This courtroom scene presents innocent characters risking their lives in order to tell the truth seems to be an attack on the injustice of Salem as well as of 1950s America. We know this because there is much evidence in this scene to back the point up. One piece of evidence is the statement made by Hale on page seventy-eight where he says there is a ‘prestigious fear’ in the court. This shows that Hale can see that some injustice is going on and is scared of it. Then when Hale tells Danforth that he is afraid, Danforth replies that there is a ‘prestigious guilt’ instead and threatens him by asking him if he is afraid to be questioned. Later on Hathorne’s feeling of intimidation grows so that he becomes angry. This shows injustice and is linked back to my point at the beginning of the paragraph, because all Hale was doing was telling him what he thought was the truth. Danforth seemed like he was being pressurised so he had to use his power to intimidate and threaten Hale so that he could feel safe. This could be associated with Miller’s own experience because when authority in society in America in the 1950s felt threatened they had to use their influence and power to threaten and intimidate people. Just like when Miller was threatened and risked being ruined just for believing in something. Even though Miller could probably not harm anybody by himself, this is just like the threat Reverend Hale risked of being hanged just for exposing the fact that the court was an unjust one.
Another piece of evidence that shows Miller’s attack on society is Mary Warren confessing to witch craft but later changing her story and denying being a witch. This is a dilemma because she was lying in the court and she had two choices; to say she was lying then or to say that she is lying now. If she confessed that she was lying before, then she had the possibility of getting hanged. But, if she said that she is lying now, then there is a possibility of her mistress Elizabeth being hanged. Her confession shows that she is lying now, to get herself in the clear. When she confessed that she is a witch the second time she also put the life of Elizabeth in danger, thus making her a bad person. This is an attack on the injustice in society because the innocent and good people are getting hanged or suffering for doing what they believe in and for what the bad people have done. The bad people are escaping the fatal consequences of their deeds which is just like the legal system of America in 1950s as portrayed in Miller‘s play. This relates back to Arthur Miller’s personal experience because he believed that innocent people, such as himself, had to suffer due to the bad conduct of other people within society, such as McCarthy, just because McCarthy was able to condemn Miller he abused his high status.
One more piece of evidence is Giles not naming the name of the informer, who told him about Thomas Putnam ordering his daughter to accuse their neighbours of witch craft, just for their land. This displays injustice because Giles is doing the loyal thing by not naming his informer’s name, knowing that his informer might get hanged. This incident is shown by Miller in his play because he wanted the audience to know how unjust the Salem society was. Giles is shown risking his own life to tell the truth and to help the society. Giles does this so that society can open its eyes and see what a charade this trial really is, but instead of being appreciated for helping he is instead punished, therefore showing irony. This relates back to Miller’s own experience because both Miller and Giles had to name names or face harsh consequences, but they both did the noble thing and kept the names to themselves.
The final piece of evidence that indicates that there was injustice in Salem and in America in 1950s is the arrest of John Proctor at the end of Act Three. This event concerns John Proctor expressing his beliefs about the society of Salem. He believes that society is being ignorant and sinful. But what I think is really going on is that Miller is using John Proctor to challenge Salem, to ask us was the society of Salem able to accept the truth? This is what Proctor expresses in his speech. I believe that Miller did this to show the audience how society can react when it is being threatened by an independent thoughts such as Proctor’s. Society’s reaction makes an example out of those who think about opposing society. This links back to my point about injustice in society because the innocent people are risking their own lives to try and make society progress into a better one. However, instead of being appreciated for making society progress they are treated worse than prisoners these days because even prisoners are allowed to have their own views and beliefs. Miller, is once again relating back to his play, because Miller acted a lot like Proctor in his McCarthy trial by expressing his own beliefs. Like Proctor he was punished for doing the honourable thing which was to not give in to the authority. Therefore this shows us that society is just as unjust as it was in both Salem and America in 1950s. Society still punishes people for believing something different that threatens society and could possibly challenge authority as demonstrated in Salem.
The court officials are consistently shown as weak and overbearing which emphasises the injustices in Salem and of McCarthy. This is portrayed by Miller’s play several times throughout Act Three. To begin with, one piece of evidence is the power Abigail has over Danforth which is shown on page eighty-seven. This event shows Abigail gaining power over Danforth by threatening him by saying that even he could get possessed by the devil. This shows that the court official is weak because Danforth hands his power over to Abigail, just so that he doesn’t draw the devil’s attention. Although, you can also argue that he handed all his power to Abigail in hope that she will purify Salem and can help execute all the people which have done bad deeds and save the innocent. But, this is ironic, because without Danforth’s knowledge, he is hurting the innocent and protecting the wicked. However, either way you look at it, Miller portrays Danforth as weak because of his lack of responsibility and power. This is shown by Danforth passing his authority and power so easily down to Abigail. This is once more attached to Miller’s own trial because he is contrasting Danforth with McCarthy to show the audience how much alike and unfair they were, by both their inequality and harsh punishment. This was probably another reason for Miller wanting to use his play as an attack on society.
Also, the switch of perspective between Reverend Parris and Reverend Hale might be evidence to show how the court officials are weak. Parris was originally represented as a minister who doubted the arts of witchery and Hale was originally characterised as a minister who had strong beliefs about witch craft. But, as the play goes on the perspective of the two ministers is exchanged. Parris later on believes that there is such a thing as witchery and is caught up in his power. Finally he gets so caught up with looking strong that he condemns innocent people which therefore shows that he is weak. However, Hale on the other hand sees the errors of his ways and becomes stronger. We know this because Miller introduces this character carrying heavy books which he said represented his authority. However, in the last scenes you see him without any books which shows the audience that he has grown to a status that he does not need to rely on his books anymore therefore showing him being a stronger person. I believe that Miller picked these characters to contrast with each other to show the audience the more you go looking for strength and power the weaker you get, because Parris kept on searching for power and strength because he wanted to feel strong but ended up being weak and harming the innocent. In contrast, Hale was never searching for power only searching for justice and therefore this made him a stronger person. Miller is using his play to say that this and his own experience is alike because the way Parris acts and 1950s America is near enough the same. At first they probably wanted to set out and do good things to help their society, but then ended up getting caught up in their power. Then they started to harm decent people just so that they could remain looking strong even if it meant that they would really become weak.
