Similarities Between The Salem Witch Trials Of 1692 And Mccarthyism

“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

Even though McCarthyism is not as gruesome as the Witch trials, it did destroy people’s reputations, they were unable to get a job, and as mentioned before, it made it so people that were accused of being communist were not accepted in

Although prosperity filled the 50s, controversy and dissatisfaction surrounded it also. As the picture "Senator McCarthy Extinguishes the Torch of Liberty" conveys, McCarthyism hushed the freedom of speech. (Kennedy, Cohen, and Bailey A127)The man who gave McCarthyism a name, Joseph McCarthy, ruined many lives by accusing tons of Americas of being Communists for about 5 years. The post-cold war paranoia about spies and infiltrates in the American government escalated the allegations to a whole other level, despite the lack of evidence. Many people lost their jobs, went to jail, or became shunned by the public. Senator McCarthy conducted countless numbers of speeches, investigations, and hearings. His actions proved to be so terrifying that very few spoke out against him. Only when taking the claims to the military did the people finally take a stand. Weeks afterward, the Senate condemned McCarthy for “practicing conduct unfit for a member.”

In the McCarthy trials, it was the Republican House that started to expand McCarthy’s targets “The Republican-led House Un-American Activities Committee began a determined campaign...targets included left-wingers in Hollywood and liberals....”(2009) When the accusations continued it gave McCarthy power over the people. Even when President Eisenhower spoke out against McCarthy and his lies. McCarthy used his power to accuse Eisenhower of being a communist. In time he had gained a big following. Whether out of fear or belief, people were influenced and tricked. When the person in power is given the ability to accuse others of the same act, this causes a lot of distrust within a community. In time they will gain more power and control over people, eventually gaining support or followers.

The McCarthy era, which generally spanned from 1947 to 1957, brought to the forefront of American politics the question of civil rights. At issue were controversies about both First Amendment rights to assembly and free speech and Fifth Amendment rights to due process and freedom from self-incrimination. Anti-Communist actions often involved restrictions on these rights, and heading the anti-Communist movement was the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC). This committee, which consisted of government officials from Congress, was formed to investigate the threat of Communism in America. In doing so, the committee brought in witnesses, usually individuals thought to have, or to have had, Communist

The McCarthy Trials on Communism were similar to The Salem Witch trials because in both cases people were wrongfully accused, and hurt by the accusations. The trials are different because The McCarthy Trials on Communism happened in the 1950s and hurt people’s jobs, while the Salem Witch Trials happened in the 1690s and innocent citizens of Salem were executed because people believed the devil was possessing women and men in the town. In the McCarthy Trials, McCarthy was a politician who promoted his own campaign by using biased information and accusations of the opposing candidates. Later in his career when he was running for re-election, his close friend Edmund Walsh suggested a crusade, or an organized campaign concerning a social, political,

The McCarthy hearings were trials in which Senator Joe McCarthy accused government employees and famous people of being Communists. He exaggerated and over analyzed the evidence and ruined many reputations. Blacklists were created and many employers refused to hire those suspected or accused. (If they did then they would also be accused.) Because of the exaggerated evidence and how serious the charges were, the hearings struck fear in Americans. Although at first popular, the public began to wonder how far it would go. After McCarthy accused the U.S. Army of housing Communists, his committee began to crumble. The army strongly defended themselves and made it there duty to end McCarthy's "witch-hunts." In November, 1954 the Watkins committee

McCarthyism was important during the 1950s, because many people feared Communism. Consequently people (falsely) accused each other of being a communist and people often lost big parts of their lives, like their job. Nobody trusted each other, so without evidence people started accusing each other.

During the 1950s there was a rise in the fear of communism called “The Red Scare”. Senator Joseph McCarthy was one of the many people who contributed to people’s fear by making a list of people who he said were communists even though there was no proof in most cases. In an article by Alan Brinkley called “The 1950s Part One: McCarthy and The Red Scare”, it informs, “McCarthy was only one of many who helped create the great fear. The Red Scare was visible in almost every area of American life” (Brinkley). This quote tell us that in the 1950s even though Senator Joseph McCarthy was a huge contributor to The Red Scare. His list of suspected communists made rumors spread and the people on the list get questioned and even go to jail when in some cases they were innocent. It also says in the article by USHistory.org called “McCarthyism: Witch Hunting and Blacklisting in America”, that, “In the 1950s anyone who was considered a communist could be questioned and thrown in jail” (USHistory.org). Which means that his allegations could have easily put people in prison.

