The two sons of Ethel Rosenberg, who was executed as a spy in 1953, are heading to Washington, D.C. Thursday to urge President Obama to exonerate their mother before he leaves office.
Ethel and Julius Rosenberg were convicted of giving atomic secrets to the Soviets during the fervent anti-communism era of Senator Joe McCarthy; they died by electric chair.
The Rosenbergs’ sons, Robert and Michael Meeropol, were six and 10 at the time. Before the execution, the boys traveled to a fence outside the White House with a letter asking President Eisenhower to let their parents go.
In the intervening years, the men — now 69 and 73 — have come to believe that their father actually was a spy, but their mother was not. They have long maintained that the evidence against her was manufactured.
So this week, Robert Meeropol said, they are repeating that White House visit as part of a decades-long effort to clear their mother’s name.
“This time with over 40,000 signatures of people who are saying it’s time for the government to admit what it did wrong,” Meeropol said. “It’s time for the government to learn from its mistakes and not repeat them.”
Robert Meeropol, a longtime political activist who lives in Easthampton, says the recent election of Donald Trump makes their request especially relevant.
We have an incoming administration which has real echoes of the McCarthy period, whether it be the creation of lists and registries and the possible detaining of people the government doesn’t like,” Meeropol said.
On a more personal note, Meeropol said he and his brother have longed for an exoneration over many years.
“This is my mother we’re talking about,” he said. “She was executed when I was six years old, and she was taken away from me, and to have the government admit that shouldn’t have happened — I can think of few things more satisfying.”
Robert and Michael Meeropol said they don’t expect an audience with President Obama when they go to the White House, but they do hope word of their campaign will reach the president — and inspire him to take action — before January 20.
They’ve gotten support from Massachusetts Congressman Jim McGovern and the Boston Globe editorial page.
A spokesman for the White House did not say whether Obama has considered exonerating Ethel Rosenberg — only that the president goes through a process for all such requests and that decisions will be announced as they’re made.