Shortly afterward, the presidential commission studying Kent State, chaired by former Pennsylvania governor William Warren Scranton, pronounced the killings “unnecessary and unwarranted.” But the grand jury in Ohio had already handed down twenty-five indictments, most against students, none against guardsmen. They spoke for the Silent Majority, which had itself spoken in angry letters to the Scranton Commission: “What these young radicals need is a good beating. And I will be the first to break the back of one of these little bitches or bastards.”
