He was arrested on May 7, 1925, and charged with teaching the theory of evolution. Clarence Darrow, an exceptionally competent, experienced, and nationally renowned criminal defense attorney led the defense along with ACLU General Counsel, Arthur Garfield Hays.
The prosecution was led by William Jennings Bryan, a former Secretary of State, presidential candidate, and the most famous fundamentalist Christian spokesperson in the country. His strategy was quite simple: to prove John Scopes guilty of violating Tennessee law.
Scopes Trial, also called the âMonkey Trial,â highly publicized trial that took place July 10â21, 1925, during which a Dayton, Tennessee, high-school teacher, John T. Scopes, was charged with violating state law by teaching Charles Darwinâs theory of evolution.
The prosecution was led by William Jennings Bryan, a former Secretary of State, presidential candidate, and the most famous fundamentalist Christian spokesperson in the country. His strategy was quite simple: to prove John Scopes guilty of violating Tennessee law.
Bryan helped prosecute Tennessee teacher in Scopes trial for teaching evolution. Bryan's greatest concern was the public's increasing acceptance of Darwinian thought and theories of evolution; he pleaded with state legislatures to pass laws barring public schools from teaching evolution.
His campaign focused on silver, an issue that failed to appeal to the urban voter, and he was defeated in what is generally seen as a realigning election. The coalition of wealthy, middle-class and urban voters that defeated Bryan kept the Republicans in power for most of the time until 1932.
Darrow was almost as famous as Bryan, a defense attorney who had, the previous year, successfully kept the self-confessed killers Leopold and Loeb off death row, arguing that they were mentally incapacitated and too young to be executed.
Wells replied that he had no legal training in Britain, let alone in America, and declined the offer. John R. Neal, a law school professor from Knoxville, announced that he would act as Scopes' attorney whether Scopes liked it or not, and he became the nominal head of the defense team.
His teachings, and His teachings alone, can solve the problems that vex the heart and perplex the world. After eight days of trial, it took the jury only nine minutes to deliberate. Scopes was found guilty on July 21 and ordered by Raulston to pay a $100 fine (equivalent to $1,500 in 2020).
The confrontation between Bryan and Darrow lasted approximately two hours on the afternoon of the seventh day of the trial. It is likely that it would have continued the following morning but for Judge Raulston's announcement that he considered the whole examination irrelevant to the case and his decision that it should be "expunged" from the record. Thus Bryan was denied the chance to cross-examine the defense lawyers in return, although after the trial Bryan would distribute nine questions to the press to bring out Darrow's "religious attitude". The questions and Darrow's short answers were published in newspapers the day after the trial ended, with The New York Times characterizing Darrow as answering Bryan's questions "with his agnostic's creed, 'I don't know,' except where he could deny them with his belief in natural, immutable law".
Scopes was found guilty and fined $100 (equivalent to $1,500 in 2020), but the verdict was overturned on a technicality. The trial served its purpose of drawing intense national publicity, as national reporters flocked to Dayton to cover the big-name lawyers who had agreed to represent each side.
John Thomas Scopes and commonly referred to as the Scopes Monkey Trial, was an American legal case in July 1925 in which a high school teacher, John T. Scopes, was accused of violating Tennessee 's Butler Act, which had made it unlawful to teach human evolution in ...
The ACLU had originally intended to oppose the Butler Act on the grounds that it violated the teacher's individual rights and academic freedom , and was therefore unconstitutional. Principally because of Clarence Darrow, this strategy changed as the trial progressed. The earliest argument proposed by the defense once the trial had begun was that there was actually no conflict between evolution and the creation account in the Bible; later, this viewpoint would be called theistic evolution. In support of this claim, they brought in eight experts on evolution. But other than Dr. Maynard Metcalf, a zoologist from Johns Hopkins University, the judge would not allow these experts to testify in person. Instead, they were allowed to submit written statements so their evidence could be used at the appeal. In response to this decision, Darrow made a sarcastic comment to Judge Raulston (as he often did throughout the trial) on how he had been agreeable only on the prosecution's suggestions. Darrow apologized the next day, keeping himself from being found in contempt of court.
The Rhea County Courthouse is a National Historic Landmark. In a $1 million restoration of the Rhea County Courthouse in Dayton, completed in 1979, the second-floor courtroom was restored to its appearance during the Scopes trial.
The trialâs proceedings helped to bring the scientific evidence for evolution into the public sphere while also stoking a national debate over the veracity of evolution that continues to the present day. Scopes Trial.
With Raulston limiting the trial to the single question of whether Scopes had taught evolution, which he admittedly had, Scopes was convicted and fined $100 on July 21.
The trialâs climax came on July 20, when Darrow called on Bryan to testify as an expert witness for the prosecution on the Bible. Raulston moved the trial to the courthouse lawn, citing the swell of spectators and stifling heat inside.
