Texas again in spotlight over creationism vs Darwin

John T. Scopes, defendant found guilty of teaching evolution

Carol Forsloff----  A petition from citizens concerned that the State of Texas is including creationism as part of science in school textbooks is making its way around the Internet, as the debate continues over the introduction of religious ideas into the science curriculum. The debate has been going on for many years, made famous by theScopes Monkey Trial, in which a high school teacher, John Scopes, was found guilty of violating the Tennessee Butler Act. That Act made it unlawful to teach evolution in any state-funded school. The famous lawyer, Clarence Darrow, and politician, William Jennings Bryan, brought intense publicity to the town of Dayton, Tennessee, as the two lined up on opposite sides of the debate. This 1925 case was won by the prosecution, but the guilty verdict, with a fine of $100 as Scopes “punishment,” was overturned on a technicality. 

The trial offered the public a view of the Fundamentalist–Modernist Controversy, which continues to the present day. Fundamentalists maintain the word of God as revealed in the Bible takes priority over all human knowledge whereas science maintains evolution is the science which should be taught in the schools.  

The present arguments mirror those at the time Texas introduced the Bible as one of the textbooks to be used in school curriculums.

Today the Institute for Creation Research stands as an organization that continues to defend creationism, maintaining the Scopes trial offered little real evidence that refuted the fact God created the world in the way the Bible details. The organization maintains that as a consequence of the Scopes trial, “ biblical doctrine and Bible believers were mercilessly ridiculed in the press, an assault which continues today. The end result? Christianity largely retreated underground and withdrew from the public arena.”