Communism In The Crucible And The Red Scare

Kelsey Leigh Reber hit it right on the nail when he said, “People are always quick to call evil what they do not know. The unknown sprouts fear. It spreads like an infection, burrowing into every facet of their lives. They need a scapegoat, someone to blame.” This was seen in the play The Crucible, and many events in history after the Salem Witch Trials. The Red Scare during the Cold War, the thought of communism rising in the United States was a real threat to people of the early 1950s. Then we can see it In the United States during World War 2 we incarcerated Japanese Americans for espionage. We saw it in World War 2, blaming the Jews for all the bad that happened to Germany by Hitler, and for that, he put them in concentration camps. Accusations that are false can destroy many lives, as seen in the Crucible.

At the time J. Edgar Hoover was in command of the F.B.I., due to this he obtained extensive files one suspected subversives through the use of wiretaps, surveillance and the infiltration of leftist groups. There were many communistic events that were internationally happening around the world at the time. Consequently, this heightened the fear for the public. Above all, the public felt the Red Scare on a personal level. Many alleged communist sympathizers saw their lives disrupted. Alleged communists were hounded by the law, friends and families alienated them and jobs were lost. All that they did was express their democratic right to join a political