Similarities Between The Crucible And The Salem Witch Trials

The horrors of history are passed on from generation to generation in hopes that they will never occur again. People look back on these times and are appalled at how horrendous the times were; yet, in the 1950s, history repeated itself. During this time, Joseph McCarthy, a United States senator from Wisconsin, began accusing people of being communists or communist sympathizers, which is parallel to the Salem witch trials in the late 1690s when innocent people were accused of practicing witchcraft. One of the people McCarthy accused was author and playwright Arthur Miller. To express his outrage at McCarthy’s actions, miller wrote The Crucible, intentionally drawing similarities between the McCarthy hearings and the Salem witch trials.

Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, communism was a major threat to the United States. Joseph McCarthy, a senator at the time, attempted to capitalize on this by accusing over two hundred men and women of sneaking communism into the United States government or for supporting the cause.* Among these two hundred men and women were several authors, including Arthur Miller. In explaining his reasoning for writing The Crucible, Miller said, ". . . my basic need was to respond to a phenomenon which, with only small exaggeration, one could say was paralyzing a whole generation and in an amazingly short time was drying up the habits of trust and toleration in public discourse."* After visiting Salem and researching the events of the Salem Witch Trials, Miller realized how the havoc of these events corresponded to the events in the 1940s and 1950s.*

“Arthur Miller made the play called “The Crucible” during the 1950’s as a response to McCarthyism and the U.S. Governments blacklisted people.”(Blakesley). Miller was then question and accused of “Contempt of Congress” for not identifying people that were at meetings he attended. McCarthyism and The Salem Witch Craft Trials have been two very wrong things that have happened in the history of the United States for a lot of reasons. First off they both wrongfully accused innocent people of performing not accepted actions of those times. In America you have a right of free will and in both cases they were denied this right just because of someone else’s opinion. In both cases of the Salem Witch Craft Trials and McCarthyism people were being accused of acts with little evidence. People pointed fingers at others so they wouldn’t get blamed for anything, so there was a scare factor taking place. Large groups of people supported these acts maybe because of a get on board everyone’s doing it theme, and if you disagreed you were considered a witch or a communist. Our country supported McCarthy until later we soon regretted it. During the 1940’s and 1950’s communism was a scare in the U.S. so McCarthy capitalized on the subject and said two hundred card carrying communist were in the U.S(PBS). With the Salem Trials people capitalized on the scare of witches and everyone starting accusing the “weird” people. Accusations weather true or false can

“A trial without witnesses, when it involves a criminal accusation, a criminal matter, is not a true trial.” - Bill McCollum. ‘The Crucible’ was a play written by Arthur Miller in 1953. It portrayed the obvious similarities between McCarthyism and The Salem Witch Trials. McCarthyism was a campaign against potential communists in the 1950’s led by Joseph McCarthy. The accused were blacklisted from their jobs even though the majority were innocent. The witch trials that took place in Salem, Massachusetts was the accusation and prosecution for witchcraft that took place between 1692 and 1693. The Salem witch Trials resulted in the execution of 20 people. There are many similarities between McCarthyism and ‘The Crucible’ including completely false accusations, a refusal to lie and confess to these accusations, and there is a clear lack of evidence in both the play and the trials.

Arthur Miller’s The Crucible focuses on the Salem Witch Trials along with the pointing of fingers that went along with it. Miller wrote this to reflect upon what was occurring during the Red Scare in the 1940’s and 1950’s. The Crucible is written in an ironic and cynical tone mocking the Red Scare.

In Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible” it tells the tale of the Salem Witch Trials. At the time of the play, the McCarthy trials, named after Sen. Joseph McCarthy, were underway. Though, instead of hunting for witches, they were hunting for communists. These two trials may have happened at different points in history, but were in many ways the same. Whether it was death to job loss a lot of lives were changed on account of these trials. “The Crucible” and the McCarthy trials have become historically important because they show the process of power, fear, and turmoil.

During the 1940s and 1950s there was a mass hysteria in America because people suspected others of being Communist. A man named Arthur Miller wrote ‘’The Crucible’’ as a way to signify what was happening in the U.S. . He used this story to show how bad things were and how easy it was for people to be falsely accused of being Communist. Miller connects America's Red scare to his fictional story ‘’The Crucible’’ because in the fictional drama the normal people of Salem where falsely persecuted as witches and just like the people during the Red Scare , their lives were ruined beyond repair and they were even killed for suspicion of being a witch even if there was littler evidence to state them as being one.

