July 10, 2025, marked the 100th anniversary of the start of the famous “Scopes Monkey Trial,” in which John Scopes was accused of teaching evolution in violation of the Butler Act. The trial was the inspiration for the heavily fictionized play (and subsequent movies) Inherit the Wind. The Scopes trial was considered a victory for the teaching of evolution in public schools. But what actually happened at this trial? Was the scientific evidence really a powerful refutation of biblical creation? Would it stand up to modern scrutiny?
Background
In March 1925, the state of Tennessee signed into law the Butler Act. This law prevented public schools and Universities receiving state funding from teaching that human beings had evolved from lower animals, thereby denying the divine creation of man as taught in Genesis. Note that the law did not prohibit teaching that animals had evolved. The maximum penalty for violating this law was a $500 fine.
Many other states had similar laws at the time. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) sought to challenge the constitutional validity of this law and offered to pay legal expenses and defend anyone willing to be prosecuted under the Butler Act. John Scopes agreed.
John Scopes was a football coach and math teacher at Rhea County High School in Dayton, Tennessee. He did not teach biology except as a substitute teacher for about two weeks. In fact, Scopes later admitted that he never taught evolution at all. However, the textbook used for the biology class had a chapter that taught human evolution.
Clarence Darrow was one of the defense attorneys in the Scopes trial, and the prosecution was led by William Jennings Bryan. Bryan was a conservative Christian but was politically liberal. He rejected evolution but allowed for the evolutionary timescale. This compromise led to his weakest moment in the trial, as we will examine below. Darrow was an agnostic and a critic of Christianity. He referred to Bryan’s belief as “your fool religion” in the Scopes trial. It is clear that Darrow wanted to use the Scopes trial to challenge creation – even though this was not the legal purpose of the trial.
Clarence Darrow (left) and William Jennings Bryan (right)
Inherit the Wind
Misconceptions of the Scopes trial abound in large part due to the play Inherit the Wind. This play and the subsequent movies were loosely based on the Scopes trial but are primarily works of fiction. For example, the character representing Scopes is shown being arrested in the classroom and thrown in jail. None of that happened. In reality, Scopes was never detained, and his penalty was a $100 fine. In Inherit the Wind, the people of Dayton, Tennessee, were presented as hostile and bigoted. In reality, Clarence Darrow himself admitted of the people, “I have not found upon any body’s part—any citizen here in this town or outside the slightest discourtesy. I have been treated better, kindlier and more hospitably than I fancied would have been the case in the north” (trial transcript p. 226).[1]
In Inherit the Wind, the character of William Jennings Bryan is portrayed as a fanatic who died in the courtroom while attempting to deliver his summation. That never happened. In reality, Bryan was a brilliant orator and was well versed on the creation vs. evolution issue. He even generously offered to pay Scopes’s $100 fine. Bryan was not afforded the opportunity of a summation because Darrow conceded and asked the judge to instruct the jury to find his own client guilty as charged. Clearly, Darrow was more interested in critiquing biblical creation than the legal issue of the trial – namely, whether Scopes had violated the Butler Act.
Bryan Takes the Stand
Clarence Darrow’s real intention was made clear when he requested that William Jennings Bryan take the witness stand as an expert on the Bible. Bryan agreed with the understanding that he would then be allowed to cross-examine Darrow. Darrow’s intention was to ridicule Christianity, and creation in particular. At one point Darrow said to Bryan, “You insult every man of science and learning in the world because he does not believe in your fool religion” (trial transcript p. 288).
The beginning of Bryan’s defense was quite strong. For example, Darrow asked, “Do you claim that everything in the Bible should be literally interpreted?” To this, Bryan correctly responded, “I believe everything in the Bible should be accepted as it is given there; some of the Bible is given illustratively. For instance: ‘Ye are the salt of the earth.’ I would not insist that man was actually salt, or that he had flesh of salt, but it is used in the sense of salt as saving God’s people.” Indeed, the Bible should be interpreted in a straightforward fashion, respecting the genre of literature and with an understanding of metaphors and other figures of speech.
When asked, Bryan also affirmed that he believed in a global flood, and that Jonah was indeed swallowed by a great fish as recorded in Scripture. He affirmed the division of languages that occurred at the tower of Babel and that pain in childbirth was the result of Eve’s sin. If Bryan had simply continued to affirm what the Bible teaches, Darrow would have had no case. After all, Darrow’s arbitrary disbelief in the historical events recorded in Scripture is not evidence.
However, Bryan faltered at two points. First, when Darrow asked if Bryan knew where Cain got his wife, Bryan responded, “No, sir. I leave the agnostics to hunt for her” (transcript p. 302). His answer was clever and perhaps humorous. But it wasn’t biblical. We know from Scripture that Adam and Eve had a number of sons and daughters (Genesis 5:1). And we know that all people are descended from Adam and Eve (Genesis 3:20, Acts 17:26). Thus, Cain’s wife was a close relative, probably a sister or perhaps a niece. It wasn’t until the time of Moses that God imposed a new decree that forbids the marriage of very close relatives. So there is no mystery there.
The second and critical error occurred when Darrow asked Bryan about the age of the Earth. Bryan was reluctant to give any answer, even though the Bible gives sufficient information to compute an approximate date of creation, roughly 6,000 years ago. Darrow specifically asked about the days of creation and that each day had an “evening” and a “morning.” He knew well that context and genre demanded that creation took place in six literal days. Had Bryan agreed that God created in six literal days, what could Darrow have said? He could have said that there are scientists who disagree, but what weight do their opinions and guesses have against the omniscient God?
