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-- Infinite0694 (Talk) 16:45, 24 June 2015 (UTC)



ケント州立大学銃撃事件（英: Kent State shootings、ケント州立大学虐殺事件とも）は  、アメリカ合衆国オハイオ州ケント市のケント州立大学で1970年5月4日（月曜日）に発生し、オハイオ州兵によって非武装の大学生が銃撃された事件である. 州兵は13秒間で67発発砲して4人の学生が死亡、9人が負傷し、中には永久的麻痺に至った者もいた.

撃たれた何人かの学生は4月30日に米大統領、リチャード·ニクソンがテレビ演説で発表したカンボジア作戦に抗議していた. また、撃たれた他の学生は近くを歩いていたか、遠くから抗議を見物していた.

この銃撃事件に対して著しい大衆の反応があった. 数百もの大学やカレッジ、高校は400万人の学生ストライキのためにアメリカ合衆国の至る所で閉鎖され 、ベトナム戦争におけるアメリカ合衆国の役割について世論にさらに影響を及ぼした.

背景
リチャード・ニクソンは1968年の大統領選挙で勝利し、ベトナム戦争の終結を約束した. 1969年11月には347人から504人のベトナム村民が米軍の襲撃によって犠牲となったソンミ村虐殺事件が明らかになり、アメリカ合衆国でこの戦争に対する一般市民の反対の声が高まった. また、1969年12月、徴兵召集の性質が第二次世界大戦以来最初のドラフト・ロッタリーで変わり、この除かれた徴兵猶予はかつての抽選の過程で許されていた為、多くの大学生と教師に影響を及ぼした.

1969年の間、ベトナム戦争は静まっているかのように見えていた為、新たなカンボジアへの侵攻は紛争が悪化するだけだと思っていた人々の不満を募らせた. 国中でタイム誌が言うところの「全国的な学生ストライキ」である抗議行動が巻き起こり、1970年5月上旬の事件の発端となった.

4月30日木曜日
リチャード・ニクソンは国民に対し、米軍戦闘部隊によってカンボジア作戦が実行されたことを発表した.

5月1日金曜日
5月1日、ケント州立大学で約500人の生徒 が集会または抗議時のたまり場として伝統的に用いられるキャンパス中央の草が生い茂る丘で抗議デモを行った. 午後1時までの授業に出席するために群衆は解散したので、カンボジアのベトナム戦争拡大に対して抗議を続ける為、5月4日に再びデモ活動をする事を計画した. 広範囲に渡る怒りがあり、多くの抗議する者は"bring the war home"を口々に叫んだ. 歴史を専攻する生徒のグループはニクソンが米国憲法を台無しにしたことを象徴する為にそのコピーを埋めた.

人々がバーを後にし、ビール瓶をパトカーに投げつけ、ダウンタウンの店頭を壊し始めた時、真夜中近くに混乱が町で急速に展開した. その過程で彼らは銀行の窓ガラスを破壊しアラームを切った. このニュースは早急に広がり、トラブルを避けるためにいくつかのバーは閉店を早めることに至った. そして間もなく多くの人々が暴動に加わった.

既に、120人もの群衆が警察が到着するまでに集まっていた. 群衆の何人かの人は道端で小さなたき火に火を付けた. 群衆は、暴走族、学生と渡り労働者の集まりであるように見えた. 群衆の数人のメンバーは警察に対してビール瓶を投げつけ始め、卑猥な言葉を叫び始めた. 全てのケント州警察は郡や周囲のコミュニティの警察と同様に召集された. ケント市長のLeRoy Satromは非常事態宣言をし、助力を求める為にオハイオ州知事のジム・ロードスの事務所に連絡を取り、全てのバーの閉店を命令した. バーを早く閉めるという決定は怒った群衆の規模を増やす事になった. ついに警察は催涙ガスを使うことで群衆を街から解散させることに成功し、彼らに数ブロック動いてキャンパスに帰ることを強いた.

Saturday, May 2
急進的な革命家が都市と大学を破壊する為にケントにいるという噂が蔓延する間、市役所職員やダウンタウンの企業が脅威を受けていた. 市長は職員とオハイオ州兵の代表と面会した. 会議の後、Satromはロードス知事と連絡をとり、州兵をケントに派遣する判断を下した. 噂と脅威のため、Satromは地元当局が今後起こりうる騒動を対処できないと思っていた. 州兵に応援を求める決定は午後5時00分にされたが、その晩の午後10時位までには町に州兵が到着しなかった.

既に大規模なデモはキャンパスで進行中であり、キャンパスの予備役将校訓練課程(ROTC)を履修する建物は燃えていた. 放火犯は逮捕されなかったが、火事によって誰も負傷者が出ることはなかった. 1000人以上の抗議者は建物を囲み、燃え上がっていくのを見物していた. 消火活動に当たっている間、数人の消防士や警官は周りから岩や鈍器のような物を投げつけられていた. 抗議者が消防ホースをコモンズに持ち込み、破損させた為に、いくつかの消防車会社を招集しなければならなくなった. 州兵と抗議者が衝突し多くの逮捕者を出し、催涙ガスを使った為、少なくとも1人の学生は銃剣で軽傷を負った.

