstration for most of the time that the people were together and I didn’t see Howie Emmer.

[Caller 23]: The reason I ask is, I was in the vicinity of the union right after apparently some gas was thrown there and the crowd went back out to the Commons. And a bunch of guys came running over the hill with bricks in their hand and they said. “Emmer just took his group over there.”

[Jackie Stewart]: There were no small specific groups led, as far as I could see, by especially people that have had recent notoriety with this kind of behavior. A number of faculty members got together today to discuss this and not one of them mentioned seeing any of the people who were recently released from jail for this kind of thing.

[Mike Ewing]: Somebody called up and said they were all out of town.

[Caller 23]: Yeah, I’ve heard that. I just wondered. You know, that’s what the guy said, and I didn’t know any other Emmers.

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah, well I think that, you know, in a situation like that there’s lots of opportunity for misunderstanding. I was out on the Commons until the teargas and so forth and I didn’t see Emmer or anyone else who was connected with the thing, and again, I really resent not your suggestion, but the place I think that it originates, which was the Governor suggesting this conspiracy and trying to tie it in. I noticed a couple of the newspapers had been, you know, kind of suggesting the same kind of thing. It’s almost as if they’re trying to set up somebody. That they haven’t found a culprit and they’re looking. And they keep looking around and looking around and looking around. As far as the hooliganism is concerned, I really think that that remark reflects a certain disdain for people which I can’t accept.

One of the problems in–I always start lines this way–”One of the problems”–of our particular community is that it is literally ridden with disdain. That is, people who look down at all kinds of other people. Look down on the workers, the faculty, many of them, look down on the students in the sense that they say, “Well, they’re here to learn. We’re here to teach.” Couldn’t it be, you know, a two-way thing? Well, that gets said at convocations and then it gets forgotten in the structure of the classroom. The same thing I’m afraid is true and reflected on a national level. That it’s so easy to categorize other types of people and so easy to set people off into categories, and make an abstraction out of them, a stereotype, a cardboard figure, a kind of good guys, bad guys, view of life that John Wayne got an Oscar for. I don’t like it and I think on campus in this particular situation it is inappropriate and it is mistaken.

[Caller 23]: Well, that’s all well and good, but in this situation there was no resolvable demand. There was no University problem that could have been resolved. You know, there were no pre-existing demands, or anything of this nature. What happened was, well, maybe it was spontaneous. However it happened, it happened. And this is mainly talking about up ‘till, say, the burning of the ROTC building.

[Tom Dubis]: Well, up to that point it’s been nation-wide.

[Caller 23]: It seems like this is sort of–students are Indians. And it’s the parents’ fault. You know, you hear about the older generation, well, here’s a thought. You’ve got kids on this campus, and I firmly believe this, and this is not disdain, but you’ve got kids on this campus that will follow, follow blindly. And they are following people that they should not be following because they’re following people that lead them to resolve imagined problems possibly or something like that.

[Jackie Stewart]: I think your comment about “students are Indians” is another example of disdain for groups.

[Caller 23]: That’s not disdain. I’m saying that they’re Indians and not chiefs, that they will follow any chief.

[Jackie Stewart]: Now wait a minute. I really don’t think that’s valid.

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah, the chief and Indian view of the world is just exactly what I was getting at. Who decides who the chiefs are and who decides who the Indians are? Well, the tendency is for people to style themselves chiefs when it’s [good going?] and Indians when they haven’t sat down and thought about things.

[Caller 23]: Well, ok.

[Carl Moore]: I’d like to respond before you get off the air, I guess. I think what ultimately you’re asking for, and forgive the terminology if it seems confusing, I don’t intend it as such. You’re asking people to be a lot more existential. You’re asking people to make judgements about other people on the basis of what they are as individuals and not what they are as groups. But at the same time that you’re asking for this, that you’re asking for them not to follow blindly and so forth, I think you’re guilty of the same mistake by categorizing them as Indians and hooligans and so forth. If you demand existentialism, give existentialism.

[Caller 23]: I don’t understand that, but thank you for the help.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much for calling. I’m sorry to cut you off, but it’s just been on so long. Make your comment now if you’d like.

[Chris Kobrak]: I just, I don’t understand how it follows from the fellow saying that the activity was hooligan-like, that he had sort of a disdain for people. I mean, I can say that Adolph Hitler was a mad man. That doesn’t necessarily reflect a disdain for people. The conversation just seemed so [unintelligible].

[Mike Ewing]: Operation Information, you’re on the air. Hello?

[Caller 24: Alan Preis]: Hello?

[Mike Ewing]: You’re on the air.

