Introduction: The Crucible By Arthur Miller

In 1950, President Harry Truman received this telegram from a State Department “spokesman.”

The unnamed author of the telegram was actually Joseph McCarthy, a senator from Wisconsin.

The Charges “In a six hour speech on the Senate floor on February 20, 1950, McCarthy raised the issue of some eighty individuals who had worked in the State Department, or wartime agencies such as the Office of War Information (OWI) and the Board of Economic Warfare (BEW). McCarthy began with a half truth, that a large foreign espionage ring existed within the government and the Truman administration was doing nothing about it. . .” (“Joseph McCarthy” )

The Beginning of the Hunt “McCarthy, was made chairman of the Government Committee on Operations of the Senate, and this gave him the opportunity to investigate the possibility of communist subversion” (McCarthyism).

“For the next two years McCarthy's committee investigated various government departments and questioned a large number of people about their political past. Some lost their jobs after they admitted they had been members of the Communist Party. McCarthy made it clear to the witnesses that the only way of showing that they had abandoned their left-wing views was by naming other members of the party.” (McCarthyism).

McCarthyism “As a result of these controversial actions the term McCarthyism was coined to specifically describe the intense anti-Communist movement that existed in America from 1950 to about 1956, a time which became popularly known as the Red Scare. During this period, people who were suspected of varying degrees of Communist loyalties became the subject of aggressive inquiries, which became known as ‘witch hunts’ to his opponents” (McCarthyism).

McCarthyism “The term "McCarthyism" has since become synonymous with any government activity which seeks to suppress unfavorable political or social views, often by limiting or suspending civil rights under the pretext of maintaining national security.

The Accused People from the media, the motion picture industry, government, and the military were accused by McCarthy of being suspected Soviet spies or Communist sympathizers. . . The now declassified Venona Cables from the former Soviet Union indicate that a number of the individuals he pursued were actually guilty.

McCarthyism “In 1947 the House of Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), began an investigation into the Hollywood Motion Picture Industry. The HUAC interviewed 41 people who were working in Hollywood. These people attended voluntarily and became known as "friendly witnesses". During their interviews they named nineteen people who they accused of holding left-wing views” (Joseph McCarthy).

McCarthyism “In June, 1950, three former FBI agents and a right-wing television producer, Vincent Harnett, published Red Channels, a pamphlet listing the names of 151 writers, directors and performers who they claimed had been members of subversive organizations before the Second World War but had not so far been blacklisted. The names had been compiled from FBI files and a detailed analysis of the Daily Worker, a newspaper published by the American Communist Party” (McCarthyism).

McCarthyism “A free copy of Red Channels was sent to those involved in employing people in the entertainment industry. All those people named in the pamphlet were blacklisted until they appeared in front of the House of Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) and convinced its members they had completely renounced their radical past” (McCarthyism).

“If people refused to name names when called up to appear before the HUAC, they were added to a blacklist that had been drawn up by the Hollywood film studios. Over 320 people were placed on this list that stopped them from working in the entertainment industry.” “Some of those alleged to have been blacklisted were: David Bohm, Physicist Charlie Chaplin, Actor Aaron Copland, Composer of modern tonal music Dashiell Hammett, Author Lillian Hellman, Playwright and left-wing activist and . . .

Arthur Miller, Playwright

McCarthyism As a result of his experiences, Miller wanted to write about the dangers of disregarding the law and making unfounded charges without due process. Rather than writing about McCarthyism, Miller turned to an earlier period in America’s history, a period when a similar “witch hunt” had occurred . . .

The Salem Witch Trials “From June through September of 1692, nineteen men and women, all having been convicted of witchcraft, were carted to Gallows Hill, a barren slope near Salem Village, for hanging. Another man of over eighty years was pressed to death under heavy stones for refusing to submit to a trial on witchcraft charges. Hundreds of others faced accusations of witchcraft; dozens languished in jail for months without trials until the hysteria that swept through Puritan Massachusetts subsided.”(Famous American Trials)

In this famous painting, the man in the lower right hand corner has been accused of being involved with witches. The girls who are standing to his right are in states of hysteria. They have named this innocent man and the court is ready to find him guilty.

The tombstone of Sarah Good, who was also accused, found guilty, and hanged in July of 1692.

Miller was interested in writing about the Salem Witch Trials for many reasons, but as he investigated what had happened in the 1600’s, he kept seeing parallels with what had happened in the 1950’s. In his article, “Why I Wrote The Crucible,” he says, “The more I read into the Salem panic, the more it touched off corresponding images of common experiences in the fifties: the old friend of a blacklisted person crossing the street to avoid being seen talking to him; the overnight conversions of former leftists into born-again patriots; and so on. Apparently, certain processes are universal.”

Works Cited “The Salem Witchcraft Trials.” Famous American Trials.” http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty /projects/ftrials/salem/salem.htm “Joseph McCarthy.” Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_McCarthy “McCarthyism.” Encyclopedia of US History. http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAmccarthyism.htm Miller, Arthur. “Why I Wrote The Crucible.” The New Yorker 1996 http://www.newyorker.com/archive/content/?020422fr_archive 02