- The central issue at stake in the jury's decision as to convict or acquit John Scopes was whether or not science or religion ought to be predominant in America
- Scopes found guilty and receives a $1,000 fine
- Note: While the legislation of the Butler Act may not have been just, it was the law and Scopes did break it
- The buzz of evolution dies down until...
- The Scopes trial revealed the battle between two different tendencies within America, the tension between science and religion
- As long as Americans are religiously passionate, the issue of the rift in American passions that were made manifest in the Scopes Trial will continue to exist
- Consider this: Are Americans today significantly divided over a topic as they were in the Scopes Trial of 1925?
The Verdict
The Aftermath after the Aftermath
- In 1957, the former Soviet Union launched the first ever Earth-orbiting satellite, called Sputnik 1.
- Americans realized that they were falling into the background of the world stage scientifically
- States such as Tennessee under the Butler Act prohibited the teaching of fundamental scientific theories like Darwin's theory of evolution while foreign nations openly taught scientific theories
- Revived interest in America regarding Darwin's theory of evolution
- It was decided that American public schools should teach such scientific theories as Darwin's theory of evolution in public education
- Greater emphasis on the sciences and mathematics
Scopes Trial Spectators
Sputnik 1
Headline of The Scopes Trial
Clarence Darrow
- Darrow was John Scope's defense attorney in the trial
- A famous lawyer whose claim to fame was from a previous court case, the Leopold in Loeb Case
- Argued that the defendants were innocent of murder even though they pleaded guilty on the account that they were deficient in emotion and could not make the right decision
- Thus Darrow proved that the defendants were mentally diseased
- The first time mental illness was used to in court as a defense for a crime
- Openly opposed the Butler Act
- He traveled around the nation country speaking about the threat it posed to teaching factual scientific discoveries
John Scopes
- Scopes was a 24 year old high school science teacher in Dayton, Tennessee
- Scopes was selected by the ACLU as the teacher to test the Butler Act
- Scopes personally objected the Butler Act
- It was arranged that he would to casually teach Charles Darwin's theory of evolution to his biology class
- Upon teaching evolution, Scopes was shortly thereafter arrested and brought to trial for violation of state legislature
William Jennings Bryan
Media Circus
- Bryan was represented the fundamentalists as the prosecution attorney
- As a fundamentalist:
- Believed the bible should be interpreted literally and non-symbolically
- Was skeptical of science and the theory of evolution
- Famed for running for the presidency thrice and for being a powerful speaker as a lawyer
- Staunch supporter of the Butler Act because he was an avid creationist
- Believed that conservative and religious ideas would promote American Democracy
The sentence that aroused a nation
- The celebrity lawyers involved brought fame to the trial
- Nationwide attention because the trial dealt with civil liberty
- The first time a social issue was decided upon in a US court
- Remember: The trial was fought over the place of evolution/role of science and religion in public schools and American society
- There was a sense that the verdict would be historic
- People came from all over to watch the court proceedings take place from the audience
- First trial to ever be nationally broadcast on the radio
- Made the headlines of tabloids nationwide
- Much humorous fundamentalist media coverage presenting the notion that mankind evolved from apes as comical and absurd
- How the Scoped Trial begot its nickname, "The Scopes Monkey Trial"
- Dubbed H. L. Mencken, a famous journalist of the Chicago Sun
"We have now learned that animal forms may be arranged so as to begin with one-celled form and culminate with a group which includes man himself."
John Scopes
- John Scopes to his Biology Class
William Jennings Bryan
Example of a song defending fundamentalist convictions, satirizing the idea that mankind could have descended from apes.
Evolution vs. Creationism
- Evolution: the process by which different kinds of living organisms are thought to have developed and diversified from earlier forms during the history of the earth
- Recent scientific evidence and developments in the 1900's made not only the quality of life rise, but also scientific fervor for many Americans
- Fundamentalists did not want evolution taught in schools because the Bible states men were created in God's image, not that men descended from apes
- The Butler Act (March 21, 1925): prohibited Tennessee public school teachers from teaching evolution or anything contradicting the biblical account of the origin of man
- The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) sought to test the Butler Act
Commemorative plaque in front of the courthouse
Significance
The Start of it All...
One example out of many political cartoons. What do you think the message is?
- There was growing conservationism in the US after WWI
- Tension between fundamentalist religious and progressive modern ideas were prominent
- Fundamentalism: strict adherence to the basic principles of any subject or discipline
- Fundamentalists believed that the bible should be literally translated and incorporated into public eduction
Thanks to the aftermath of the Scopes Trial,
evolution has been taught in American public schools and
America has become scientifically more advanced.
America would surpass the former Soviet Union scientifically in the space race to put the first man on the moon thanks in part to
the acceptance of scientific theories in American public schools.
The Scopes "Monkey" Trial, 1925
by Rachel Rosenberg