SCOPES TRIAL

(July 1021, 1925, Dayton, Tenn., U.S.), highly publicized trial of a Dayton, Tenn., high-school teacher, John T. Scopes, charged with violating state law by teaching the theory of evolution. In March 1925 the Tennessee legislature had declared unlawful the teaching of any doctrine denying the divine creation of man as taught by the Bible. World attention focused on the trial proceedings, which promised confrontation between Fundamentalist literal belief and liberal interpretation of the Scriptures. William Jennings Bryan (q.v.) led for the prosecution and Clarence Darrow (q.v.) for the defense. The judge ruled out any test of the law's constitutionality or argument on the validity of Darwin's theory, limiting the trial to the single question of whether or not John T. Scopes had taught evolution, which he admittedly had. He was convicted and fined $100. On appeal, the state supreme court upheld the constitutionality of the 1925 law but acquitted Scopes on the technicality that he had been fined excessively. The law was repealed in 1967.