ABSTRACT
Professor Malcolm P. Sharp has performed a great public service by his book Was Justice Done? which examines the Rosenberg-Sobell case from the point of view of the evidence presented and its credibility or the reverse. The case is one of those arousing such strong passions on the one side or on the other that few people have the intellectual self-control required for a calm appraisal. Professor Sharp has this self-control. He is not and has never been a Communist. He is a man trained in the estimation of evidence and in the legal relevance of facts. He was concerned in the last stages of the Rosenberg case, but only because, as a lawyer, he came to the conclusion that justice was not being done. Like most people, he had been inclined to accept the verdict of the Court, and it was reluctantly that he was compelled to change this opinion. I have not found in his book any evidence of bias on his part. So far as I am able to judge, he gives due weight to all the evidence that was offered; and when he rejects or questions any piece of evidence, he does so either on grounds of internal inconsistency or because the witness concerned had powerful motives for departing from the truth. His book is as admirable in form as it is in substance, and in both respects deserves the highest praise.
