Clarence Darrow

In the early 1920’s Traditionalists, the older Victorians worried that everything valuable was ending. Modernists no longer asked about the society and their behavior which bothered a lot of people. Only weather their behavior met the approval of their intellect. Americans danced to the sound of Jazz Age, showed their contempt for alcoholic prohibition. In a response to the new social patterns in motion by modernism, a wave of revivalism developed, becoming especially strong in the American South. The “Scopes Trial” was held in Dayton, Tennessee courtroom in the summer of 1925. In there was a big jury to decide the fate of John Scopes who was 24. John Scopes was a high school biology teacher and part time football coach who was charged with illegally teaching the theory of evolution. The guilt or innocence of John Scopes, and the constitutionality of Tennessee anti evolution statute, mattered a little. The whole point of this trial is emerged through its interpretation as a conflict of social and intellectual values. Clarence Darrow is a lawyer, who is Agnostic, liberal, a defender of the underdog and fighter for civil rights. He said “I am an agnostic as to the question of God; I think that it is impossible for the human mind to believe in an object or thing unless it can form a mental picture of such object or thing.” (Agnostic 1) William Jennings Bryan was the one fighting against Clarence Darrow in this trial. William was a three time Democratic candidate for president and a populist, who also led a Fundamentalist to banish Darwin’s theory of evolution from Americans classrooms. There were people who believed in teaching evolution and on the opposite side were anti-evolution. The case was about Scopes, but Scopes played a little part in the trial, the trial basically turned into a circus. Darrow was questioning Bryan on his beliefs.
Clarence said “He didn’t think John did anything wrong by deciding to teach evolution to his biology students in school.