We Need a New Darrow

Eighty-four years ago today, Dayton, Tennessee police arrested high school teacher John Scopes for the crime of teaching evolution.

Scopes was guilty. Guilty of premeditated teaching evolution, for the express purpose of getting arrested and thus testing Tennessee's absurd law in court.

And that Dayton jury correctly found him guilty of breaking the ridiculous law he had, in fact, broken.

Yet today we remember the Scopes trial as a victory for evolution, science and reality because Scopes attorney Clarence Darrow humiliated legendary fundamentalist orator William Jennings Bryan on the stand.

An area of questioning involved the book of Genesis and if Eve was actually created from Adam's rib, where Cain got his wife, and how many people lived in Ancient Egypt. Darrow used these examples to show that the stories of the Bible could not be scientific and should not be used in teaching science with Darrow telling Bryan, "You insult every man of science and learning in the world because he does not believe in your fool religion."[20] Bryan's declaration in response was "The reason I am answering is not for the benefit of the superior court. It is to keep these gentlemen from saying I was afraid to meet them and let them question me, and I want the Christian world to know that any atheist, agnostic, unbeliever, can question me anytime as to my belief in God, and I will answer him."[21]

Stewart objected, demanding to know the legal purpose of Darrow's questioning. Bryan, gauging the effect the session was having, snapped that its purpose was "to cast ridicule on everybody who believes in the Bible." Darrow, with equal vehemence, retorted, "We have the purpose of preventing bigots and ignoramuses from controlling the education of the United States." (299)

A few more questions followed in the charged open-air courtroom. Darrow asked where Cain got his wife; Bryan answered that he would "leave the agnostics to hunt for her" (302–03). When Darrow addressed the issue of the temptation of Eve by the serpent, Bryan insisted that the Bible be quoted verbatim rather than allowing Darrow to paraphrase it in his own terms. However, after another angry exchange, Judge Raulston banged his gavel, adjourning court and bringing the drama to a sudden close (303–04).

After that, the fundies slunk back to their caves for 50 years.

Converging events and personalities in the '60s and '70s brought them pouring out to poison the public sphere and accumulate power undreamed-of by Bryan.

We need a 21st-century Darrow, a champion of science and reality and the Constitution to challenge the freakazoids on their own ground and slap them back to the fourth century where they belong.

Cross-posted at They Gave Us A Republic ....