Parents' Guide to A Dangerous Idea: The Scopes Trial, the Original Fight Over Science in Schools

A DANGEROUS IDEA begins in May 1925 at the drugstore in small-town Dayton, Tennessee. Some influential men in the community want to bring "a little publicity" to Dayton and they think they know how to do it. Tennessee has just passed a law making it illegal to teach anything but the biblical creation story, and the American Civil Liberties Union is looking for a teacher willing to be part of a case to test the law. So first-year football coach and biology teacher John Scopes is invited down to the drugstore. Has he taught evolution? "Sort of. Maybe." Would he be willing to be arrested to help the town attract some publicity? He would, and is promptly arrested and released. The story then moves on to several chapters about Charles Darwin and his books Origin of the Species and The Descent of Man and the remarkable and contrasting lives of Clarence Darrow, who would defend Scopes, and William Jennings Bryan, who would lead the prosecution. In July of 1925, the trial begins, and Dayton will get all the publicity it could have wished for, with 200 journalists from around the country reporting on everything from the gorilla exhibit in a local hotel to stores selling stuffed monkeys and the "Monkey Fizz" drinks available at the drugstore. The trial lasts eight days, and the jury takes only nine minutes to find Scopes guilty. He's fined $100, which is paid by the Baltimore Sun newspaper. The story then moves forward in time to a chapter and epilogue about how both science and state and federal law have evolved in the continuing fight over teaching evolution in the schools.