Robert Meeropol - Activism and Career

Activism and Career

In the 1960s and 1970s, Meeropol became active in the anti-war effort. After completing his master's degree, Meeropol taught anthropology at Western New England College in Springfield, Massachusetts from 1971 to 1973.

With his brother, Meeropol sued the FBI and CIA under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), winning the release of 300,000 previously secret documents pertaining to their parents' case. Believing the documents proved their parents' innocence, the Meeropol brothers co-wrote a book about their childhood, We Are Your Sons: The Legacy of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg (1975). From 1974 to 1978, he worked actively with the National Committee to reopen the Rosenberg Case and the Fund for Open Information and Accountability.

From 1980 to 1982 he was managing editor of Socialist Review in the San Francisco Bay Area. During this time, his parents' executioner, Joseph Francel, died. In 1982 Meeropol moved back to Massachusetts. He returned to college, studying at the Western New England College School of Law, from which he graduated in 1985. He was admitted to the Massachusetts Bar and began practice as an attorney.

In 1990, Meeropol started the Rosenberg Fund for Children, a public foundation which provides support for children in the U.S. whose parents are targeted, progressive activists. The RFC also supports youth in the U.S. who have been targeted for their own progressive activism. He will step down from the position of Executive Director of RFC on September 1, 2013, to be succeeded by his daughter Jennifer.

He later wrote An Execution in the Family: One Son's Journey (2003), a memoir that reflected on his life and his parents' fate.