Summer for the Gods: The Scopes Trial and America’s Continuing Debate Over Science and Religion

The Introduction begins with a description of the direct examination of William Jennings Bryan by Clarence Darrow during the Scopes trial in 1925. Darrow, as described by Larson, “stood at the height of his powers, America’s greatest criminal defense lawyer and champion of anticlericalism” (3). He was questioning William Jennings Bryan, “the former Boy Orator of the Platte—once the nation’s youngest major-party presidential nominee and now leader of a fundamentalist crusade against teaching evolution in public schools” (3). Darrow pressed and interrogated Bryan regarding some of the events and miracles of the Old Testament such as the age of the earth, Noah and the ark, and Joshua and the sun standing still. In the questioning that ensued, Bryan conceded that the Bible required some interpretation in the face of modern scientific discoveries. Darrow avoided questions about evolution—questions for which Bryan would have had well-crafted responses.

The debate regarding evolution at the time involved the interpretation of the fossil record. For antievolutionists like Bryan, much was made of the “missing links” or gaps in the chain of human ancestors. While many of them did not completely reject evolutionary theory, the lack of fossil evidence meant to them that it should not be taught in schools as fact and truth, as it was no better than guessing.