William Jennings Bryan led for the prosecution and Clarence Darrow for the defense. Jury selection began on July 10, and opening statements, which included Darrowâs impassioned speech about the constitutionality of the Butler law and his claim that the law violated freedom of religion, began on July 13. Judge John Raulston ruled out any test of the ...
Judge John Raulston ruled out any test of the lawâs constitutionality or argument on the validity of evolutionary theory on the basis that Scopes, rather than the Butler law, was on trial. Raulston determined that expert testimony from scientists would be inadmissible.
On July 21, Scopes was found guilty and fined $100, but the fine was revoked a year later during the appeal to the Tennessee Supreme Court. As the first trial was broadcast live on radio in the United States, the Scopes trial brought widespread attention to the controversy over creationism versus evolution .
Verdict. On the morning of Tuesday, July 21, Darrow asked to address the jury before they left to deliberate. Fearing that a not guilty verdict would rob his team of the chance to file an appeal (another opportunity to fight the Butler Act), he actually asked the jury to find Scopes guilty.
The ACLU was notified of the plan, and Scopes was arrested for violating the Butler Act on May 7, 1925. Scopes appeared before the Rhea County justice of the peace on May 9, 1925, and was formally charged with having violated the Butler Actâa misdemeanor. He was released on bond, paid for by local businessmen.
But because the prosecution objected to the use of expert testimony, the judge took the unusual step of hearing the testimony without the jury present. Metcalf explained that nearly all of the prominent scientists he knew agreed that evolution was a fact, not merely a theory.
The Scopes "Monkey" Trial (official name is State of Tennessee v John Thomas Scopes) began on July 10, 1925, in Dayton, Tennessee. On trial was science teacher John T. Scopes, charged with violating the Butler Act, which prohibited the teaching of evolution in Tennessee public schools. Known in its day as "the trial of the century," ...
A fictionalized version of the Scopes Trial, Inherit the Wind, was made into a play in 1955 and a well-received movie in 1960. The Butler Act remained on the books until 1967, when it was repealed. Anti-evolution statutes were ruled unconstitutional in 1968 by the U.S. Supreme Court in Epperson v Arkansas.
The first day of the trial was spent selecting the jury and was followed by a weekend recess. The next two days involved debate between the defense and prosecution as to whether the Butler Act was unconstitutional, which would thereby place doubt on the validity of Scopes' indictment.
Ironically Scopes could have avoided a criminal trial with its possible conviction and loss of a job by taking advantage of his status as a professional educator, questioning the constitutionality of the anti-evolution law, and asking for a declaratory judgment (Larson 60).
Because Judge Raulston had been so eager to get the case that he had allowed Scopes to be indicted on May 25th by a grand jury whose term had expired, the judge convened another grand jury to indict Scopes a second time (Ginger 129). Eight prospective jurors were examined and excused for various reasons.
Scopes was not called to the witness stand because, as Darrow explained to Judge Raulston, âYour honor, every single word that was said against this defendant, everything was trueâ ( Trial 133).
Because so few reporters were present when Bryan took the stand to be interrogated by Darrow, Scopes was conscripted to write covering news stories for the delinquent newsmen (Scopes 183-184). Much of the Scopes Trial news coverage in 1925 and ever since leaves a great deal to be desired.
Since 1988, Bryan College and the Dayton community have cooperated in organizing a four-day Scopes Trial Festival whose main feature is a documentary drama based almost entirely on the transcript of the trial and performed in the Scopes Trial courtroom.
By far the most celebrated court case in Rhea County and perhaps in all of Tennessee history was the case of the State of Tennessee vs. John Thomas Scopes , which took place in Daytonâs Rhea County Courthouse 10-21 July 1925. For the most part, the trial has been misreported and misinterpreted by journalists at the time of the trial and ever since, by historians who depended on the journalists more than on the official records and actual participants, and by audiences of the play, film, and television versions of Inherit the Wind, who rarely read the authorsâ disclaimer in their preface: â Inherit the Wind is not historyâ (Lawrence and Lee ix).
The Scopes Evolution Trial was a world-class event in its day, and it continues to attract inquiries and visitors from all over the United States and many parts of the world. It has become the benchmark for subsequent trials dealing with similar problems which are usually dubbed âScopes IIâ by the press.
John Scopes, a young popular high school science teacher, agreed to stand as defendant in a test case to challenge the law. He was arrested on May 7, 1925, and charged with teaching the theory of evolution. Clarence Darrow, an exceptionally competent, experienced, and nationally renowned criminal defense attorney led the defense along ...
John Scopes was fined $100. The ACLU hoped to use the opportunity as a chance to take the issue all the way to the Supreme Court, but the verdict was reversed by state supreme court on a technicality.
ACLU History: The Scopes 'Monkey Trial'. In March 1925, the Tennessee state legislature passed a bill that banned the teaching of evolution in all educational institutions throughout the state. The Butler Act set off alarm bells around the country. The ACLU responded immediately with an offer to defend any teacher prosecuted under the law.
