You would hope that the passage of fifty years might have cleared the passions that once inflamed the Rosenberg case. The end of the cold war has cooled the ideological battles, and many of the factual questions that once divided the parties seem to have been resolved. Julius Rosenberg was a Soviet spy; the evidence against Ethel was flimsy; judge and prosecutor were overzealous and broke the law themselves. So now maybe the personal issues at the center of the dramatic case might be examined.

This is the task that Robert Meeropol, the younger of the Rosenbergs' two sons, has taken on in his earnest memoir, An Execution in the Family, published to coincide with the fiftieth anniversary of the execution. His subject is his parents' political and psychological legacy, and his efforts to come to terms with it. The writer's manner and position at once command sympathy and respect. For Meeropol has led a worthy life, now as the head of a foundation, called the Rosenberg Fund for Children, that helps children of activists who have been targeted by the law. A man who loves the company of children and mistrusts the state has found the right job.

It wasn't easy getting there.

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