In March 1925, the so–called Butler Act (named after the representative who introduced it) made it illegal for teachers in public schools in Tennessee to "teach any theory that denies the story of the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead that man has descended from a lower order of animals." 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 he didn't believe it would be enforced, or that it would interfere with education in Tennessee schools. The celebrated lawyer William Jennings Bryan – a three–time Democratic presidential candidate, and a fundamentalist hero – thanked Peay enthusiastically for the bill: "The Christian parents of the state owe you a debt of gratitude for saving their children from the poisonous influence of an unproven hypothesis."
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) offered to defend anyone accused of teaching the theory of evolution in defiance of the Butler Act. George Rappleyea, a businessman based in the small town of Dayton, Tennessee (population in 2010: 7,191) persuaded the local superintendent of schools and a local attorney that if they could precipitate a trial, the associated controversy would bring much–needed publicity to Dayton. They asked John T. Scopes, a 24–year–old Dayton high school science and maths teacher, to admit to teaching the theory of evolution.
Rappleyea pointed out that in the textbook that the state required teachers to use, the theory of evolution was explicitly described and endorsed; this meant that teachers were effectively required to break the law. Scopes mentioned that he couldn't remember whether he had actually taught evolution in class, but he had taken the class through the chart and chapter that covered evolution. He added: "If you can prove that I've taught evolution ... then I'll be willing to stand trial."
Scopes was charged on 5 May 1925 with teaching evolution from a chapter in George William Hunter's textbook, Civic Biology: Presented in Problems (1914).
Scopes and Rappalyea enlisted the aid of the ACLU in organising a defence. The ACLU brought in one of the USA's biggest legal names: Clarence Darrow. Darrow was known as a champion of liberal causes and defender of the underdog. He had defended many trade union leaders, including Eugene Debs in 1894; more recently, in 1924, he'd been counsel for the defence in the Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb murder trial in Chicago. The aforementioned William Jennings Bryan volunteered to assist the prosecution, and the stage was set for one of the most famous trials in US history.
The trial was held in Dayton, and followed on radio transmissions throughout America. Almost before it had begun, hordes of spectators and reporters had descended on the town, which took on a carnival–like atmosphere. Preachers set up revival tents along the main street; vendors sold Bibles, toy monkeys, hot dogs, and lemonade. One exhibit featured two chimpanzees and a supposed 'missing link'. One of the chimpanzees – named Joe Mendi – wore a plaid suit, a brown fedora, and white spats, and entertained the public by monkeying around on the courthouse lawn. The 'missing link' was in fact 51–year–old Jo Viens of Burlington, Vermont – a man of short stature, with a receding forehead and a protruding jaw.
Inside the Rhea County Courthouse, the defence's strategy suffered an early setback when Judge John Raulston ruled that expert scientific testimony on evolution was inadmissible – on the grounds that it was Scopes who was on trial, not the law that he had violated. The judge also refused to end his practice of opening each day's proceeding with prayer. On the second day he ordered that the trial be moved to the courthouse lawn, fearing that the weight of the crowd inside was in danger of collapsing the floor.
In front of several thousand spectators in the open air, Darrow changed his tactics. He called the prosecution attorney William Bryan as his sole witness, in an attempt to discredit Bryan's literal interpretation of the Bible. In a searching examination, Bryan was subjected to severe ridicule and forced to make ignorant and contradictory statements – much to the amusement of the crowd.
In his closing speech, Darrow asked the jury to return a verdict of guilty in order that the case might be appealed. Under Tennessee law, Bryan was thereby denied the opportunity to deliver the closing speech that he had been preparing for weeks. After just eight minutes of deliberation, the jury returned a guilty verdict; the judge ordered Scopes to pay a fine of $100 – the smallest amount that the law allowed. Although Bryan had won the case, he had been publicly humiliated and his fundamentalist beliefs had been disgraced. Five days later, he lay down for a Sunday afternoon nap and never woke up.
The Tennessee Supreme Court overturned the Monkey Trial verdict in 1927, on a technicality. But the constitutional issues were left unresolved until 1968, when the US Supreme Court overturned a similar law passed in Arkansas, on the grounds that it violated the First Amendment.
© Haydn Thompson 2017