The reaction of people challenging Danforth’s power (and his closed mindedness) shows how weak he really is. We know this because on page sixty-nine Francis said that he ‘cannot be heard’ for three days to Danforth. This shows weakness in Danforth because Danforth is making judgment on his own opinion and not supported by evidence. I believe that he is doing this because he doesn’t want to get embarrassed in the court by saying he was wrong and looking weak, so he rather keep with his judgement and condemns innocent people in order to look strong. He won’t use the evidence given to him to make a fair judgement and this shows that he is weak and closed minded. Also, on page ninety-two when Proctor tries to offer a more suitable reason about why the girls are acting so childish Danforth tells him to
‘Be quiet’. This shows closed mindedness again, but it also shows Danforth’s reaction to people challenging his authority. This shows Proctor challenging Danforth’s authority because Danforth knows that if he goes with the story of the girls then he wouldn’t get embarrassed. When Proctor tries to change his perspective Danforth can only tell him to ‘Be quiet’ because he doesn’t want to listen because it might make him look small. Challenging what Danforth believes is also like challenging his authority which shows that he has quick reaction when someone challenges what he believes. This reveals Danforth’s weakness because when someone challenges him he tells them to be quiet which means that he is so weak that he won’t accept the truth.
Once again this can be linked back Miller’s own experience, because he believed that McCarthy and Danforth are alike. Both are closed minded and don’t understand when someone is doing the loyal thing and don’t care what they are doing to people. When someone challenges their authority they have to use threats or just don’t listen.
The slow build up of tension throughout the scene emphasises the emotional trauma suffered by the victims of both Salem and McCarthy. One piece of evidence we can look at that backs up this point is Elizabeth’s ‘natural lie’ portrayed by the movie of The Crucible. This scene slowly builds up the tension and highlights the suffering of Elizabeth by slowly zooming the camera into Elizabeth’s face when Danforth asks her is her husband ‘a lecher’. This is deliberately used to build up tension because it is trying to make the viewer or reader feel sorry for her because she also has to deal with the court making her admit to it in front of everybody. However, I believe that Elizabeth is not thinking about what should she say to help her husband’s trial, but I believe that she is questioning she really believes that her husband is ‘a lecher’. The slow zooming in of the camera angle also suggests that Elizabeth has to search her own heart deeper and got to really ask herself in her own heart whether she believes that her husband is really ‘a lecher’ - her reply is ‘no’. This shows the emotional trauma suffered by Elizabeth because she and Miller had to ask themselves a question from within, but the two were slightly different. I believe Miller’s question I believe was ‘am I really a type of person that’ll sell out my friends for my own benefit?’ After searching deep inside for the answer, both Miller and Elizabeth decide no. Because of this, they had to suffer; Elizabeth had accidentally accused his own husband and Miller had his life ruined, just for standing by their beliefs.
Another piece of evidence is the tension given off by the suffering of the people in the court. They are not court officials, which is also evidence to emphasise the emotional trauma of the victims of both McCarthy and Salem. The play starts to build up tension because it says the ‘right door opens’ on page eighty-two of the stage directions. By saying the right door opens this must mean that there is a left door as well, and the reason for Miller doing this is to tell us through stage direction that the girls have to enter slowly because there is only room for one person to pass at a time. This enhances the affect. Also by making Abigail the last person to enter makes it more dramatic because it shows how strong she is and how many people they have to go through to achieve justice and bring Abigail down. This makes us feel sorry for the people in the play because Abigail is so strong that she can do anything she pleases without the fear of the consequences, but the victims aren’t as fortunate which only emphasises the suffering in the play because it reminds us that she is responsible for it all. Once again this is an attack on the unfairness of society because of how the bad people can get away without the fear of the consequences and the innocent people have to pay by suffering for the deeds of others. This makes us sympathise with the suffering of the innocent, just like Miller’s own trial with McCarthy.
Finally, there is the tension that is given to us when Proctor makes his damning speech on page ninety-six. This event makes the audience sympathise with Proctor because we, as the audience know that roaring at the court officials won’t make them change their minds. Instead it would be used as evidence against you and this makes us want to shout from the audience to tell him ‘don’t shout at them!’ Despite this, the event is made to make us think that he doesn’t know that shouting at the officials will be seen as evidence against himself. In fact there is proof that shows that he does. If he does know that shouting will only make the matter worse, why did he do it? The reason is that he is so desperate that no matter how small the chance is of convincing the court that they are condemning innocent people he still has to take it. This gets our sympathy because we feel so sorry for him that he is so desperate he even has to shout at them to try and make the court realise what they are doing is wrong. This relates back to Miller’s own experience because both Miller and Proctor had to stoop so low to try and convince the authorities by shouting at them, except that Miller did his shouting from the safeness within a play.
In conclusion, I believe that Arthur Miller’s ‘The Crucible’ is an attack, but only to a certain point. Using evidence I believe that he was really trying to show us two different perspectives. One, is that to find justice you have to be full of justice and fairness as a person. I believe that his second perspective was that he wanted us to see that there is responsibility attached to power and that it is important not to get caught up with the power by itself. This shows us that he is saying; Power can be a good servant, but a bad master.