Religious+Fundamentalism+and+the+Scopes+Trial

= Religious Fundamentalism and The Scopes Trial = toc

Thesis
Religious Fundamentalism rose in the 1920s as a response to the changing society and rise of modern theories. It wanted a return to the old American and religious values. The Scopes Trial displayed the tensions rising between the Fundamentalists and Modernists.

[[image:http://dummidumbwit.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/scopes-monkey-trial_article.jpg width="211" height="314" align="left"]]

 * changes in society caused a debate about where religion belonged in the new society
 * there was a split - some wanted to adapt it to suit a modern way of life, Fundamentalists wanted a return to traditional faith and values
 * Fundamentalists gained power, passed legislation in Tennessee forbidding public schools to teach evolution
 * Biology teacher John T. Scopes volunteered to break law, with support from the ACLU
 * Scopes lost, but the trial represented a victory for modernists - fundamentalists lost a large amount of public support and the trial helped end the political actions of the fundamentalists



Religious Fundamentalism

 * There was a debate in the 1920s over the place of religion in daily life
 * Represented a split in American Protestantism - some wanted to adapt religion to new ways and ideas, others resented and feared these developments
 * Began in rural areas, especially in the South
 * Fundamentalists wanted direct interpretation of the Bible in all subjects, including science and evolution
 * Fundamentalists gained their name from a series of twelve pamphlets, The Fundamentals, published shortly before WWI
 * Objected strongly to the teachings of Charles Darwin (evolution challenged the story of Creation found in the Bible)
 * Attracted large crowds, and began to gain political power
 * Began to pass state legislation forbidding the teaching of evolution in public schools media type="youtube" key="rhE26ooD_Vo" height="312" width="384"

The Scopes Trial
media type="youtube" key="tAzEgCIJkac" height="327" width="402" align="left"
 * Tennessee's anti-evolution statute
 * unlawful "to teach any theory that denies the story of divine creation as taught by the Bible and to teach instead that man was descended from a lower order of animals."
 * instituted in March of 1925
 * William Jennings Bryan
 * led Fundamentalist crusade to banish Darwin's theory of evolution from American classrooms
 * concerned that Darwin's theory undermined traditional values
 * transformed himself into a "sort of Fundamentalist Pope"
 * American Civil Liberties Union
 * offered its services to anyone who challenged the new Tennessee anti-evolution statue
 * biology teacher, John Scopes, in the town of Dayton agreed to have himself arrested
 * The Trial
 * carnival atmosphere (banners, lemonade stands, performances, thousands of poeple, etc.)
 * first live radio broadcast from a trial
 * Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryan are rememberd as the key adversaries in the trial
 * the jury found Scopes found guilty of violating the law and fined him $100
 * Bryan and anti-evolutionists clamied victory but Darrow and ACLU succeeded in publicizing scientific evidence for evolution
 * Bryan had won the case but lost the argument
 * "As a man and as a legend, Bryand was destroyed by his testimony that day" his performance described by the press as "pitiable, punch drunk warrior"
 * Darrow came off "as something of an anti-religious cynic"
 * Tennessee law would stand for another 42 years and teaching of evolution did not appear in schoolbooks until 1960s [[image:http://historicalthinkingmatters.org/sources/DaytonCartoon.jpg width="366" height="449" align="left" caption="John Knott, "Playing for all it's worth," Dallas News (July 8, 1925)" link="@http://historicalthinkingmatters.org/scopestrial/1/sources/46/"]]
 * [[image:http://www.bradburyac.mistral.co.uk/monkeys.gif width="322" height="419" link="@http://www.bradburyac.mistral.co.uk/tennesse.html"]]

[[image:http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_DhwcCqGFPe4/TNCE1hqM8fI/AAAAAAAAAXo/CVWZdqmY3rI/s1600/sci.gif]]

 * Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District
 * 2005: "Scopes II" trial
 * Dover Area school board required the presentation of intelligent design (aka. neo-creationism) as an alternative to evolution or an "explanation of the origin of life"
 * court ruled against intelligent design
 * Texas Board of Education
 * on March 27, 2009 by a vote of 13 to 2, Texas Board of Education voted for mandatory teaching of intelligent design alongside of evolution and question the validity of the fossil record
 * According to Science magazine "Because Texas is the second-largest textbook market in the US, publishers have a strong incentive to be certified by the board as 'conforming 100% to the state's standars'."

media type="youtube" key="40Q8p3GqPqQ" height="279" width="344" align="left"