Sunday, May 3
ケント消防署の記者会見で、感情的になったロードス知事は机を叩き 、学生の抗議者をアメリカ人ではないと言った. そして、ロードスは彼らのことをオハイオ州の高等教育を破壊する革命家呼ばわりした. 「我々は特にケント市で、未だ反体制派グループによって行われている暴力的な恐らくキャンパスの最悪な形態を目の当たりにした. 彼らは放火、破壊、警察や州兵、ハイウェイ・パトロールに石を投げつける確実な計画を立てた. この時、我々は彼らをケントから追い出すためにオハイオ州のあらゆる法執行機関を利用し、問題を根絶するつもりである. 我々はこの徴候を扱うつもりはない. そして、これらの人々はまた他のキャンパスへ移ってコミュニティを威嚇する. 彼らは、突撃隊や共産分子、更にはクー・クラックス・クランや自警団員よりたちが悪い」とロードスは語った. 「彼らは、私達がアメリカでかくまう最悪の人々です. 今、私はこう言いたい. 彼らはキャンパスを乗っ取ることはできないだろう. 私は、最も強く、よく訓練された、好戦的な今までにアメリカに集まった革命グループに、我々が直面していると思う. 」ロードスが叫び、拳を机に叩きつけるのを彼のスピーチの記録から聞くことができる.

Rhodes also claimed he would obtain a court order declaring a state of emergency that would ban further demonstrations and gave the impression that a situation akin to martial law had been declared; however, he never attempted to obtain such an order.

During the day, some students came into downtown Kent to help with cleanup efforts after the rioting, which was met with mixed reactions from local businessmen. Mayor Satrom, under pressure from frightened citizens, ordered a curfew until further notice.

Around 8:00 pm, another rally was held on the campus Commons. By 8:45 pm the Guardsmen used tear gas to disperse the crowd, and the students reassembled at the intersection of Lincoln and Main, holding a sit-in with the hopes of gaining a meeting with Mayor Satrom and the university president, Robert White. At 11:00 p.m., the Guard announced that a curfew had gone into effect and began forcing the students back to their dorms. A few students were bayoneted by Guardsmen.

Monday, May 4
On Monday, May 4, a protest was scheduled to be held at noon, as had been planned three days earlier. University officials attempted to ban the gathering, handing out 12,000 leaflets stating that the event was canceled. Despite these efforts, an estimated 2,000 people gathered on the university's Commons, near Taylor Hall. The protest began with the ringing of the campus's iron Victory Bell (which had historically been used to signal victories in football games) to mark the beginning of the rally, and the first protester began to speak.

Companies A and C, 1/145th Infantry and Troop G of the 2/107th Armored Cavalry, Ohio National Guard (ARNG), the units on the campus grounds, attempted to disperse the students. The legality of the dispersal was later debated at a subsequent wrongful death and injury trial. On appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit ruled that authorities did indeed have the right to disperse the crowd.

The dispersal process began late in the morning with campus patrolman Harold Rice, riding in a National Guard Jeep, approaching the students to read them an order to disperse or face arrest. The protesters responded by throwing rocks, striking one campus patrolman and forcing the Jeep to retreat.

Just before noon, the Guard returned and again ordered the crowd to disperse. When most of the crowd refused, the Guard used tear gas. Because of wind, the tear gas had little effect in dispersing the crowd, and some launched a second volley of rocks toward the Guard's line, to chants of, "Pigs off campus!" The students lobbed the tear gas canisters back at the National Guardsmen, who wore gas masks.

When it became clear that the crowd was not going to disperse, a group of 77 National Guard troops from A Company and Troop G, with bayonets fixed on their M1 Garand rifles, began to advance upon the hundreds of unarmed protesters. As the guardsmen advanced, the protesters retreated up and over Blanket Hill, heading out of the Commons area. Once over the hill, the students, in a loose group, moved northeast along the front of Taylor Hall, with some continuing toward a parking lot in front of Prentice Hall (slightly northeast of and perpendicular to Taylor Hall). The guardsmen pursued the protesters over the hill, but rather than veering left as the protesters had, they continued straight, heading down toward an athletic practice field enclosed by a chain link fence. Here they remained for about ten minutes, unsure of how to get out of the area short of retracing their path. During this time, the bulk of the students congregated off to the left and front of the guardsmen, approximately 150 to 225 ft away, on the veranda of Taylor Hall. Others were scattered between Taylor Hall and the Prentice Hall parking lot, while still others (perhaps 35 or 40) were standing in the parking lot, or dispersing through the lot as they had been previously ordered.

While on the practice field, the guardsmen generally faced the parking lot which was about 100 yd away. At one point, some of the guardsmen knelt and aimed their weapons toward the parking lot, then stood up again. For a few moments, several guardsmen formed a loose huddle and appeared to be talking to one another. They had cleared the protesters from the Commons area, and many students had left, but some stayed and were still angrily confronting the soldiers, some throwing rocks and tear gas canisters. About ten minutes later, the guardsmen began to retrace their steps back up the hill toward the Commons area. Some of the students on the Taylor Hall veranda began to move slowly toward the soldiers as they passed over the top of the hill and headed back down into the Commons.

