Introduction

Salem witchcraft is often invoked in the united states to talk about a kind of runaway lack of lega ity. It's come to mean when people are not restrained by law, morality or common sense. The thought that the state had lost its mind and is punishing so many innocent people is intolerable. So had the state really lost its mind by allowing the trials to unfold as they did? Historian ronald hutton drew some interesting comparisons between the salem case and the ways that witchcraft prosecution played out in europe.