In this paper, I will be talking about The Crucible, a story written by Arthur Miller in 1952 about the Salem Witch Trials in 1692, and the Red Scare, a time in the 1950’s when Americans were scared that Communists were a threat to them. I will also talk about how Arthur Miller uses “The Crucible” to help the reader understand that similarities such as fear and nationalism occur in historical witch hunts such as the Red Scare still exist, and society persecutes those who do not fit into society because it fears those who are different.

When we hear or read about a tragic story, our mind will often prompt us to read or hear the end result first and then glimpse over how the event actually came to that particular point. However, the events that led or caused the event to happen should also capture our attention as well because we would have a better understanding of the situation on a rounded spectrum. An example of a similar situation is the infamous event occurring in the spring of 1692. When Arthur Miller retold the event in the format of a play in 1967, the United States was recovering from WWII in 1945. In that period, the country was going through an overwhelming era of post-war paranoia and intolerance because the Communist Era shook people on an emotional level. There are many similarities between the Salem Witch Trials in 1692 and the communist paranoia in the U.S. in the 1960s. People were asked to point out names who they thought were in suspicion of being one of the wretched communists. As soon as a person’s name was called out, that person’s status diminished almost immediately along with their family members which a similar event occurred in Salem as well. Miller wanted to point out that if hysteria and paranoia continued, it could ultimately lead to the loss of innocent lives once again. Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible” displays the lack of knowledge in medicine and psychology accompanied with the horrendous effects occurring from the causes led to the hanging of 19 people.

The Crucible is the fictional story of the Salem witch trials in which many women were accused of being witches. The Crucible is written by Arthur Miller, who was recorded as the greatest American playwright (“Arthur Miller” 1). The scene for the play is based in the Massachusetts Bay Colony around 1692. McCarthyism was the act of accusing people of treason without evidence, attacks on a person's character, and attack on their patriotism by accusing many Americans of being communist (Ortega). Lisa Martin says, “Communists control led the two world superpowers, China and the Soviet Union Americans feared a takeover in their own country” (Martin 1). Many people tried to accuse the men and women who were spreading the fear. One man named Joseph McCarthy was a senator that charged communists that interfered with the U.S. State Department (“Joseph McCarthy” 1). The accusations lead to investigations, questioning and finding people guilty without evidence,

In the 20th century a period known as the Cold War occurred, involving an ideological battle between the United States and Russia that was fought on the front of countries, such as Korea, China, and Vietnam. The people of America grew fearful of communism, believing it would undermine their values and take away democracy, and capitalism. Because communist values appealed to many people, Americans feared communist influence believing it would destroy democracy and freedom like it had in Korea, China, Vietnam, and other countries. In America, senator Joseph McCarthy began accusing old communist party sympathizers, who at some time had supported communism were now under suspicion from the government and general public. This support may have cost them their jobs, friends, and even family as fear of communism spread like a wildfire. What was happening in America was essentially a witch-hunt. Government officials faced a series of tests to prove their loyalty, and Hollywood actors were blacklisted if they refused to rat out any communist employees. This period in time is known as the Red Scare. In 1953, Arthur Miller wrote The Crucible in response to the Red Scare to compare current events at the time to the Salem Witch Trials of 1692. Miller uses his allegorical tale to reveal the truths behind McCarthyism, presenting a serious warning to the Americans of the history of false accusations, crowd hysteria, abuse of power, and the repercussions that soon follow them.

The play “The Crucible” by Arthur Miller was written in response to McCarthyism in the 1950’s. In 1692 and 1693 the Salem witch trials took place in Salem Massachusetts. Girls believed to be involved in witchcraft were responsible for these trials. In the late 1940’s and early 1950’s senator McCarthy came to office. Senator McCarthy and some of his allies were responsible for hysteria in the United States of America in the 1950’s. The scare was also in result of a communist scare after World War II and leading to the cold war. The behavior of the people of the Salem witch trials and Americans in the 19050’s resulted in a big scare in reaction to hysteria.

The Crucible is a play by Arthur Miller written in the 1950’s. It was set in the 1690’s in Massachusetts. The play is about the witch trials and how something like a group of girls in the woods could lead to about 200 people being hanged and accused of witchcraft. The people of Salem were new to Massachusetts as they were puritans who went off to America to set up a new religious colony . The people were new to their surroundings had the Native Americans as enemies because they took their land. Although the Crucible is about the witch trials, it is thought to be a metaphor for the McCarthy Communist trials

The history of religious and government intolerance creates a bridge between the 1692 witch trials and present society, including the impending McCarthyism of the 1950s. Hysteria continues to cause riots and uprisings within the world and reputation is still held to a high level of respect. Without these main themes, The Crucible would not be a piece of work that is still prevalent within society and continues to teach

The Crucible uses fear of witchcraft in the America of the 1600s as a metaphor for the fear of communism that was widespread in America in the 1950s. Both