At 12:24 pm, according to eyewitnesses, a Sgt. Myron Pryor turned and began firing at the students with his .45 pistol. A number of guardsmen nearest the students also turned and fired their rifles at the students. In all, 29 of the 77 guardsmen claimed to have fired their weapons, using a final total of 67 rounds of ammunition. The shooting was determined to have lasted only 13 seconds, although John Kifner reported in the New York Times that "it appeared to go on, as a solid volley, for perhaps a full minute or a little longer." The question of why the shots were fired remains widely debated.

The Adjutant General of the Ohio National Guard told reporters that a sniper had fired on the guardsmen, which itself remains a debated allegation. Many guardsmen later testified that they were in fear for their lives, which was questioned partly because of the distance between them and the students killed or wounded. Time magazine later concluded that "triggers were not pulled accidentally at Kent State." The President's Commission on Campus Unrest avoided probing the question of why the shootings happened. Instead, it harshly criticized both the protesters and the Guardsmen, but it concluded that "the indiscriminate firing of rifles into a crowd of students and the deaths that followed were unnecessary, unwarranted, and inexcusable."

The shootings killed four students and wounded nine. Two of the four students killed, Allison Krause and Jeffrey Miller, had participated in the protest, and the other two, Sandra Scheuer and William Knox Schroeder, had been walking from one class to the next at the time of their deaths. Schroeder was also a member of the campus ROTC battalion. Of those wounded, none was closer than 71 ft to the guardsmen. Of those killed, the nearest (Miller) was 225 ft away, and their average distance from the guardsmen was 345 ft.

Eyewitness accounts
現場にいた二人の男は彼らが見たものを説明した.

証言者1: "Suddenly, they turned around, got on their knees, as if they were ordered to, they did it all together, aimed. And personally, I was standing there saying, they're not going to shoot, they can't do that. If they are going to shoot, it's going to be blank."

Unidentified speaker 2: "The shots were definitely coming my way, because when a bullet passes your head, it makes a crack. I hit the ground behind the curve, looking over. I saw a student hit. He stumbled and fell, to where he was running towards the car. Another student tried to pull him behind the car, bullets were coming through the windows of the car. As this student fell behind the car, I saw another student go down, next to the curb, on the far side of the automobile, maybe 25 or 30 yards from where I was lying. It was maybe 25, 30, 35 seconds of sporadic firing. The firing stopped. I lay there maybe 10 or 15 seconds. I got up, I saw four or five students lying around the lot. By this time, it was like mass hysteria. Students were crying, they were screaming for ambulances. I heard some girl screaming, 'They didn't have blank, they didn't have blank,' no, they didn't."

May 4, after the shootings
Immediately after the shootings, many angry students were ready to launch an all-out attack on the National Guard. Many faculty members, led by geology professor and faculty marshal Glenn Frank, pleaded with the students to leave the Commons and to not give in to violent escalation:

"I don't care whether you've never listened to anyone before in your lives. I am begging you right now. If you don't disperse right now, they're going to move in, and it can only be a slaughter. Would you please listen to me? Jesus Christ, I don't want to be a part of this ... !"

After 20 minutes of speaking, the students left the Commons, as ambulance personnel tended to the wounded, and the Guard left the area. Professor Frank's son, also present that day, said, "He absolutely saved my life and hundreds of others".

Casualties
Killed (and approximate distance from the National Guard):
 * Jeffrey Glenn Miller; age 20; 265 ft shot through the mouth; killed instantly
 * Allison B. Krause; age 19; 343 ft fatal left chest wound; died later that day
 * William Knox Schroeder; age 19; 382 ft shot in the back; fatal chest wound; died almost an hour later in a hospital while undergoing surgery
 * Sandra Lee Scheuer; age 20; 390 ft fatal neck wound; died a few minutes later from loss of blood

Wounded (and approximate distance from the National Guard):
 * Joseph Lewis Jr.; 71 ft; hit twice in the right abdomen and left lower leg
 * John R. Cleary; 110 ft; upper left chest wound
 * Thomas Mark Grace; 225 ft; struck in left ankle
 * Alan Michael Canfora; 225 ft; hit in his right wrist
 * Dean R. Kahler; 300 ft; back wound fracturing the vertebrae, permanently paralyzed from the chest down
 * Douglas Alan Wrentmore; 329 ft; hit in his right knee
 * James Dennis Russell; 375 ft; hit in his right thigh from a bullet and in the right forehead by birdshot, both wounds minor
 * Robert Follis Stamps; 495 ft; hit in his right buttock
 * Donald Scott MacKenzie; 750 ft; neck wound

In the President's Commission on Campus Unrest (pp. 273–274) they mistakenly list Thomas V. Grace, who is Thomas Mark Grace's father, as the Thomas Grace injured.

All those shot were students in good standing at the university.