[Alan Preis]: I’m on the air.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Alan Preis]: Ok. My name is Alan Preis and I was one of the students sitting out on the street on front campus. After we had been sitting there for a period of time, we–one guy besides myself – got up,  we went out to the middle of the street and we asked for the head of the police to come forward so we could negotiate with him. The police came forward and we talked with him and he says–we said that we wanted to see President White and the mayor come, and we wanted to talk to them about settling this. He said, “if you get your students off the streets, back onto front campus, and as long as they stay peaceful on front campus, we’ll do as you ask. We met their demands as they asked and the National Guard also agreed to this, they said that they wouldn’t bother us. The National Guard then formed a line between Main Street and the library, going across the campus, so that the students were blocked and there was no place for them to go. Everything seemed alright though, all we asked was that the National Guard move the troops off the campus and back onto the street so that we could–the kids could sit down, you know, have some room. The National Guard started to do this. Then the commander of the National Guard came down and he says, “the heck with you people” and not those words–he said, “the heck with you people, we’re going to [unintelligible], we read the riot act, we’re going in.” And then they started to go in. I went up and started to yell at these people to get out of there. I got clubbed. And right now I make an appeal: people please stay in. Don’t go out. Don’t cause trouble. I’m asking that President White call me. My name is in the directory. My name is Alan Preis. I ask that he call me, I would like to talk to him. I would like to set up negotiations again, so that this can be settled. I realize that he has no power right now, but he can be the mediator before us or the National Guard unit, for the police department, for James A. Rhodes, and set this up so that the people on this University can have peace and order again. And maybe some of our demands can be met, some of theirs can be met, and maybe we can negotiate these things so that there will be peace and quiet again.

[Mike Ewing]: Alan, I’d like to ask you what your involvement is.

[Alan Preis]: My involvement was one originally a demonstrator sitting down peacefully on the walk. And there was a group of us down there and we were talking and we decided, well, let’s try to talk to them. So we went up to talk to them. We talked to them and we got a list of demands that we wanted and we read it over a loudspeaker system from one of the police cars. The students cheered it, they liked it, they wanted to go ahead with it. They agreed to everything. So we decided to go ahead with it and the Guard went in and grabbed us all out. They broke their promise to us.

[Mike Ewing]: Tell us the demands. Right. Good idea. Ask him, because he didn’t hear us.

[Tom Dubis]: Could you enumerate what the demands or issues were?

[Alan Preis]: The first demand was to abolish ROTC on campus. Another demand was to have the curfews lifted. Another demand was for lower tuition, which is insignificant at this point.

[laughter, background chatter] What was that?

[Unidentified Speaker]: What was that?

[Jackie Stweart]: Lower tuition.

[Alan Preis]: One of the demands–I’m trying to think of them all because I don’t have them written down. They were written down once and the paper’s gone now, I don’t know where it’s at.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Alan Preis]: Demand that the troops leave, that peace and order be restored without having the troops, and that we get a complete system of communication. There were a couple others, I cannot remember exactly what they were at this point because I’m very tired at the moment, but I’m still working like mad. I’ve called Barclay McMillen, he’s going to try tomorrow to set up a meeting if he can. I don’t know if he will, that’s why I’m making this message. I would like President White to hear or some of his aids, somebody who is listening to him, who is in good contact with him, who can tell him to try to get in touch with me. I’ll stay in my room all day tomorrow if I have to. I don’t care what. I’d like to see this thing come to a peaceful summit without riots tomorrow night, because tomorrow night, after what happened tonight, the kids are going to be out there, they’re going to be out to kill. Out to kill people. To burn this campus to the ground. And that’s my own fear. I came here to get an education and I agree with some of the things that went on tonight. I can’t see burning this campus to the ground, because there’s no purpose whatsoever. Right now all we’re doing is making this one of the hottest spots in the country, and it’s serving us no good.  Demonstrations can be peaceful. They don’t have to be violent. And I subject myself to arrest several times this evening, so far I haven’t been arrested but by tomorrow morning I don’t know where I could be. I could be arrested by tomorrow.

[Mike Ewing]: Alan, do you represent a group of any sort?

[Alan Preis]: The only group I represent as such is the group of people that are out there on front campus, every last one of them. We read our demands, they agreed to them, they seemed to want us to back them. I don’t know–there was another person there–I don’t know his name, he had a red beard, he was out there. If he’s listening, I ask him to get in touch with me also, because he was the one–me and him were the two that started the ball rolling. We’d like to keep it rolling.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much. Does anybody on the panel have comments? Thank you for calling.

[Alan Preis]: Thank you.

