Today in History—July 21: John T. Scopes Found Guilty of Teaching Evolution

The so-called Monkey Trial was a setup, but not like you might think.

Math and science teacher John T. Scopes was not “caught” teaching evolution but was recruited to teach by two groups with vastly different objectives—the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and civic leaders in Dayton, Tennessee.

A guilty verdict—issued on this day in 1925—would suggest that Scopes and the ACLU lost the battle. Many believe, however, that they won the war by presenting public evidence for evolution. And Dayton’s civic leaders? Simply holding the trial was their victory.

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In March 1925 Tennessee passed the Butler Act, prohibiting teaching evolution in public schools. The ACLU saw this as an attack on academic freedom and the constitutional freedoms of speech and religion, and they placed newspaper advertisements seeking a teacher to challenge it.

Dayton businessman George W. Rappleyea read the ad and saw opportunity. Dayton had fallen on hard times, and Rappleyea correctly anticipated the publicity a trial would bring. His group approached Scopes. Soon after, while teaching biology, Scopes read aloud a passage about evolution published in a state-approved textbook and was arrested.

The trial, which began July 10, became a lively, often heated, confrontation between fundamentalist literalism and liberal interpretation of Scripture. Hundreds of journalists and throngs of spectators attended—so many that proceedings moved outside, reportedly for fear that the courtroom floor might collapse (though oppressive heat was probably the real reason).

The drama was matched outside. Dayton took on a circuslike atmosphere with tents, itinerant preachers, and food vendors. Dueling signs—“Read Your Bible” and “Darwin Is Right”—decorated storefronts, while monkey-themed souvenirs proliferated, including sheet music for the song “Don’t Make a Monkey Out of Me”: “That evolution line is just a monkey shine, / Please don’t make a monkey out of me.”

On July 21, Judge John Raulston addressed the court. Having reconsidered the scope of the case, he ruled that, contrary to much of defense attorney Clarence Darrow’s questioning of lead prosecutor William Jennings Bryan, the trial concerned only whether Scopes had violated the law by teaching evolution. Neither the Butler Act’s constitutionality nor evolutionary theory itself was at issue because Scopes’s teaching—not the law—was on trial. By then, the final verdict was somewhat beside the point—the defense had already presented its evidence and deflated the prosecution’s reliance on Biblical text.

The only remaining question was whether Scopes had taught evolution. He had. And admitted it. And Dayton had gathered the crowds to hear it.

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