Although initial newspaper reports had inaccurately stated that a number of National Guard members had been killed or seriously injured, only one Guardsman, Sgt. Lawrence Shafer, was injured seriously enough to require medical treatment, approximately 10 to 15 minutes prior to the shootings. Shafer is also mentioned in a memo from November 15, 1973. The FBI memo was prepared by the Cleveland Office and is referred to by Field Office file # 44-703. It reads as follows:"Upon contacting appropriate officers of the Ohio National Guard at Ravenna and Akron, Ohio, regarding ONG radio logs and the availability of service record books, the respective ONG officer advised that any inquiries concerning the Kent State University incident should be directed to the Adjutant General, ONG, Columbus, Ohio. Three persons were interviewed regarding a reported conversation by Sgt Lawrence Shafer, ONG, that Shafer had bragged about 'taking a bead' on Jeffrey Miller at the time of the ONG shooting and each interviewee was unable to substantiate such a conversation." In an interview broadcast in 1986 on the ABC News documentary series Our World, Shafer identified the person that he fired at as Joseph Lewis.

Aftermath and long-term effects
Photographs of the dead and wounded at Kent State that were distributed in newspapers and periodicals worldwide amplified sentiment against the United States' invasion of Cambodia and the Vietnam War in general. In particular, the camera of Kent State photojournalism student John Filo captured a fourteen-year-old runaway, Mary Ann Vecchio, screaming over the body of the dead student, Jeffrey Miller, who had been shot in the mouth. The photograph, which won a Pulitzer Prize, became the most enduring image of the events, and one of the most enduring images of the anti-Vietnam War movement.

The shootings led to protests on college campuses throughout the United States, and a student strike, causing more than 450 campuses across the country to close with both violent and non-violent demonstrations. A common sentiment was expressed by students at New York University with a banner hung out of a window which read, "They Can't Kill Us All." On May 8, eleven people were bayonetted at the University of New Mexico by the New Mexico National Guard in a confrontation with student protesters. Also on May 8, an antiwar protest at New York's Federal Hall held at least partly in reaction to the Kent State killings was met with a counter-rally of pro-Nixon construction workers (organized by Peter J. Brennan, later appointed U.S. Labor Secretary by President Nixon), resulting in the "Hard Hat Riot". Shortly after the shootings took place, the Urban Institute conducted a national study that concluded the Kent State shooting was the single factor causing the only nationwide student strike in U.S. history; over 4 million students protested and hundreds of American colleges and universities closed during the student strikes. The Kent State campus remained closed for six weeks.

Just five days after the shootings, 100,000 people demonstrated in Washington, D.C., against the war and the killing of unarmed student protesters. Ray Price, Nixon's chief speechwriter from 1969–1974, recalled the Washington demonstrations saying, "The city was an armed camp. The mobs were smashing windows, slashing tires, dragging parked cars into intersections, even throwing bedsprings off overpasses into the traffic down below. This was the quote, student protest. That's not student protest, that's civil war." Not only was Nixon taken to Camp David for two days for his own protection, but Charles Colson (Counsel to President Nixon from 1969 to 1973) stated that the military was called up to protect the administration from the angry students; he recalled that "The 82nd Airborne was in the basement of the executive office building, so I went down just to talk to some of the guys and walk among them, and they're lying on the floor leaning on their packs and their helmets and their cartridge belts and their rifles cocked and you’re thinking, 'This can't be the United States of America. This is not the greatest free democracy in the world. This is a nation at war with itself.'"

President Nixon and his administration's public reaction to the shootings was perceived by many in the anti-war movement as callous. Then National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger said the president was "pretending indifference." Stanley Karnow noted in his Vietnam: A History that "The [Nixon] administration initially reacted to this event with wanton insensitivity. Nixon's press secretary, Ron Ziegler, whose statements were carefully programmed, referred to the deaths as a reminder that 'when dissent turns to violence, it invites tragedy.'" Three days before the shootings, Nixon himself had talked of "bums" who were antiwar protestors on US campuses, to which the father of Allison Krause stated on national TV "My child was not a bum."

Karnow further documented that at 4:15 am on May 9, 1970, the president met about 30 student dissidents conducting a vigil at the Lincoln Memorial, whereupon Nixon "treated them to a clumsy and condescending monologue, which he made public in an awkward attempt to display his benevolence." Nixon had been trailed by White House Deputy for Domestic Affairs Egil Krogh, who saw it differently, saying, "I thought it was a very significant and major effort to reach out." In any regard, neither side could convince the other and after meeting with the students, Nixon expressed that those in the anti-war movement were the pawns of foreign communists. After the student protests, Nixon asked H. R. Haldeman to consider the Huston Plan, which would have used illegal procedures to gather information on the leaders of the anti-war movement. Only the resistance of J. Edgar Hoover stopped the plan.