[Mike Ewing]; Right now it’s twelve minutes before the hour of two o’clock. This is Operation Information. We are taking your calls at 7997. If you’re calling from off campus, that’s 672-7997.

Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 25: Jennifer Miller]: Hello, this is Jennifer Miller calling. I’ve been trying to get a call in for a couple of hours. About three hours ago someone called who’d been arrested.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Jennifer Miller]: Well I’m calling concerning what he said, concerning one student who was arrested on a sorority porch.

[Mike Ewing]: He felt was very unfairly treated by the police.

[Jennifer Miller]: Well, that’s right. I can verify that this is true. I saw it happen. This person was just running from the policemen, who were chasing him down the street. And they were chasing him somewhere, anywhere he could go, doing exactly what he wanted them to do. And they arrested him. They just picked him right and, you know, said, “come on.”

[Mike Ewing]: And, from what you observed he didn’t do anything wrong.

[Jennifer Miller]: No he didn’t. I could have been arrested the same way he could have been. I was an innocent bystander the same as he was. A spectator to a situation that we were looking at. And he was merely picked up, chosen out of the group, and this is a sad situation if this is allowed to occur. When somebody has to be responsible for this to be happening, and somebody can be just singled out, you know, just as an innocent bystander like anybody else.

[Mike Ewing]: Right. It was just brought up that perhaps we need a grievance board to view some of these problems that we’ve had with the police department and the National Guard, if such exists. There was a girl who evidently has a bayonet wound who is in the hospital right now, and it would seem that the cause of that was the National Guard, although we don’t know for sure. We haven’t got that exact information.

[Operator]: Excuse me, this is the Operator. A woman called in and she wants 672-7997.

[Mike Ewing]: Yes.

[Operator]: She’s an involved student and she would like to talk to you. She said your line has been busy.

[Mike Ewing]: Yeah. Could you – is there anyway, operator, you could put her on as soon as I say goodbye to the caller I have on now? Or is that impossible?

[Operator]: Well, see, we have to release your line and–

[Mike Ewing]: Oh, I see. Why don’t you release the line and give us to her, because I think the other person made their point anyhow.

[Operator]: Thank you.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much. Hello? Who is this, who am I talking to?

[Operator]: This is the operator.

[Mike Ewing]: Oh, this is the operator. Where’s–oh she hung up?

[Operator]: I guess.

[Mike Ewing]: Oh.

[Operator]: Ok, now do you want to hang up and I’ll call you back?

[Mike Ewing]: Oh, why? Oh, you have to call me back in order to get this other person on?

[Operator]: Right.

[Mike Ewing]: Ok, fine, we’ll do that.

[Operator]: Ok, thank you.

[Mike Ewing]: Goodbye.

I’m sorry if we eliminated the other caller but I think she got her point across. So, we’ll take another one right now.

Operation Information, you’re on the air. Hello? Is this the operator?

[Operator]: Yes. Ok, now you have to hang up.

[Mike Ewing]: Oh, I already did and then it rang again. Ok, I’ll hang up again. Alright. Tony, you want to hang that up please? Thank you.

Right now it’s 8 minutes before two, and we will be signing off at two o’clock in the morning, and I can’t thank our panelists enough for being here. I don’t know what happened to the operator. She was supposed to call back. The number once again is 672-7997 if you’re calling from off campus. If you’re calling from on campus it’s 7997.

[Carl Moore]: It’s probably my wife calling.

[Laughter from panel]

[Mike Ewing]: Tell you to get home.

[Unidentified Speaker]: The operator didn’t make it.

[Mike Ewing]: She didn’t make it, ok.

Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 26]: Yes, I’d just like to say that in terms of the radical students’ commitment to whatever they believe to be true, is to my mind, is a kind of authentic living. As opposed to the [unauthentic] living the existentialists talk about. Now Carl earlier said that, I think he was criticizing the students who were out on the streets. I think that those who are not out on the streets are those who should be ashamed. Because we permit this to go on, we know it’s wrong, we back the students silently and–

[David Kritzer?]: I’d just like to comment to the fact that calling people who’re responsible for any of the actions that have taken place–the window breaking, the burning of the ROTC building–radical students is not extremely fair. We don’t know that for a fact. If you want to say that people who break windows are radical students then you would have to call the students who broke so many windows in Columbus after the Michigan-OSU game are radical students. I’d also have you note that, at that instance, the police just stood by and watched, and Governor Rhodes wasn’t very far down the road.

