A friend emailed this afternoon to ask why I hadn’t put up a post commemorating the fortieth anniversary of the Kent State killings. It actually hadn’t occurred to me to write about it.

But I did speak with a reporter at length on the subject a couple of weeks ago. Her article — a solid commemoration — is worth reading. I also posted to commemorate last year’s 39th anniversary, and I’ve addressed other aspects of the Kent State story here, here, and here.

Four students were killed at Kent State forty years ago today, murdered by National Guard troops. Nine others were injured.

The dead were these four students:

Allison Krause, 19, a demonstrator, shot in the side at a distance of 33o feet.

Jeffrey Miller, 20, a demonstrator, shot in the face at a distance of 265 feet.

Sandra Scheuer, 20, a bystander, shot in the throat at a distance of 390 feet.

And William Schroeder, 19, a bystander, shot in the back on his way to class at a distance of 382 feet.

Two dozen activists launched a hunger strike on the Berkeley campus last night, calling on UC administrators to denounce Arizona’s new immigration law, drop disciplinary charges against student demonstrators, and revise the student code of conduct through a “democratic, student-led process.”

The Arizona law, SB1070, has drawn campus protest nationwide, and become a lightning rod in the debate over immigration policy.

The hunger strikers released a six-point list of demands:

• That UC Berkeley administrators denounce SB1070, and call on administrators throughout the UC system to do the same.

• That the university implement a task force on AB540, a law that provides in-state tuition rates to longtime California residents who are undocumented.

• That “any and all” disciplinary charges stemming from student protests in the 2009-10 academic year be dropped.

• That the university reverse layoffs of unionized service workers and “stop attacks against union activists.”

• That the current university code of conduct be suspended, and that a democratic, student-led process to replace it be undertaken.

• That the university “accept responsibility for the violence and escalation of the confrontation surrounding Wheeler Hall on November 20th and December 11th 2009” and meet future protests with a non-violent response.

We’ll be following this story as it develops.

The ACLU of Northern California is harshly criticizing UC Santa Cruz’s treatment of students accused of participating in the occupation of UCSC’s Kerr Hall last November. Citing UCSC’s “failure to provide notice of specific factual allegations” and “its imposition of significant financial restitution payments without a hearing,” the chapter declared its belief that the students constitutional rights have been violated.

In a seven-page letter to the university’s chancellor and the chair of its academic senate, the chapter detailed the improprieties and inadequacies of the disciplinary process currently in effect, and urged UCSC to take immediate steps to remedy the legal and constitutional deficiencies of its current approach.

The chapter sent a letter to Berkeley’s administration earlier this month alleging similar deficiencies in that university’s treatment of student protesters. About a week ago, more than a hundred Berkeley faculty signed a petition echoing those charges.

The letter to UCSC has not yet been made available online. When it is, I’ll update this post with a link and a more detailed discussion of its contents.

The saga of the UC Berkeley student government’s Israel divestment resolution continues this evening, in the final student senate meeting of the academic year.

Meanwhile, students at the University of California San Diego, inspired by the Berkeley example, will be bringing a vote on a similar resolution to their own student government for the first time tonight.

Neither of the two resolutions call for divestment from Israeli businesses. Instead, each urges divestment from General Electric and United Technologies, companies that have contracts with the Israeli military.

4 am California time | The UCSD resolution was referred to committee several hours ago in a 13-10 vote. Debate at Berkeley, which began at 10:30 last night, is still going on. You can follow the discussion at the #ucbdivest hashtag, or at supporters’ new @ucbdivest Twitter account.

4:15 am | The Berkeley fell one vote short of overriding the veto a few minutes ago. Tonight was the last meeting of the semester.