By RFC Founder Robert Meeropol
The August 2024 release of the memo written by the National Security Agency’s (NSA) chief analyst, which concluded that my mother, Ethel Rosenberg, was not a spy, was a smoking gun. Both the KGB and the NSA agreed Ethel was not a spy, and this evidence was kept secret for 74 years!
On April 16th, the Boston University Archive and Libraries, Boston University Law School, the Rosenberg Fund for Children and the Elie Wiesel Center sponsored a day-long symposium. There, my brother and I presented that NSA memo, along with other documents recently released through our July 2024 Freedom of Information request, to the Howard Gotlieb Archive. These documents will now join the collection of our parents’ papers housed at the archive.
The symposium began with a screening of my niece Ivy Meeropol’s HBO film, Heir to an Execution, and a talk-back after the screening with Ivy, my brother Michael and me. This was followed by a panel discussion featuring Clay Risen, author of the 2025 critically acclaimed book Red Scare: Blacklists, McCarthyism and the Making of Modern America; bestselling author and Ethel’s biographer, Anne Sebba (joining us virtually from England); and Wells Dixon, our FOIA attorney, whose actions forced the release of the NSA blockbuster memo about Ethel. A recording of the panel is available here.
The evening culminated with the presentation of the files to the archive, and the presentation of a Human Rights Champion Award to Congressman Jim McGovern for his unstinting support of the effort to exonerate Ethel Rosenberg. McGovern's powerful video acceptance of the award can be viewed here.
My brother and I have championed freedom of information because we believe a functioning democracy requires a knowledgeable public. It is particularly gratifying that the donated materials will be on display and used to educate future generations. To be allied with a major university’s library system and our local Congressman sweetens this even further.
We initiated our first Freedom of Information Act legal action over 50 years ago. It is hard to express the intensity of the satisfaction I feel that after over a half century, I can now say with absolute certainty that Ethel Rosenberg was not a spy.
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Rosenbergs
I was eight years old when the Rosenbergs were executed. It was the end of my innocence so to speak as I saw my mother weeping. I had met Helen Sobel as well. I remember that era as if it was yesterday. First the Russians were the bad guys than the war came along and they were the good guys and then they were the bad guys again. Many atomic secrets were passed by a variety of people whether due to naive intentions that since they were our allies, the soviets should have access, or for profit who knows? Only the Rosenbergs paid the ultimate price and I wonder if a Jewish judge condemning a Jewish couple made him feel safer in a basically anti- Jewish America. I often heard if we just get rid of those Jews and blacks we will be fine.I recently read a book about Ethel and believe her to be innocent. I also believe should stood by her husband for better or worse 'til death do them part. I had nightmares for a long time as did my sister. I believe the McCarthy era was just a practice run for what we are experiencing now on steroids. Sincerely, J. Wital
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