EXECUTION OF ROSENBERGS
Clemency Pleas Rejected
(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) (Rec. 8 p.m.) NEW YORK, June 20. Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, found guilty of betraying their country’s atomic secrets to the Soviet Union, died in the electric chair at sunset yesterday. The couple did not take advantage of a Government offer to save their lives by making a confession of guilt. They had maintained to the end that they were innocent. Mr Eisenhower, in a statement issued through one of his press aides, said: “When democracy’s enemies have been judged guilty of a crime as horrible as that of which the Rosenbergs have “been convicted, when the legal processes of a democracy have been marshalled to their maximum strength to protect the lives of convicted spies, when in their most solemn judgment the tribunal of the United States has adjudged them guilty, and the sentence is just, I will not intervene in this matter. “I am not unmindful of the fact that this case has aroused grave concern both here and abroad in the minds of serious people, aside from considerations of the law. In this connexion I can only say that by immeasurably increasing the chances of atomic war, ? le J Ro A enbergs nSa y have condemned to death tens of millions of innocent people all over the world. The execution of two human beings is a grave matter. But even graver is the thought of the millions of dead whose deaths may be directly attributable to what these spies have done." Stay Set Aside The Supreme Court had earlier set aside the stay of execution granted to the atom spies by Mr Justice Douglas. The voting to overrule the stay was six to three, Mr Justice Douglas, Mr Justice Black, and Mr Justice Frankfurter dissenting. The Chief Justice (Mr Fred Vinson) summarised the defence contention on which the stay had been granted that certain parts of the 1917 espionage law had been superseded by the Atomic Energy Act of 1946. Under the later act sentence of death could only be passed with a recommendation of the jury. No such recommendation was made at the Rosenbergs’ trial in 1951. U £ t,C ? Vi ? son , said he did not believe the legal point raised by the destay 6 had enough merit t 0 warrant a'
■ Mr Justice Douglas, his voice heavy j with emotion, dissented: “I know I am 5 ? g .?‘ °? tbe law> ” he said - adding that ■ Judge Irving Kaufman, of New York, i who tried the couple, had ho power to impose the death penalty. Demonstration in the U.S. I * eXGCU tion started many demon- . ?‘„ r - atlon A and counter-demonstrations ' ‘ he » nation. The widest excite- . centred on Broadway in Manhattan as a crowd which the police Shv 3 !? at 5000 . swarmed to attend „ s P° na onng “National Committee to Secure Justice in the Rosenberg Case called a prayer meeting ” ~ Jne speakers called the eiccutions “brutal murder,” and said theßos?n--bergs were doomed because they were ““ ““Rared the case to Hit- ■ lers tactics in Germany. There was tho S^f< i- SlnBl^ g and chanting and then “tei'vened. They ordered U screams^ f arose y as or one Ur h?d°a?rived‘ hat the hour of executioa . Soon after the Rosenbergs were nut to death the “National Committee to i Secure Justice in the Rosenberg Case” issued this statement: “The very memory of them win one day cause ack shame oS the era of hysteria under which thev J na e S^ rtured *? nd P“‘ to de"** Ou? 1 it * On? ls not the greater for ] II" na tion s conscience is not more I S ,hine e bri g h°tS“ nat,OnS Hght d ° aa < Judge’s Comment i wnv Supr l ? me , Court Judge. Mr Justice r Wilham Douglas, said today that after H«= y L ng i,‘he record of the Rosenberg s case, he knows deep in my heart” that 1 ex e eSn riSh ‘ in issuing ‘ ha r
Oouglas said: “When the motion for a stay was before me I was tvn^erprt r 0U A« d b & ‘t le ]egal Questions e + l2 hours of research and study I concluded that the Question was a substantial one never prea??‘ad “> Court, and never dt cide d by any Court. So I issued the view He sald he stiu held this
- Yol * " Dailv News” said that the price the Rosenbergs paid was no more than fair, we think for crime which President Eifenhow" hl U Xln' Y ? rSe than ™urder. It would be well if more convicted traitors were charged the same price ” T* l ® New York “Herald Tribune" said that the supporters of the Rosengranted " ever y facility for “Meanwhile. Willi Goettling. an unSM, o®™" 0 ®™" °f West B^lin - was arrested by the Russians, charged with organised provocations and riots The interval between the alleged crime and punishment was no more than 24 hours- The contrast between American justice and the Soviet Union cannot be more strikingly illustrated than by these executions taking place within a day or two of one another. It is a £™' raB ‘„ tha A. ‘ he Americans must never allow the world to forget.”
In London ,J n .r < ? ndol J’ a meeting arranged by !??„Nation al Rosenbergs Appeal Comm“f e v h j ld at Marble Arch in the West End was addressed by the committee chairman, the Rev Stanley Evans, who announced that a deputation would leave Downing street to try to get the Prime Minister to inter-
Mr Evans said: “Tonight is a black mght. It is the worst night since the niglft of Munich when London drank and danced white the grapes of wrath were stored and the Inevitability of the bombing of London was made certain " Seven people were elected as a deputation by the crowd of more than 1000 which marched 10 deep down Oxford street creating havoc to police traffic arrangements. The deputation rushed 20 miles by car to Cherwell, Sir Winston Churchill’s private home, to ask mm f? make a last-minute plea with Mr Eisenhower to save the Rosenbergs’ lives. They arrived half an hour after Sir Winston Churchill had gone to bed. They were told he would see nobody. Sir Winston Churchill tonight told the demonstrators in a typewritten note: “It is not within my duty or my power, to intervene in ’ this matter.”
There were only small demonstrations against the execution in Australian cities. About 50 nennle gathered
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Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27072, 22 June 1953, Page 9
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1,068EXECUTION OF ROSENBERGS Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27072, 22 June 1953, Page 9
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