A Gallup Poll taken immediately after the shootings reportedly showed that 58 percent of respondents blamed the students, 11 percent blamed the National Guard and 31 percent expressed no opinion. However, there was wide discussion as to whether these were legally justified shootings of American citizens, and whether the protests or the decisions to ban them were constitutional. These debates served to further galvanize uncommitted opinion by the terms of the discourse. The term "massacre" was applied to the shootings by some individuals and media sources, as it had been used for the Boston Massacre of 1770, in which five were killed and several more wounded.

On May 14, ten days after the Kent State shootings, two students were killed (and 12 wounded) by police at Jackson State University under similar circumstances - the Jackson State killings - but that event did not arouse the same nationwide attention as the Kent State shootings.

On June 13, 1970, as a consequence of the killings of protesting students at Kent State and Jackson State, President Nixon established the President's Commission on Campus Unrest, known as the Scranton Commission, which he charged to study the dissent, disorder, and violence breaking out on college and university campuses across the nation.

The Commission issued its findings in a September 1970 report that concluded that the Ohio National Guard shootings on May 4, 1970, were unjustified. The report said:

"Even if the guardsmen faced danger, it was not a danger that called for lethal force. The 61 shots by 28 guardsmen certainly cannot be justified. Apparently, no order to fire was given, and there was inadequate fire control discipline on Blanket Hill. The Kent State tragedy must mark the last time that, as a matter of course, loaded rifles are issued to guardsmen confronting student demonstrators."

In September 1970, twenty-four students and one faculty member were indicted on charges connected with the May 4 demonstration at the ROTC building fire three days before. These individuals, who had been identified from photographs, became known as the "Kent 25." Five cases, all related to the burning of the ROTC building, went to trial; one non-student defendant was convicted on one charge and two other non-students pleaded guilty. One other defendant was acquitted, and charges were dismissed against the last. In December 1971, all charges against the remaining twenty were dismissed for lack of evidence.

Legal action
Eight of the guardsmen were indicted by a grand jury. The guardsmen claimed to have fired in self-defense, a claim that was generally accepted by the criminal justice system. In 1974 U.S. District Judge Frank Battisti dismissed charges against all eight on the basis that the prosecution's case was too weak to warrant a trial.

Larry Shafer, a guardsman who said he fired during the shootings and was one of those charged, told the Kent-Ravenna Record-Courier newspaper in May 2007: "I never heard any command to fire. That's all I can say on that." Shafer—a Ravenna city councilman and former fire chief—went on to say, "That's not to say there may not have been, but with all the racket and noise, I don't know how anyone could have heard anything that day." Shafer also went on to say that "point" would not have been part of a proper command to open fire.

Civil actions were also attempted against the guardsmen, the State of Ohio, and the president of Kent State. The federal court civil action for wrongful death and injury, brought by the victims and their families against Governor Rhodes, the President of Kent State, and the National Guardsmen, resulted in unanimous verdicts for all defendants on all claims after an eleven-week trial. The judgment on those verdicts was reversed by the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit on the ground that the federal trial judge had mishandled an out-of-court threat against a juror. On remand, the civil case was settled in return for payment of a total of $675,000 to all plaintiffs by the State of Ohio (explained by the State as the estimated cost of defense) and the defendants' agreement to state publicly that they regretted what had happened:

"In retrospect, the tragedy of May 4, 1970 should not have occurred. The students may have believed that they were right in continuing their mass protest in response to the Cambodian invasion, even though this protest followed the posting and reading by the university of an order to ban rallies and an order to disperse. These orders have since been determined by the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals to have been lawful."

"Some of the Guardsmen on Blanket Hill, fearful and anxious from prior events, may have believed in their own minds that their lives were in danger. Hindsight suggests that another method would have resolved the confrontation. Better ways must be found to deal with such a confrontation."

"We devoutly wish that a means had been found to avoid the May 4th events culminating in the Guard shootings and the irreversible deaths and injuries. We deeply regret those events and are profoundly saddened by the deaths of four students and the wounding of nine others which resulted. We hope that the agreement to end the litigation will help to assuage the tragic memories regarding that sad day."

In the succeeding years, many in the anti-war movement have referred to the shootings as "murders," although no criminal convictions were obtained against any National Guardsman. In December 1970, journalist I. F. Stone wrote the following:

"To those who think murder is too strong a word, one may recall that even Agnew three days after the Kent State shootings used the word in an interview on the David Frost show in Los Angeles. Agnew admitted in response to a question that what happened at Kent State was murder, 'but not first degree' since there was – as Agnew explained from his own training as a lawyer – 'no premeditation but simply an over-response in the heat of anger that results in a killing; it's a murder. It's not premeditated and it certainly can't be condoned.'"

The Kent State incident forced the National Guard to re-examine its methods of crowd control. The only equipment the guardsmen had to disperse demonstrators that day were M1 Garand rifles loaded with .30-06 FMJ ammunition, 12 Ga. pump shotguns, bayonets, and CS gas grenades. In the years that followed, the U.S. Army began developing less lethal means of dispersing demonstrators (such as rubber bullets), and changed its crowd control and riot tactics to attempt to avoid casualties amongst the demonstrators. Many of the crowd-control changes brought on by the Kent State events are used today by police and military forces in the United States when facing similar situations, such as the 1992 Los Angeles Riots and civil disorder during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

One outgrowth of the events was the Center for Peaceful Change established at Kent State University in 1971 "as a living memorial to the events of May 4, 1970." Now known as The Center for Applied Conflict Management (CACM), it developed one of the earliest conflict resolution undergraduate degree programs in the United States. The Institute for the Study and Prevention of Violence, an interdisciplinary program dedicated to violence prevention, was established in 1998.

