The Scopes Trial of 1925 has made an almost indelible impression upon the consciousness of modern Americans as an indication of the hopelessly anti-intellectual, obscurantist, and bigoted nature of "Fundamentalism," or the literal belief in the Bible. However, the image that most of us have of the trial is derived from Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee's portrayal in the 1955 play, Inherit the Wind. When it was released as a movie in 1960, critics, even those with very little sympathy for Fundamentalism, stated that it "in effect create[s] history," and "unjustly caricatures Fundamentalism."1 Lawrence and Lee admitted that their play "is not history."2 However, millions of people have unknowingly accepted Inherit the Wind as a faithful dramatization of a historical event.
The Scopes trial was argued at the Rhea County courthouse in Dayton, Tennessee, from Friday, July 10 until Tuesday, July 21, 1925, when John Thomas Scopes was found guilty of breaking a Tennessee law which forbade teaching in tax-supported schools that human beings evolved from lower forms of life. Leading the defense was the renowned criminal lawyer and agnostic, Clarence Darrow, who had become widely known in many widely publicized trials.
One of the many popular misconceptions of the trial concerns the leader of the prosecution for the case, William Jennings Bryan. Many people mistakenly think of Bryan as a country bumpkin with very little education who, due to ignorance and lack of sophistication, defended a literal interpretation of the Bible. However, far from being unsophisticated, Bryan was three times the Democratic nominee for President of the United States, and was Secretary of State under President Woodrow Wilson.
Another common misconception is that, because of the bad publicity surrounding the trial, the Biblical world view could no longer be taken seriously by thinking Christians. However, the Fundamentalist controversy had been the subject of wide publicity for several years, and by the time of the trial, the battle lines for the Fundamentalist controversy had already been drawn. While the press made a mockery of Bryan's Fundamentalism, "most of the news reports were simply the convinced reaching the already convinced."3
Some people are also under the mistaken impression that the outcome of the trial was that the court overturned the Tennessee state law forbidding the teaching of evolution. However, the court found Scopes guilty, and he was fined $100.00 for teaching evolution.
It is true, however, that the Scopes trial received a great deal of unfavorable publicity, and served to confirm public opinion in its newly found opposition to the Biblical world view. Most descriptions of Clarence Darrow's cross examination of William Jennings Bryan seem to make Bryan appear to be ridiculous for believing that Jonah had remained three days "in a whale's belly," and that Joshua had really made the sun stand still. Ray Ginger describes Clarence Darrow's questioning:
Did Bryan think that Jonah had remained three days in a whale's belly? . . . Was this whale just an ordinary big fish, or had God created him especially for this purpose? . . .Darrow began asking whether Joshua had really made the sun stand still. . . .
Is there any conceivable way that a day could be lengthened unless the earth stood still? What would happen to the earth if it suddenly stopped? Wouldn't it become a molton mass? . . .
When, asked Darrow, did the flood occur? . . .
You insult every man of science and learning in the world because he does not believe in your fool religion. . . . [Do you] believe that all of the species on the earth had come into being in the 4,200 years, by the Bishop's dating, since the Flood occurred? Didn't [you] know that many civilizations had existed for more than 5,000 years? Didn't [you] know that many old religions described a Flood? [Do you] know how old the earth [is]? . . .
We have the purpose of preventing bigots and ignoramuses from controlling the education of the United States and you know it--and that is all. . . .
I am examining you on your fool ideas that no intelligent Christian on earth believes.4
Clarence Darrow continued brow-beating Bryan with questions of this nature for an hour and a half, and Bryan did not have ready answers. Five days after the trial, Bryan died, probably as a direct result of this ordeal. Because Darrow was able to make Fundamentalism look ridiculous during the Scopes trial, many people, even to the present day, have been ashamed to admit to a belief in the Biblical world view. However, one cannot make an accurate determination as to truth based upon the extent to which one's opponents can be caricatured and made to look ridiculous under cross-examination in court.
1 James H. Smylie, "In Memoriam: WJB," Christian Century 78 (January 11, 1961): 48-49; and "The New Pictures," Time (October 17, 1960): 95.
2 Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee, Inherit the Wind (New York: Random House, 1955), preface.
3 Paul M. Waggoner, "The Historiography of the Scopes Trial: A Critical Re-Evaluation," Trinity Journal, vol. 5, New Series (Autumn 1984): 158.
4 Ray Ginger, Six Days or Forever? (London: Oxford University Press, 1958), pp. 167-173.