Instead, Bryan answered that creation “might have continued for millions of years” (trial transcript p. 303). That concession accomplished exactly what Darrow intended. It apparently showed that it is okay to reject a straightforward reading of the Bible when that reading is contradicted by the opinions of scientists. Bryan had compromised on one seemingly small point of Scripture. But that opened the door. If the timescale of creation is not literally true, what about the creation of man? Might that also be subject to scientific scrutiny? And what about the fall of man? If that isn’t literally true, then why do we need a Savior?
Clarence Darrow had accomplished exactly what he wanted. He had cast doubt on the Bible. This was his goal for the trial, not the exoneration of John Scopes. Indeed, after his interrogation of Bryan, Darrow requested that the judge instruct the jury to find Scopes guilty as charged. This would prevent Bryan from being able to cross-examine Darrow. This was a smart move because Bryan was far more knowledgeable of the science surrounding the origins debate than Darrow was. It is likely that Bryan’s cross-examination would have been devastating to Darrow, since the latter mainly relied upon expert testimony rather than firsthand knowledge. It also meant that neither Darrow nor Bryan would be able to give a closing summation. So, from a legal perspective, Darrow lost. John Scopes was found guilty and was fined $100.[2] But from the perspective of social influence, the trial accomplished exactly what the secularists desired.
Gone with the Wind
And what of the scientific evidence that was presented during the Scopes trial? The defense entered into evidence the written statements of eight experts in defense of evolution. The jury never saw these because the judge rightly ruled that they were irrelevant to the legal issue of the trial – whether or not John Scopes had violated the Butler Act. That issue has nothing to do with the truth or falsehood of evolution. Then again, Darrow wasn’t really interested in the legal issues. He wanted to discredit the Bible. So his eight experts provided evidence including comparative anatomy, vestigial organs, embryonic recapitulation, and fossils of alleged ape-men. Interestingly, none of these lines of evidence stand up to scrutiny. Indeed, many of them would not be considered legitimate today even by evolutionists. Let’s examine them.
Charles Hudd
Charles Hudd argued on the basis of comparative anatomy (trial transcript p. 232). He argued that human sensory organs like the eye and ear are similar in structure and action to those of animals. In reality, there are both similarities and differences between the human eye and the eyes of various animals, just as there are similarities and differences among the rest of God’s creation. We expect some similarities because all eyes have the same Creator and serve a similar function. We expect some differences due to the different needs of various environments. By analogy, many of my written articles have common features and a common style because they were written by the same author. It would be ridiculous to argue that articles are similar because they evolved from a common ancestor. So Hudd’s argument amounts to a confirmation bias: presenting evidence as if it supported his view when the evidence is equally supportive of the alternative.
Hudd also equivocated on the word “evolution.” He referred to the evolution of tools, languages, customs, and laws as evidence of the evolution of man. This is a “bait and switch” fallacy because showing that certain things change in known ways does not remotely prove common descent. Some evolutionists today make a similar mistake when they refer to changes within a kind (like bacteria developing resistance to antibiotics) as “evolution” and think this proves that all life has a common ancestor.
Jacob Lipman
Jacob Lipman made many evolutionary assertions regarding geology (trial transcript p. 233-234). He asserted that soil itself had evolved over millions of years along with living organisms. He asserted that early bacteria produced the nitrogen compounds from which plant and animal cells are constructed. He asserted that mineral acids produced by bacteria dissolved rock material which went into the sea, providing the material from which marine organisms evolved. However, he made no actual argument – he just asserted his opinion. He further asserted that agricultural institutions could not render effective industry without evolution. Again, this is the confirmation bias. We can understand and study agriculture and soil science very effectively from a biblical creation worldview. Lipman simply told a story and presented no actual evidence for evolution.
Fay-Copper Cole
Fay-Cooper Cole argued on the basis of vestigial organs, embryology, and ape-man fossils (trial transcript p. 235-238). However, none of these stand up today. For example, vestigial organs are those claimed to have little or no function in an organism today but were allegedly very useful in that organism’s ancestors. Many features of human anatomy that evolutionists once considered to be vestigial are now known to have important functions. These include the thymus, parathyroid glands, appendix, tonsils, coccyx, and so on. Just because scientists don’t know what something does doesn’t make it useless.
Cole specifically referred to the “tail” seen in the human embryo as evidence of evolution. In reality, this is the developing spinal cord – an essential feature for a healthy human! It never was, is, or becomes a true tail in humans. Even the idea of vestigial organs doesn’t make sense in support of evolution. An organ becoming useless is more along the lines of devolution. Evolution requires new organs to become functional.
Most of Cole’s argument revolved around fossil evidence of ape-men. The alleged ape-men he introduced into evidence included Java man, Australopithecus africanus, Homo heidelbergensis, Piltdown man, Neanderthal, and Cro-Magnon. Interestingly, all of these have been refuted. Not even one is considered a genuine ape-man today by modern evolutionists. “Java man” was a composite of two different creatures: the skull of an ape and the femur of a human. Today we know that Australopithecus africanus is an extinct species of ape with no human features at all. Homo heidelbergensis is 100% human, with no ape features. Likewise, Neanderthals and Cro-Magnon are 100% human. And Piltdown man was a hoax; it consisted of a human skull cap attached to an ape’s jaw. The teeth on the jaw had been filed down to make them appear more human.
Preliminary Thoughts
The claims of these first three experts have not aged well. Some of them may have seemed compelling at the time, like the alleged ape-men. But these have been refuted, and no knowledgeable evolutionist would use them today. In part 2, we will examine the testimonies of the remaining experts to see if they fare better.
[1] The complete transcript of the Scopes Trial is available here: https://profjoecain.net/scopes-monkey-trial-1925-complete-trial-transcripts/
[2] This fine was later overturned on a technicality. (The judge had set the fee when legally the jury was supposed to do this.)