According to FBI reports, one part-time student, Terry Norman, was already noted by student protesters as an informant for both campus police and the Akron FBI branch. Norman was present during the May 4 protests, taking photographs to identify student leaders, while carrying a sidearm and wearing a gas mask.

In 1970, FBI director J. Edgar Hoover responded to questions from then-Congressman John Ashbrook by denying that Norman had ever worked for the FBI, a statement Norman himself disputed. On August 13, 1973, Indiana Senator Birch Bayh sent a memo to then-governor of Ohio John J. Gilligan suggesting that Norman may have fired the first shot, based on testimony he [Bayh] received from guardsmen who claimed that a gunshot fired from the vicinity of the protesters instigated the Guard to open fire on the students.

Throughout the 45 years since the shootings, debate has continued on about the events of May 4, 1970.

Two of the survivors have died: James Russell on June 23, 2007; and Robert Stamps in June 2008.

Strubbe Tape and further government reviews
In 2007 Alan Canfora, one of the wounded, located a copy of a tape of the shootings in a library archive. The original 30-minute reel-to-reel tape was made by Terry Strubbe, a Kent State communications student who turned on his recorder and put its microphone in his dorm window overlooking the campus. A 2010 audio analysis of a tape recording of the incident by Stuart Allen and Tom Owen, who were described by the Cleveland Plain Dealer as "nationally respected forensic audio experts," concluded that the guardsmen were given an order to fire. It is the only known recording to capture the events leading up to the shootings. According to the Plain Dealer description of the enhanced recording, a male voice yells "Guard!" Several seconds pass. Then, "All right, prepare to fire!" "Get down!," someone shouts urgently, presumably in the crowd. Finally, "Guard! ... " followed two seconds later by a long, booming volley of gunshots. The entire spoken sequence lasts 17 seconds. Further analysis of the audiotape revealed that four pistol shots and a violent confrontation occurred approximately 70 seconds before the National Guard opened fire. According to The Plain Dealer, this new analysis raised questions about the role of Terry Norman, a Kent State student who was an FBI informant and known to be carrying a pistol during the disturbance. Alan Canfora said it was premature to reach any conclusions.

In April 2012, the United States Department of Justice determined that there were "insurmountable legal and evidentiary barriers" to reopening the case. Also in 2012 the FBI concluded the Strubbe tape was inconclusive because what has been described as pistol shots may have been slamming doors and that voices heard were unintelligible. Despite this, organizations of survivors and current Kent State students continue to believe the Strubbe tape proves the Guardsmen were given a military order to fire and are petitioning State of Ohio and U.S. Government officials to reopen the case using independent analysis. The organizations do not desire to prosecute or sue individual guardsmen believing they are also victims.

One of these groups, the Kent State Truth Tribunal, was founded in 2010 by the family of Allison Krause along with Emily Kunstler to demand accountability by the U.S. government for the massacre. In 2014 KSTT announced their request for an independent review by the United Nations Human Rights Committee under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the human rights treaty ratified by the United States.

Memorials and remembrances
Each May 4 from 1971 to 1975 the Kent State University administration sponsored an official commemoration of the events. Upon the university's announcement in 1976 that it would no longer sponsor such commemorations, the May 4 Task Force, a group made up of students and community members, was formed for this purpose. The group has organized a commemoration on the university's campus each year since 1976; events generally include a silent march around the campus, a candlelight vigil, a ringing of the Victory Bell in memory of those killed and injured, speakers (always including eyewitnesses and family members), and music.

On May 12, 1977, a tent city was erected and maintained for a period of more than 60 days by a group of several dozen protesters on the Kent State campus. The protesters, led by the May 4 Task Force but also including community members and local clergy, were attempting to prevent the university from erecting a gymnasium annex on part of the site where the shootings occurred seven years earlier, which they believed would alter and obscure the historical event. Law enforcement finally brought the tent city to an end on July 12, 1977, after the forced removal and arrest of 193 people. The event gained national press coverage and the issue was taken to the U.S. Supreme Court.

In 1990, twenty years after the shootings, a memorial commemorating the events of May 4 was dedicated on the campus on a 2.5 acre (10,000 m²) site overlooking the University's Commons where the student protest took place. Even the construction of the monument became controversial and, in the end, only 7% of the design was constructed. The memorial itself does not contain the names of those killed or wounded in the shooting; under pressure, the university agreed to install a plaque near it with the names.

In 1999, at the urging of relatives of the four students killed in 1970, the university constructed an individual memorial for each of the students in the parking lot between Taylor and Prentice halls. Each of the four memorials is located on the exact spot where the student fell, mortally wounded. They are surrounded by a raised rectangle of granite featuring six lightposts approximately four feet high, with the student's name engraved on a triangular marble plaque in one corner.

