The Monkey Man HImself: John Scopes and his effects on the w

John Thomas Scopes was born in Paducah Kentucky in 1900. John was a simple kid who enjoyed simple things. John’s family was on the move through most of his childhood. John’s first love was books, he loved to read. In high school John spent most of his time in the library. Ironically when Scopes graduated from Salem High School in Southern Illinois, the man that would later prosecute him, Williams Jennings Bryan was the guest speaker. John graduated from the University of Kentucky five years later. In his years there he learned of a subject that was taught by his favorite teacher that would change his life forever, evolution. Then in 1924 John was offered a job in Dayton Tennessee as a teacher and a football coach at Rhea High School. Little did he know this decision would lead to his name and his town into the history books.

John Washington Butler was in the Tennessee House of Representative when he introduced the bill that would change Tennessee forever. It was named the Butler Bill.

“The bill would make it unlawful for teachers working in schools financed wholly or in part by the state, to teach any theory that denies the story of divine creation of man

Clarence Darrow was the main attorney that repented John Scopes. He was a Chicago lawyer who had become rather famous after he defended Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb who were accused of murder. He got their sentence reduced to life in prison from the death penalty. Darrow was a very liberal man, he saw Christianity as a “Slave Religion” (Kingstone 28). He believed in God but did not agree with the Bible at all. He felt that it was not a good account of what happened because it was written by so many different people. He did not like how people would not agree with the Bible all the times; it was just when it suit them. Darrow brought fire to the case. He kept the whole courtroom on the edge of their seats. (ACLU) did not want Darrow at first because of his beliefs, but he turned out to be the savior for John Scopes.

One day shortly after the school year had ended, John was summoned too the local drugstore, which was like the town hall where most of the decision for the town were made. In the store were the leaders of the town cooking up a plan. John was asked what his feelings were on the teaching of evolution. He said, “Nobody could teach biology without teaching evolution” (Scoped 58). Then the men proceeded to tell John that he had broken the law when he had substituted for a biology teacher at the school that he taught. The men really were not trying to get John in trouble; they knew that the ACLU would pay for anyone to test the Butler Law. They saw this as a chance to make some money and to put the town of Dayton on the map.

The bill went though both houses of the state will ease. The reason that this happened was because most of the politicians thought that the governor of Tennessee would veto the bill. As it turns out the governor passed the bill in order to be some political support. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) was worried that the bill would spread to other states, so they decided to offer legal and financial support to anyone who would test the law.

Some topics in this essay:
Bryan Darrow, Butler Law, Bryan’s Bryan, Union ACLU, Butler Bill, John Raulston, Scopes Trial, Bible Bryan, Religion” Kingstone, Darrow Bryan, butler law, john scopes, scopes trial, kingstone 28, butler law conflict, question religion, agree bible, people tennessee, town dayton, 100 dollars, trial town,