[Caller 26]: I mean radical to be a compliment in the sense that you’re either engaged in life or you’re not engaged in life. You either accept the commitment to what you believe or you do not. To be radical is the only way to be if you live authentically. [Unintelligible] is an existentialist. Someone was throwing the word existentialist around as if to degrade them. And actually the ones who should be degraded are those who are sitting quietly, those who have done nothing, those who have said nothing. Peaceful demonstrations don’t work, I mean obviously if Rhodes doesn’t come out and talk that, sounds a lot like Nixon not coming out and talking. They have half a million marchers in Washington D.C. I think that the American people who say, “We want peace, we want law and order, we want it to be done properly or not at all,” are simply saying “We want it to be done not at all.” I mean, they’re not sufficiently engaged in life to–certainly not existentially engaged. I think it’s much to my own unhappiness and self-estimation that I realize that I haven’t done anything.

[Chris Kobrak]: I’d like to make this statement concerning that. I think that whenever we make a decision, any individual, whether it be the people who decided to stay in the dorms tonight or those people who decide not to disobey speeding laws–laws against speeding, one makes a decision as to whether the institutions that make laws are justified in making a specific law or not. And I think you have to ask the question: was the National Guard justified in asking all students to stay in the dorms and making a rule saying that they all must stay in the dorms? I, as an individual student, who was out last night watching the demonstration, and I’ve been sitting here listening to reports of what’s going on, I think for the students’ own safety they should be inside. They’re not going to bring down the “Capitalist system” or end the war in Vietnam by being outside. They only can do bodily damage to themselves or possibly to other people or possibly destroy the University by being outside. And none of those objectives, I think, are worth having. I still don’t know why you would feel that they’re cowards, or whatever it was that, I don’t know, you described them, for not being out on the streets confronting people.

[Caller 26]: Well, I think in terms of authentic existence, existentially speaking I mean I know that I might be talking over some people’s heads–

[Chris Kobrak]: I’m sorry I can’t–

[Caller 26]: –Kierkegaardian thought. But you actually have to transcend law and order if you are committed to something and you attempt to live by it. In other words it’s like, well, I don’t know how justified an example would be [unintelligible] to the masses of people, but it’s like when Abraham faced the idea that he had to sacrifice his son. All the law and all the lawyers said that – law says you should not kill, and Abraham knew this and went ahead, you see?

[Chris Kobrak]: He made a moral decision.

[Caller 26]: It’s a moral decision, yeah, and it transcends, it automatically transcends–

[Chris Kobrak]: That was my point.

[Caller 26]: –it transcends law when you become existentially and fully engaged to what you believe. That’s the idea.

[Chris Kobrak]: Yeah, as I said, that was my point. That whenever we decide to obey a law or not we make a moral decision as to whether it’s justified, and I don’t know if you were considering that. I don’t think you were.

[Caller 26]: Yeah, well, ok, the moral decision though, I think many of us are making and not living to it. Morally we know it’s wrong and then we don’t do anything. And that’s [unauthentic] existence and that’s something that I think we should just face. Maybe cowardice is a better word and maybe [unauthentic] existence is a better one. But the fact that we’re not fully engaged in it, means that we’re not engaged in life and we’re not existentialists, so we can’t say that these students who are out on the streets should try to live existentially. They are, precisely. That’s just what they’re doing and the average person that’s sitting at home that’s talking about, you know, “this is bad, this is nasty,” they’re not living authentically if they believe the war is wrong and they’re not doing anything.

Incidentally, I think you should stay on the air as long as you can because I think you’re doing a great service.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much. We’re on only for a couple more minutes.

[Caller 26]: Well hold on as long as you can, there’s a lot of students that are expending a great deal of their energy and taking great risks to make themselves heard in this crisis.

[Mike Ewing]: Well I can guarantee there’s going to be further discourse on this particular topic. It may not all be tonight but it will be within the next couple of days.

[Caller 26]: Ok, thank you.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you for calling.

[Caller 26]: Alright, bye bye.

[Mike Ewing]: We are going to have to wrap it up people, it’s about two minutes before the hour of two o’clock and we did make a promise that we would wrap it up at two o’clock. I want to thank you all: Chris Kobrak, Carl Moore, Tom Dubis, Jackie Stewart, and Dave Kritzer, for being on the program. Would any of you like to make some closing comments?

[Tom Dubis]: Yeah, I’ll make a comment, why don’t you take that call.

[Mike Ewing]: Ok, why don’t we do that, that’s a good thought. Operation Information, you’re on the air.

[Caller 27]: There was a guy that called in a while ago that said he represented some of the people on the street. Well I was on the street and he didn’t represent me. And he didn’t represent a lot of people I know.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you very much.