No one realized at first that McCarthy accused many on baseless charges, as they were too scared to see straight. As a response to this “Red” (Communist) Scare, the United States House of Representatives commenced the House un-American Activities Committee. As Grolier Online stated, “Under the chairmanship of Texas Democratic representative Martin Dies, Jr., it investigated fascist, Communist, and other so-called extremist or subversive political organizations” (“Grolier Online”). In other words, the HUAC attempted to censor Communist, Nazi, and other “left-wing” parties and prevent them from poisoning the minds of the American public. They viciously attacked such Nazi-supporting parties as the German-American Bund and the Silver Shirt Legion (“Grolier Online”), calling them out publicly and trying to get them shut down or obliterated. The HUAC also tried to investigate the Communist Party’s “infiltration of the government,” supposedly to keep the people safe and promote democracy and capitalism in America (“Grolier Online”). However, things did not go as planned for the HUAC. Over time, its arguably good intentions became skewed and a desire to improve America turned into a horribly misguided witch-hunt, influenced by Communism fear, that ruined the lives and careers of many. Law-abiding citizens were accused of Communism on ridiculous charges, and citizens were promptly sent to prison. Due to this, the HUAC began to change in

Army officials of knowingly harboring Communists in their ranks. Many of his protagonists viewed him as going too far with this speculation. McCarthy soon found himself being investigated by Congress and the F.B.I., which was so-called Army-McCarthy Hearings. The Senate voted 67 to 22 to censure Senator McCarthy making him the fourth Senator who had been censured by the Senate.Dishonesty and malice were at the root of the Salem Witch Delusion and the Red Scare. Two contemporary individuals were blessed with the power to manipulate the justice system to their own advantages. Their vindictiveness brought their supremacy and reliability to a halt. Given that history repeated itself once, a strong atrociousness remains that it will repeat it’s self again. With those assumptions, in present times, we now have the fear ISIS that hey are a direct consequence of the Cold War-era governmental apparatus that statists grafted onto our constitutional republic after World War II that is known as the national-security state. In order to maintain this alien, undemocratic-like instrument in existence, fear had to become very

During the times of McCarthyism the House Committee on Un-American Activities employed barbaric and “Un-American” techniques that would characterize the American law system as an extinguisher of American civil liberties; during this exploration we will be examining a brief history of McCarthyism and a few documents from this time period. Initially, we will be traversing the history from pre-McCarthyism on into the times of McCarthyism. Following, we will be evaluating three documents from the times of McCarthyism: a letter to the House Committee on Un-American Activities, a reflection on the times of McCarthyism, and a political cartoon.

Communism in the early 1950’s in the United States was something that everyone feared. People did not know how to handle the topic of communism. Everyone was a suspect. So when Senator Joseph McCarthy claimed that he had a list of people that the United States government knew to be communists but were not being thrown in jail or even questioned about their ties to the communist party people freaked out. Everyone was turning their trust towards Senator McCarthy, and going along with anything he said. This turned to be a dangerous time for anyone even associated with the Communist Party.

McCarthyism not only destroyed the lives and careers of many Americans but also the innocent image of the country. Senator Joe McCarthy from Wisconsin was the same as any man. But when he cried Communism the world seemed to listen.<br><br>Following the Cold War between Russia and the United States there came many hardships, such as unemployment and high inflation. These hardships produced a restless society. The society then looked for something or someone to blame (Fried, 39). They found someone to blame. Communists. Throughout the country there was a witch hunt known as the Red Scare. A basic idea was formed: Communism was evil. Anyone who participated in such evil was considered illegitimate and were to be excluded from such things as

His accusations ended up posing a real danger to American values. One important value McCarthy degraded was the right to remain silent, because, as he once stated, “a witness’s refusal to answer whether or not he is a Communist on the ground that his answer would tend to incriminate him is the most positive proof obtainable that the witness is a Communist” (Schrecker 69). The rights of LGBT members were also threatened, since some of the people on McCarthy’s lists got there just for being “sexual deviants” (Cunningham 90). And of course, McCarthy’s techniques threatened free speech, as anyone who expressed radical liberal views in public could be a target. Even with all these problems, McCarthy remained in power for years, by capitalizing on the tense, frenzic atmosphere among the American people. As Charles Potter described it, the debate over what McCarthy was “emotional nonsense”, where “sanity seemed to go into hiding, opinions whirled around the outer edges of human thought” (Cunningham 27). Eventually, it came to a point when “each citizen found he must declare himself… either ‘for’ McCarthy or ‘against’ him” (Cunningham 28). The problem was, at this point, McCarthy was seen as an American hero and protector. As McCarthy said himself stated, “McCarthyism is Americanism with its sleeves rolled" (McCarthy). Therefore, while those in support of him could claim to be “red-blooded patriots”, and anyone who dared to oppose McCarthy ran the risk of being called a “commie lover” (Cunningham 28). As a result of the way McCarthyism was equated with patriotism McCarthy was able to get away with some blatant violations of civil