Ann Putnam and Karl Marx?

 At the beginning of the semester, I found it very improbable that I would be able to connect a lesson from my Contending Perspectives in Economics class with anything I learned from Witches, Witchcraft, and Witch Hunts. However, with our last class complete, I can say that I was mistaken. As we read through the public confession of Ann Putnam, which occurred over a decade after the executions she was largely responsible for, I thought to myself: “Wow, Ann Putnam seems to have a view of justice almost identical to that of Karl Max and the Marxist School of economic thought.

You may be thinking that there is no way that a young girl in Salem in the 15th/16th century could ever relate to the father of communism. Well, her justification for her involvement was very close to the way that Marx viewed certain negative aspects of capitalism and other economic systems. He believed that justice is a function of history and is relative. For example, we believe today that slavery is an unjust and disgusting practice. In the view of Marx, this can be completely true, but at the same time those who acted in that way were justified in doing so based on the legal code and societal culture at the time. People have tried to euphemize this down to mean that people were “caught up in the times,” but in reality Marx’s view is a full justification.

Now, if we critically examine the language of Ann Putnam’s public confession, we will see striking similarities in her almost releasing herself of blame based on what was happening in the relative society around her. It might be more accurate to label this public confession as a public justification of actions. Let’s check out a few instances. Right at the beginning, Ann Putnam starts by saying that in 1692, she was an “instrument for the accusing of several persons of a grievous crime.” This sounds extremely similar to saying I was caught up with the relative situation around me, just how a Marxist would indicate.  Again, further into the confession, we see her say “I just fear I have been instrumental, with others, through ignorance and unwittingly.” Next, she continues down the path by stating that she “did it not out of any anger, malice, or ill-will.” This is further evidence of her relying on this Marxist definition of justice to mean that her actions were not of intentional evil, which would make it easier to justify them. Finally, she barely references the actual case and individuals who were executed, in the same way that someone who wishes to justify themselves attempts to distance themselves from the actual humanity.

Overall, I found it quite academically stimulating to combine two very different ideas from two very different fields of study. I am sure that if I dug deeper, I would be able to find other ways to relate what happened in Salem with the 9 other schools of economic thought.