His strategy was quite simple: to prove John Scopes guilty of violating Tennessee law. The Scopes trial turned out to be one of the most sensational cases in 20th century America; it riveted public attention and made millions of Americans aware of the ACLU for the first time.
An opportunity finally arose, more than four decades later, when the ACLU filed an amicus brief on behalf of Susan Epperson, a Zoology teacher in Arkansas, who challenged a state ban on teaching 'that mankind ascended or descended from a lower order of animals.'. In 1968, the Supreme Court, in Epperson v.
Defending substitute high school teacher John Thomas Scopes was Clarence Darrow, one of the celebrity lawyers of the day. William Jennings Bryanâthe âGreat Commoner,â three-time Democratic nominee for President, and Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. ruling elderâargued for the prosecution, the State of Tennessee, ...
Charles Wishart, RG 414. (Image No. 4725) A convert to Presbyterianism, Bryan had served as Secretary of State under fellow Presbyterian Woodrow Wilson.
Scopes was found guilty and ordered to pay the minimum fine of $100. A year later, the Tennessee Supreme Court reversed the decision of the Dayton court on a procedural technicalityânot on constitutional grounds, as Darrow had hoped. According to the court, the fine should have been set by the jury, not Raulston.
Darrow succeeded. Caverly sentenced Leopold and Loeb to life in prison plus 99 years.
( m. 1903) â. Children. 1. Relatives. J. Howard Moore (brother-in-law) Clarence Seward Darrow ( / ËdĂŚroĘ /; April 18, 1857 â March 13, 1938) was an American lawyer who became famous in the early 20th century for his involvement in the Leopold and Loeb murder trial and the Scopes "Monkey" Trial.
Darrow married Jessie Ohl in April 1880. They had one child, Paul Edward Darrow, in 1883. They were divorced in 1897. Darrow later married Ruby Hammerstrom, a journalist 16 years his junior, in 1903. They had no children.
"Attorney for the Damned" (Arthur Weinberg, ed), published by University of Chicago Press in 2012 ; Simon and Schuster in 1957; provides Darrow's most influential summations and includes scene-setting explanations and comprehensive notes; on NYT best seller list 19 weeks.
Also in 1894, Darrow took on the first murder case of his career, defending Patrick Eugene Prendergast, the "mentally deranged drifter" who had confessed to murdering Chicago mayor Carter Harrison, Sr. Darrow's "insanity defense" failed and Prendergast was executed that same year.
The young Clarence attended Allegheny College and the University of Michigan Law School, but did not graduate from either institution. He attended Allegheny College for only one year before the Panic of 1873 struck, and Darrow was determined not to be a financial burden to his father any longer.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) offered to defend anyone accused of teaching the theory of evolution in defiance of the Butler Act. On April 5, 1925, George Rappleyea, local manager for the Cumberland Coal and Iron Company, arranged a meeting with county superintendent of schools Walter White and local attorney Sue K. Hicks at Robinson's Drug Store, convincing them that the controversy of such a trial would give Dayton much needed publicity. âŚ
State Representative John Washington Butler, a Tennessee farmer and head of the World Christian Fundamentals Association, lobbied state legislatures to pass anti-evolution laws. He succeeded when the Butler Act was passed in Tennessee, on March 25, 1925. Butler later stated, "I didn't know anything about evolution ... I'd read in the papers that boys and girls were coming home from school and telling their fathers and mothers that the Bible was all nonsense." Tennessee governor Austin Peay signed the law to gain support among rural legislators, but believâŚ
Scopes' lawyers appealed, challenging the conviction on several grounds. First, they argued that the statute was overly vague because it prohibited the teaching of "evolution", a very broad term. The court rejected that argument, holding:
Evolution, like prohibition, is a broad term. In recent bickering, however, evolution has been understood to mean the theory which holds that man has developed from some pre-existing lower type. This is the popular significanâŚ
The trial revealed a growing chasm in American Christianity and two ways of finding truth, one "biblical" and one "evolutionist". Author David Goetz writes that the majority of Christians denounced evolution at the time.
Author Mark Edwards contests the conventional view that in the wake of the Scopes trial, a humiliated fundamentalism retreated into the political and cultural background, a viewpoint which is evidenced in the film Inherit the Wind (1960) as well as in the majority of contemporary historical accounts. Rather, the cause of fundaâŚ
Edward J. Larson, a historian who won the Pulitzer Prize for History for his book Summer for the Gods: The Scopes Trial and America's Continuing Debate Over Science and Religion (2004), notes: "Like so many archetypal American events, the trial itself began as a publicity stunt." The press coverage of the "Monkey Trial" was overwhelming. The front pages of newspapers like The New York Times were dominated by the case for days. More than 200 newspaper reporters from all parts of the country and two from London were in Dayton. Twenty-two