The Scopes Trial Essay

On March 21st, 1925 the governor of Tennessee signed the Butler Bill which banned the teaching of evolution in public schools. The bill was introduced as America was pushing for a return to fundamentalism due to the actions of many citizens. In an attempt to bring publicity to the town of Dayton, Tennessee people in the town asked John Thomas Scopes to cover evolution in his class so he can be indicted and bring the case to national attention. Scopes’ defense attorney was a man named Clarence Darrow; he was a very popular defense attorney and public speaker. Darrow delivered a powerful speech in which he tried to prove the Butler Bill unconstitutional due to the fact that it

Through the 1920s, conflicts regarding the teachings of religious values versus Evolution, along with the increasing fight for women’s independence, caused a great deal of tension within America. Prior to the ‘20s schools taught the Bible and Christianity’s principles were stressed. It was in 1925 when Clarence Darrow defended John Scopes, a biology teacher, who was put on trial in the court for teaching the theory of Evolution (Doc C). This document illustrates the dialogue of

On March 13, 1925 the state of Tennessee passed the Butler Act. This law prohibited teaching the Theory of Evolution in Tennessee public schools. Any teacher who taught a theory that denied the story of the Divine Creation would be punished by a fine. The American Civil Liberties Union offered legal defense to any Tennessee teacher who would break the law and fight it in court. John Thomas Scopes was a teacher in Dayton, Tennessee, and he intentionally taught his class about the theory of evolution, which led to his arrest and trial.

The Tinker v. Des Moines case had lots of impacts; including the Tinker family’s lives over the years. Mary Beth continued in activist movements such as peace, anti-war, and civil rights efforts. John Tinker continued his anti-war movements in college. He even ended up majoring in protest. In addition, only 2 years after the ruling, leading attorney for the Tinkers, Dan Johnston, was invited to Roosevelt High School to be their commencement speaker (Anker). Secondly, to mark the 50th anniversary of the case, On December 15, 2015, Mary Beth and John Tinker visited Roosevelt High School and discussed students’ rights. Besides the effects of the people involved in the case, many subsequent cases have also been affected from the Tinker v. Des Moines case. For example, a subsequent case similar to the Tinker case would be Epperson v. Arkansas. In this case, a teacher, in a public school, sued the school for prohibiting her from teaching human evolution. The Supreme Court, with Justice Abe Fortas writing the opinion, concluded that "The State's undoubted right to prescribe the curriculum for its public schools does not carry with it the right to prohibit, on pain of criminal penalty, the teaching of a scientific theory or doctrine where that prohibition is based upon reasons that violate the First Amendment” (qtd. in “Epperson v.

In summarizing the salient points of the Supreme Court case Elk Grove Unified School District v. Newdow, it had to do with the respondent’s father who sued candidates, including a school region, affirming that the school locale's approach requiring the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance at his little girl's school damaged the First Amendment. The United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit found that the father had standing and decided for the father. Certiorari was conceded to audit the standing and First Amendment issues.

1. Great Migration The Great Migration is when African Americans moved from the rural South to the cities up in the North, Midwest and West. The event was important because it began to build a new public life for African Americans which leads to creating a new black urban culture that would influence the United States later on. 2.

Starting with the Scopes Trial, many more cases have occurred concerning the teaching of evolution. “By 1928 every southern state except Virginia had debated or was considering legislation banning the teaching of evolution in the

On January 20, 1925, a Tennessee state senator named John A. Shelton proposed a bill to make it a felony, or a criminal act, to teach evolution in the state’s public schools. Fundamentalists had been supporting and pushing the passage of laws such as this, because the teaching of evolution and Darwinism contradicts the religious beliefs of creation in Christianity. Popular evangelist, Billy Sunday, undertook an eighteen-day crusade in Memphis in support of the prospective bill. Night after night, Sunday’s audiences grew until more than two-hundred thousand people heard him preach against the evils of evolution. The bill, known as the Butler Act, was officially passed on March 21, 1925, just 3 months after its proposal. Just as state legislators suspected, the ink had hardly dried on the Butler Act before its first challenger emerged.

In early 1925, Tennessee passed a law that made it illegal to teach evolution. In the summer of 1925, a young schoolteacher named John Scopes stood trial in Dayton, Tennessee, for violating the state law against the teaching of evolution (The Scopes Trial).The jury found Scopes guilty of violating the law and fined him $100 (Scopes Trial). The Scopes trial resulted in two enduring conclusions: that legislatures should not restrain the freedom of scientific inquiry, and that society should respect academic freedom (The Scopes

Bryan traveled around the United States campaigning for laws that banned the teaching of evolution. One such law passed in Tennessee prohibited teachers in state supported schools and universities from teaching any theory of the origin of human life other than the creation story contained in the Bible. In 1925 John Thomas Scopes violated the law and was brought to trial. The trial quickly took on the air of a circus, with reporters and photographers from all over the world and the first live radio coverage of such an event broadcast by WGN in Chicago. The media cast the proceeding as a contest between science and the Bible. The defense tried to frame the issue as tolerance for new ideas. Ultimately,

Dayton, Tennessee was the location of which John Thomas Scopes was charged with a crime. The crime charged against Mr. Scopes was that he was teaching evolution. The law in Tennessee states that the misdemeanor is punishable and the law states “teach any theory that denies the story of the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead of that man has descended from a lower order of animals.” Scopes asked for the aid of the American Civil Liberties Union to assist him in his trial. When William Jennings Bryan heard of the attack on Christian fundamentalism went to assist the prosecution. Clarence Darrow an amazing attorney agreed to help the defense. The trial began on July 10, 1921 and within a few days many reporters

A teacher believed that the law was invalid and lost her job for violating it. The Supreme Court of the United States was called in to review the bill. At issue was whether the Arkansas statute that restricted the teaching of evolution violated the First Amendment and the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment because of its religious ties (Oyez.com). The Court ruled that because of judicial review, the Arkansas statute forbidding the teaching of evolution in public learning institutions was a violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendment. The Court ruled that a state may not eliminate ideas from a school's curriculum solely because the concepts come in conflict with the beliefs of certain religious groups.

The Scopes trial, writes Edward Larson, to most Americans embodies “the timeless debate over science and religion.” (265) Written by historians, judges, and playwrights, the history of the Scopes trial has caused Americans to perceive “the relationship between science and religion in . . . simple terms: either Darwin or the Bible was true.” (265) The road to the trial began when Tennessee passed the Butler Act in 1925 banning the teaching of evolution in secondary schools. It was only a matter of time before a young biology teacher, John T. Scopes, prompted by the ACLU tested the law. Spectators and newspapermen came from allover to witness

This question provides further evidence of the religious basis of the Scopes Trial, simply because the defendant’s side realized that, in order to protect the teaching of The Theory of Evolution, flaws within the bible’s interpretation and reasoning would have to be pointed out. This would weaken the argument of the plaintiff, and possible help the jury realize that The Theory of Evolution was plausible.

In 1925, the Scopes Trials becomes huge because it was right after the law was changed that states shouldnt share your opions on evolution to their students. John Scopes taught his highschool that humans come from monkeys and that is why they often call the Monkey Trials. Teachers arent allowed to talk about evolution, “the scientifically accepted notion that human beings developed from other animals