George Segal's 1978 cast-from-life bronze sculpture, In Memory of May 4, 1970, Kent State: Abraham and Isaac was commissioned for the Kent State campus by a private fund for public art, but was refused by the university administration who deemed its subject matter (the biblical Abraham poised to sacrifice his son Isaac) too controversial. The sculpture was accepted in 1979 by Princeton University, and currently resides there between the university chapel and library.

An earlier work of land art, Partially Buried Woodshed, was produced on the Kent State campus by Robert Smithson in January 1970. Shortly after the events, an inscription was added that recontextualized the work in such a way that it came to be associated by some with the event.

In 2004, a simple stone memorial was erected at Plainview-Old Bethpage John F. Kennedy High School in Plainview, New York, which Jeffrey Miller had attended.

On May 3, 2007, just prior to the yearly commemoration, an Ohio Historical Society marker was dedicated by KSU president Lester Lefton. It is located between Taylor Hall and Prentice Hall between the parking lot and the 1990 memorial. Also in 2007, a memorial service was held at Kent State in honor of James Russell, one of the wounded, who died in 2007 of a heart attack.

In 2008, Kent State University announced plans to construct a May 4 Visitors' Center in a room in Taylor Hall. The center was officially opened in May 2013, on the anniversary of the shootings.

A 17.24 acre area was listed as "Kent State Shootings Site" on the National Register of Historic Places on February 23, 2010. Places normally cannot be added to the Register until they have been significant for at least fifty years, and only cases of "exceptional importance" can be added sooner. The entry was announced as the featured listing in the National Park Service's weekly list of March 5, 2010. Contributing resources in the site are: Taylor Hall, the Victory Bell, Lilac Lane and Boulder Marker, The Pagoda, Solar Totem, and the Prentice Hall Parking Lot. The National Park Service stated the site "is considered nationally significant given its broad effects in causing the largest student strike in United States history, affecting public opinion about the Vietnam War, creating a legal precedent established by the trials subsequent to the shootings, and for the symbolic status the event has attained as a result of a government confronting protesting citizens with unreasonable deadly force."

Every year on the anniversary of the shootings, notably on the 40th anniversary in 2010, students and others who were present share remembrances of the day and the impact it has had on their lives. Among them are Nick Saban, head coach of the Alabama Crimson Tide football team who was a freshman in 1970; surviving student Tom Grace, who was shot in the foot; Kent State faculty member Jerry Lewis; photographer John Filo; and others.

Documentary

 * 1970: Confrontation at Kent State (director Richard Myers) – documentary filmed by a Kent State University filmmaker in Kent, Ohio, directly following the shootings.
 * 2000: Kent State: The Day the War Came Home (director Chris Triffo, executive producer Mark Mori), the Emmy-Award-winning documentary featuring interviews with injured students, eyewitnesses, guardsmen, and relatives of students killed at Kent State.
 * 2007: 4 Tote in Ohio: Ein Amerikanisches Trauma ("4 dead in Ohio: an American trauma") (directors Klaus Bredenbrock and Pagonis Pagonakis) – documentary featuring interviews with injured students, eyewitnesses and a German journalist who was a U.S. correspondent.
 * 2008: How It Was: Kent State Shootings – National Geographic Channel documentary series episode.
 * 2010: Fire In the Heartland: Kent State, May 4, and Student Protest in America (director Daniel Lee Miller) – documentary featuring the build-up to, the events of, and the aftermath of the shootings, told by many of those who were present and in some cases wounded.
 * 2015: "The Day the 60's Died" (Director Jonathan Halperin) - documentary featuring build-up of events at KSU, archival photos and film as well as eyewitness reminisce of the event.

Film and television

 * 1974: The Trial of Billy Jack – The climactic scene of this film depicts National Guardsmen lethally firing on unarmed students, and the credits specifically mention Kent State and other student shootings.
 * 1981: Kent State (director James Goldstone) – television docudrama.
 * 1995: Nixon – Directed by Oliver Stone, the film features actual footage of the shootings; the event also plays an important role in the course of the film's narrative.
 * 2000: The '70s starring Vinessa Shaw and Amy Smart, a mini-series depicting four Kent State students affected by the shootings, as they move through the decade.
 * 2002: The Year That Trembled (written and directed by Jay Craven; based on a novel by Scott Lax), a coming-of-age movie set in 1970 Ohio, in the aftermath of the Kent State killings.

Plays

 * 1976 – Kent State: A Requiem by J. Gregory Payne. First performed in 1976. Told from the perspective of Bill Schroeder's mother, Florence, this play has been performed at over 150 college campuses in the U.S. and Europe in tours in the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s; it was last performed at Emerson College in 2007. It is also the basis of NBC's award-winning 1981 docudrama Kent State.
 * 2010 – David Hassler, director of the Wick Poetry Center at Kent State and theatre professor Katherine Burke teamed up to write the play May 4 Voices, in honor of the incident's 40th anniversary.
 * 2012 – 4 Dead in Ohio: Antigone at Kent State (created by students of Connecticut College's theatre department and David Jaffe '77, associate professor of theater and the director of the play) - An adaptation of Sophocles' Antigone using the play Burial at Thebes by Nobel Laureate Seamus Heaney. It was performed November 15–18, 2012 in Tansill Theater.

