The Crucible And The Mccarthy Trials Of The 1950s

History always has a mysterious method of repeating itself, and this concept is visible in the drama The Crucible and the McCarthy Trials of the 1950s. The Crucible, written in 1952 by famous playwright Arthur Miller, tells the story of an account of the infamous Salem Witch Trials in 1692, and how the spread of fear and endless scapegoats caused numerous civilians to be hanged. In correlation, the McCarthy Trials, whose purpose was to find communists, ended up incriminating innocent people, similar to the witch trials. In Arthur Miller’s allegorical play The Crucible and in the anti-communist McCarthy Trials, victims were accused and punished without proper evidence.

During both events, even though they were distant in time periods, there

In the play, The Crucible, Giles Corey, a hot-tempered but honorable elderly man exclaims, “My proof is there! If Jacobs hangs for a witch he forfeit up his property- that's law... [Putnam] is killing his neighbors for their land!” (The Crucible 1299). During the witch trials, if someone was accused, the government took their property and their land. This law resulted in people being accused for the mere purpose of stealing land, as with Jacobs and Putnam. To add, Verlizzo wrote that during the McCarthy Trials, “Persons accused of being communists were often denied employment in both the public and private sector. Hundreds were imprisoned and 10-12,000 people lost their jobs. In the film industry alone, over 300 actors, writers, and directors were denied work in the US” (Verlizzo par 7). Those who were thought to be communist, no matter what their career was, were fired from their jobs and “blacklisted” from finding another. People who were accused had everything they worked their lives towards ripped away from them, in the 1600s and the

In The Crucible, Abigail Williams, a teenager who begins to blame people to get herself out of trouble, revealed, “I saw Sarah Good with the Devil! I saw Goody Osburn with the Devil! I saw Bridget Bishop with the Devil!” (The Crucible 1262). To take the blame off herself, Abigail Williams and the other girls who danced in woods, call out the names of the people they “witnessed with the Devil.” Although, in reality, they use them as scapegoats. Lastly, Verlizzo explains that during the McCarthy Trials, “Witnesses either incriminated themselves or had to name someone they know or believe to be a Communist” (Verlizzo par 9). To be cleared or to be considered innocent, the accused were forced to reveal others who were potentially communists, which kept the cycle going. Victims put on trial were forced to reveal others, but in both situations, the people used others as scapegoats with no real