[Caller 27]: Ok, I just wanted to let you know.

[Mike Ewing]: Right. Ok, bye bye. Should we–

[Carl Moore]: I hope this doesn’t sound facetious. It will.

[Laughter from panel]

[Mike Ewing]: You always qualify your statements.

[Carl Moore]: I noticed that. I was going to say pray for rain, but I’m not really sure I mean that. I’m not sure I mean that because if we do pray for rain and if it does come–I’m not suggesting causal relationship between those two events–but if it does come, all that really does is stick us inside to stew about it for a long while, and I think it’s a serious, serious problem we’re faced with. It transcends [immediate?] lines, it goes to the whole fabric of American society, it goes to the whole fabric of the role that the university has to play in that society. and I don’t think we can run from those issues, I don’t think we can hide from those issues, we’ve got to resolve them. And the only way we’re going to resolve them is having the kind of dialogue we had tonight. We’ve got to continue it, and we’ve got to continue it at levels where it makes some kind of impact.

[Mike Ewing]: Thank you, Carl.

Yes, go ahead.

[Tom Dubis]: I’d just like to suggest that it’s very interesting the way in which, with our modern technology, we seem here to have mastered it this evening, at least sufficiently to open up something that too often has fallen before into a kind of format of watching other people converse. We’re not experts on anything and we listened as much or more than we talked, and we probably talked too much at some times, but you know, we can learn, and other people can learn. And again, looking into this question of resolution, I think the media here can play for perhaps one of the few times, a really genuinely honest and useful role in getting as many kinds of these things going as possible.

[Mike Ewing]: That’s why I’m in this field. I believe in it, it can do wonders if it’s used correctly. Chris, would you like to make a final comment?

[Chris Kobrak]: No, no thank you.

[Mike Ewing]: Ok. Jackie?

[Jackie Stewart]: No, I think everything’s been said.

[Mike Ewing]: We shall adjourn. Thank you very much everyone for joining us tonight on Operation Information. We will let you know of any further shows we will have. WKSU FM will sign on tomorrow at 8:55. I would like to make one statement at this point and that is that all the opinions expressed herein are not necessarily those of Kent State University or WKSU radio. WKSU FM will be on at 8:55 and WKSU AM also will be on at 8:55. Until we meet again, this is Mike Ewing. Goodnight.

[Transition to radio broadcast]

[Greg Benedetti]: After a calm day on the Kent State University campus, violence erupted for a third successive night as students confronted National Guardsmen and police officers Sunday night. The National Guard, who had announced a 1:00 a.m. campus curfew earlier today, imposed a curfew at 11:00 p.m. as a result of several violations of orders banning assemblies and demonstrations. Teargas was used to disperse the crowds.

At 12:30 this morning, police reported 44 arrests last night, mostly stemming from curfew violations. The two-day total of arrests now stands at 84. Officials at the University Health Center treated three students and one National Guardsman for injuries. One girl was treated for cuts at the health center and was transferred to Robinson Memorial Hospital, listed in fair condition.

The day started with Governor James A. Rhodes visiting the campus, inspecting damage from Saturday night’s disturbances. Rhodes declared a state of emergency on campus. By mid-afternoon, University President Robert I. White outlined areas on which the University’s position should be made clear. Dr. White said the University had been disastrously hurt and immediate and responsible actions were necessary from all quarters if any part of the loss was to be retrieved.

Violence erupted again early in the evening and continued throughout the night as small groups continued to roam the campus.

WKSU will commence broadcasting at 8:55 this morning with complete details.

This is Greg Benedetti along with Tim Zuercher reporting from the office of News Service and Internal Communications at Kent State University.

[WKSU announcer]: This concludes our broadcast for the day. These are the Kent State University broadcasting facilities, WKSU and WKSU FM, operated by the Division of Telecommunications in the School of Speech.

WKSU AM operates on a carrier current of 730 kilocycles, closed circuit to the residence halls on the Kent State campus. WKSU FM operates on a federally assigned frequency of 89.7 megacycles with an effective radiated power of 7500 watts. Both WKSU and WKSU FM will return to the air at 8:55 this morning. For now, a pleasant good evening.

[Pause in recording]

[Unidentified Speaker]: WKSU Radio

[Steve Titchenal]: Hello, this is Steve Titchenal.

[Unidentified Speaker]: Yes, Steve

[Steve Titchenal]: How’s things working out up there?

[Unidentified Speaker]: There’s fine up here we just went off the air.

[Steve Titchenal]: [unintelligible]

[Unidentified Speaker]: Yeah, completely

[Unidentified music plays until end of recording]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



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