The Salem Witch Trials

1. The Salem Witch Trials Background and Modern Implications

2. O Christian Martyr Who for Truth could dieWhen all about thee Owned the hideous lie!The world, redeemed from superstition's sway,Is breathing freer for thy sake today. • Words written by John Greenleaf Whittier and inscribed on a monument marking the grave of Rebecca Nurse, one of the condemned "witches" of Salem.

3. Synopsis of the 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.

4. Synopsis of the Trials • Hundreds of others faced accusations of witchcraft. Dozens languished in jail for months without trials.  Then, almost as soon as it had begun, the hysteria that swept through Puritan Massachusetts ended.

5. Causes of the Witch Hysteria • Governmental Instability • The provincial government was in transition because of the removal of Sir Edmund Andros, (who was appointed by the king to rule over the newly-created Dominion of New England) due to discontent with his methods and beliefs, • The government responded too slowly to prevent the executions of twenty due to this hysteria.

6. Causes of the Witch Hysteria • This incident displayed the everyday tensions that existed in the colonies at the time and reflected a growing fear of one’s neighbors as the trials built to a fever pitch

7. Causes of the Witch Hysteria • Many other factors contributed to this hysteria: • Generational strife • Tensions between agricultural Salem Village and commercial Salem Town • Possibly an outbreak of food poisoning that may have caused hallucinations • The Salem Witch trials were indicative of the times, which was marked by war, economic and political disruption, and erosion of the society’s utopian vision

8. Arthur Miller and McCarthyism • The play is an allegory (in which a narrative reveals a second meaning beneath the surface) of the McCarthy era, in which similar ’witch hunts’ occurred, targeting citizens as communists rather than disciples of Satan.

9. Arthur Miller and McCarthyism • Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy, inFebruary 1950, made the public charge that 205 Communists had infiltrated the State department. • Upon subsequent testimony before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, McCarthy proved unable to produce the name of any "card-carrying" communists, but he gained increasing popular support for his campaign of accusations.

10. Arthur Miller and McCarthyism • Although McCarthy was later denounced, he promoted unfounded accusations and suspicions of communism in many quarters, most prominently within the entertainment industry through the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). • HUAC investigated communism within Hollywood, calling a number of playwrights, directors and actors known for left-wing views to testify.

11. Arthur Miller and McCarthyism • Although some testified for the committee to avoid prison sentences, the Hollywood Ten, a group of entertainers, refused to testify and were convicted of contempt and sentenced to up to one year in prison.

12. Arthur Miller and McCarthyism • Over three hundred other entertainers were placed on a blacklist for possible communist views and were thus forbidden to work for major Hollywood studios. • Arthur Miller was one of these blacklisted.

13. The blacklist prevented these men from receiving screen credit during this time, until actor Kirk Douglas pushed for writer Dalton Trumbo to receive screen credit for his adaptation of Spartacus in 1960, thus finally breaking the blacklist. Arthur Miller and McCarthyism