On the recordMay 5, 2010
Earlier today, we voted on memorializing the tragic events that took place 40 years and 1 day ago at Kent State University. Most Americans today are too young to remember what happened then, but I think that those of us who lived through that time and the many others who thought about it or who saw afterwards what happened have this picture in their minds. This is Mary Vecchio, kneeling over the body of Jeffrey Miller, at Kent State, on that terrible day when four students were shot by American soldiers. I think we would honor them by remembering how and why they died, and that is what I propose to do now. In 1968, Richard Nixon ran for President. He said he had a secret plan to end the war. That plan was so secret that, apparently, even Nixon, himself, didn't know what it was because, when he was elected, he simply expanded the war. In November of 1969, the My Lai Massacre exposed to the whole world-- not just to Americans but to the whole world--the sheer brutality of the war in Vietnam.
