I know there weren't opinion polls until very recently. But is there any way to estimate when a general opinion of a country is one way or another? I'd love to see a map that shows the date of when each country switched from "majority believe in witchcraft/spells/etc" to "majority do not believe in witchcraft/spells/etc."
To be transparent about my motive: I've heard the argument a few times that "the first countries to adopt universal human rights and to permanently abolish slavery were ones where Christianity was the majority. Therefore Judeo-Christian values are important for morality." But this seems like correlation not causation. And I was trying to figure out if the majority of these countries shared other beliefs that most now agree are crazy.
It's a tricky question to answer, even for Americans, simply because immigration plays such an important role in the answer. Mainstream WASPs may have shaken off the notion of witchcraft in the 18th century, but newly-arrived Scotch-Irish in the 19th century still believed in the fair folk and magic. Likewise, Southern/Eastern Europeans arriving as late as the 20th century still believed in witches and actively tried to rid their communities of them. So, the best answer (with any historical question it seems...) is "it depends." It depends on the timeframe, the people involved, and even your definition of witchcraft.
The best book I can point you to would be Owen Davies, "America Bewitched: The Story of Witchcraft After Salem." He argues quite convincingly that the witchcraft epidemic didn't end at Salem and in fact a startling number of people were killed (close to or over 200, if I'm remembering correctly) over witchcraft accusations vs the 19 officially hanged at Salem (and 1 pressed to death).
Edited to add: Judeo-Christian beliefs and a belief in folk magic/witches are not mutually exclusive, either. Most of the Irish immigrants in the 19th century were practicing Catholics who also believed in charms, folk remedies, fairies, etc. The same with Louisiana and Voodoo. Marie Laveau, famously hailed as the Voodoo Queen, was a practicing Catholic who went to mass daily but also allegedly performed Voodoo rituals. Voodoo is generally seen as a syncretic religion, blending Catholicism with African Vodun (I believe Haitian Vodou, while similar, is still an entirely separate religion that rose concurrent with New Orleans Voodoo). And if you throw hoodoo into the mix... you can have any Christian belief (or none) and still believe in root magic, spirits, etc.
So, having Judeo-Christian morals/beliefs does not automatically mean a society does not also believe in magic and witches.