Prose

 * Harlan Ellison's story collection, Alone Against Tomorrow (1971), is dedicated to the four students who were killed.
 * Gael Baudino's Dragonsword trilogy (1988–1992) follows the story of a teaching assistant who narrowly missed being shot in the massacre. Frequent references are made to how the experience and its aftermath still traumatize the protagonist decades later, when she herself is a soldier.
 * Jerry Fishman's How Nixon Taught America to do The Kent State Mambo (2010) is a fantasy novella about the tragedy.
 * Stephen King's post-apocalyptic novel The Stand includes a scene in Book I in which Kent State campus police officers witness U.S. soldiers shooting students protesting the government cover-up of the military origins of the Superflu which is decimating the country.

Music
The best known popular culture response to the deaths at Kent State was the protest song "Ohio", written by Neil Young for Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. The song was written, recorded, and preliminary pressings (acetates) were rushed to major radio stations, although the group already had a hit song, "Teach Your Children", on the charts at the time. Within two-and-a-half weeks of the Kent State shootings, "Ohio" was receiving national airplay. Crosby, Stills, and Nash visited the Kent State campus for the first time on May 4, 1997, where they performed the song for the May 4 Task Force's 27th annual commemoration.

There are a number of lesser known musical tributes, including the following:
 * Harvey Andrews' 1970 song "Hey Sandy" was addressed to Sandra Scheuer.lyrics
 * Steve Miller's "Jackson-Kent Blues," from The Steve Miller Band album Number 5 (released in November 1970), is another direct response.
 * The Beach Boys released "Student Demonstration Time" in 1971 on Surf's Up. Mike Love wrote new lyrics for Leiber & Stoller's "Riot in Cell Block Number Nine."
 * Bruce Springsteen wrote a song called "Where Was Jesus in Ohio" in May or June 1970. The unreleased and uncirculating song is reported to be the artist's emotionally charged response to the Kent State shootings.
 * In 1970–71 Halim El-Dabh, a Kent State University music professor who was on campus when the shootings occurred, composed Opera Flies, a full-length opera, in response to his experience. The work was first performed on the Kent State campus on May 8, 1971, and was revived for the 25th commemoration of the events in 1995.
 * Actress and singer Ruth Warrick released in 1971 a single with the song "41,000 Plus 4 - The Ballad of the Kent State", an homage to the four students killed at Kent State.
 * In 1971, the composer and pianist Bill Dobbins (who was a Kent State University graduate student at the time of the shootings), composed "The Balcony", an avant-garde work for jazz band inspired by the same event, according to the album's liner notes.
 * Dave Brubeck's 1971 cantata Truth Is Fallen was written in response to the slain students at Kent State University and Jackson State University; the work was premiered in Midland, Michigan on May 1, 1971, and released on LP in 1972.
 * Holly Near's "It Could Have Been Me" was released on A Live Album (1974). The song is Near's personal response to the incident.
 * A commemorative 2-CD compilation featuring music and interviews was released by the May 4 Task Force in May 2005, in commemoration of the 35th anniversary of the shootings.
 * One of the students who participated in the protest was Chrissie Hynde, future leader of The Pretenders, who was a sophomore at the time. Her former bandmate, Mark Mothersbaugh, and Gerald Casale, founding members of Devo, also attended Kent State at the time of the shootings. Casale was reportedly "standing about 15 ft away" from Allison Krause when she was shot, and was friends with her and another one of the students who were killed. The shootings were the transformative moment for him and for the band, which became less of a pure joke and more a vehicle for social critique (albeit with a blackly humorous bent).
 * Magpie cover the topic in their 1995 album, Give Light. The song 'Kent' was written by band member, Terry Leonino, a survivor of the Kent State shootings.
 * Genesis recreates the events from the perspective of the Guards in the song "The Knife", on Trespass (October 1970).
 * Barbara Dane sings "The Kent State Massacre" written by Jack Warshaw on her 1973 album I Hate the Capitalist System.
 * Musician, spoken word artist and political activist Jello Biafra, who was influenced by the Vietnam War protests and Kent State, mentions the shootings in his satirical song "Wish I Was in El Salvador", included in the collaboration album Last Scream of the Missing Neighbors he made with Canadian hardcore punk band D.O.A. in 1990. The verse recites "Commander says I gotta hold the line/'Til the TV cameras leave/Then we'll fire away, make my day/Just like good ol' Kent State".
 * Chris Butler (The Waitresses) was attending Kent State University at the time of the shootings and released an album in 2014 based on his personal recollections of the event.
 * The Swedish rock band Gläns över Sjö & Strand made a song about the shootings, in the album Är du lönsam lilla vän?, called "Ohio 4 maj 1970".