Scopes vs. monkey trial

Chimpanzees, said to have been brought to town to testify for the prosecution, performed in a side show on Main Street. Anti-Evolution League members sold copies of T. Martin's book Hell and the High School. Holy rollers rolled in the surrounding hills and riverbanks.

Nearly a thousand people, of whom were standing, jammed the Rhea County Courthouse on July 10, for the first day of trial. Judge John T. Raulston , the presiding judge in the Scopes Trial, had proposed moving the trial under a tent that would have seated 20, people. Also in attendance were announcers ready to send to listeners the first live radio broadcast from a trial.

Judge Raulston, a conservative Christian who craved publicity, was flanked by two police officers waving huge fans to keep air circulating. The proceedings opened, over Darrow's objections, to a prayer. Judge Raulston being fanned at Scopes trial. A jury of twelve men, including ten mostly middle-aged farmers and eleven regular church-goers, was quickly selected. The trial adjourned for the weekend.

He used the occasion to attack the defense strategy in the Scopes case. As Bryan spoke, Judge Raulston and his entire family listened attentively from their front pew seats. The Scopes jury is sworn in. On the first business day of trial, the defense moved to quash the indictment on both state and federal constitutional grounds.

This move was at the heart of the defense strategy. The defense's goal was not to win acquittal for John Scopes, but rather to obtain a declaration by a higher court--preferably the U. Supreme Court--that laws forbidding the teaching of evolution were unconstitutional. That goal, however, would not be realized for another 43 years, in the case of Epperson v. As expected, Judge Raulston denied the defense motion.

Darrow speaking to jurors at the Scopes trial. Opening statements pictured the trial as a titanic struggle between good and evil or truth and ignorance. Bryan claimed that "if evolution wins, Christianity goes. The prosecution opened its case by asking the court to take judicial notice of the Book of Genesis , as it appears in the King James version.

It did. Superintendent White led off the prosecution's list of witnesses with his testimony that John Scopes had admitted teaching about evolution from Hunter's Civic Biology. Chief Prosecutor Tom Stewart then asked seven students in Scope's class a series of questions about his teachings. They testified that Scopes told them that man and all other mammals had evolved from one-celled organism. Darrow cross-examined--gently, though with obvious sarcasm--the students, asking freshman Howard Morgan: "Well, did he tell you anything else that was wicked?

The trial began on July 10, The atmosphere was circus-like. More than six hundred spectators shoehorned themselves into the courtroom. The presiding judge, John T. Raulston, had proposed holding the trial outdoors in a tent that would accommodate twenty thousand. Reporters assembled from as far away as London and Hong Kong. Mencken chronicled the trial for the Baltimore Sun. Years later, the U.

Supreme Court struck down a similar Arkansas law in Epperson v. Arkansas , finding that it violated the establishment clause of the First Amendment. The so-called Butler Act was passed six days later almost unanimously with no amendments.

What became known as the Scopes Monkey Trial began as a publicity stunt for the town of Dayton, Tennessee. A local businessman met with the school superintendent and a lawyer to discuss using the ACLU offer to get newspapers to write about the town. The group asked if high school science teacher John Scopes would admit to teaching evolution for the purposes of prosecution.

It was announced to newspapers the next day that Scopes had been charged with violating the Butler Act, and the town wired the ACLU to procure its services. The Tennessee press roundly criticized the town, accusing it of staging a trial for publicity. Three-time presidential nominee William Jennings Bryan volunteered to present for the prosecution. The politician was already well-known as an anti-evolution activist, almost single-handedly creating the national controversy over the teaching of evolution and making his name inseparable from the issue.

Author H. Wells was approached early on to present the case for evolution, but he turned down the offer. Clarence Darrow — a famous attorney who had recently acted for the defense in the notorious Leopold and Loeb murder trial — found out about the Scopes trial through journalist H. Mencken , who suggested Darrow should defend Scopes. Darrow and Bryan already had a history of butting heads over evolution and the concept of taking the Bible literally, sparring in the press and public debates.

It was the only time in his career he offered to give free legal aid. Bryan and Darrow set the tone by immediately attacking each other in the press. The ACLU attempted to remove Darrow from the case, fearing they would lose control, but none of these efforts worked.

The grand jury met on May 9, In preparation, Scopes recruited and coached students to testify against him. Three of the seven students attending were called to testify, each showing a sketchy understanding of evolution. The case was pushed forward and a trial set for July Bryan arrived in Dayton three days before the trial, stepping off a train to the spectacle of half the town greeting him.

He posed for photo opportunities and gave two public speeches, stating his intention to not only defend the anti-evolution law but to use the trial to debunk evolution entirely. The trial day started with crowds pouring into the courthouse two hours before it was scheduled to begin, filling up the room and causing onlookers to spill into the hallways. There was applause when Bryan entered the court and further when he and Darrow shook hands.

The judge, a conservative Christian, began each day's court proceedings with prayer and did not allow the defense to call any expert scientific witnesses. Darrow responded with an unusual trial maneuver that paid off.

He called opposing counsel, Bryan, as an expert witness on the Bible and proceeded to publicly humiliate him over the course of days by questioning him on his literal interpretation of the Bible.

Bryan fell into every trap and further undermined his credibility by stating, "I do not think about things I do not think about.

The trial lasted only eight days with the jury returning a verdict of guilty in less than nine minutes. 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. Nonetheless, the ultimate result of the trial was pronounced and far-reaching: the Butler Act was never again enforced and over the next two years, laws prohibiting the teaching of evolution were defeated in 22 states.