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Similarities Between Mccarthyism And The Crucible

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The Crucible is a playwright of the Salem witch trials that was written by Arthur Miller as an allegory for McCarthyism in the 1950s. Allegations from the characters in the Crucible very closely related to the claims made by Senator Joseph McCarthy. Both situations caused mass hysteria that contributed by the people of Salem and McCarthy. The accusations of McCarthy caught the attention of many people and the US Federal government. Communism during this time was frightening because the US was apart of a cold war with the Soviet Union. Communists in a critical area of the state allowed the Soviets to gain secret information about atomic weaponry and US government political strategy. The hysteria grew as accusations from McCarthy were investigated …show more content…

The townsfolk pressed young girls to confess who in the town was involved in the witchcraft. They named three people who eventually were hanged along with 16 others.
This fear arose on February 9, 1950, Senator Joseph McCarthy, spoke, “Today we are engaged in a final, all-out battle between communistic atheism and Christianity. The modern champions of communism have selected this as the time. Moreover, ladies and gentlemen, the chips are down, they are truly down” (McCarthy 191). These effects of fear led to trials and investigations of the accused creating the second red scare in US history.

Mass Hysteria: Arthur Miller wrote the play, The Crucible in the 1950s, right in the middle of when the McCarthyism era was taking place. Miller wrote about the Salem Witch Trials to hint at the theme of mass hysteria that was occurring with McCarthyism at the time. The witch trials of The Crucible closely resemble what McCarthy did by accusing many people. In The Crucible, the people feared witches and charged innocent people because of the hysteria. With McCarthyism, the people concerned communism and accused innocent people in hopes of destroying it. The mass hysteria included in both situations left the population curious about their decisions in government and

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