thetrialthatrockedtheworld全文及翻译

John Scopes

A buzz ran through the crowd as I took my place in the packed court on that sweltering July day

in 1925. The counsel for my defence was the famous criminal lawyer Clarence Darrow. Leading counsel

for the prosecution was William Jennings Bryan, the silver-tongued orator , three times Democratic

nominee for President of the United States, and leader of the fundamentalist movement that had brought

about my trial.

A few weeks before I had been an unknown school-teacher in Dayton, a little town in the mountains

of Tennessee. Now I was involved in a trial reported the world over. Seated in court, ready to testify

on my behalf, were a dozen distinguished professors and scientists, led by Professor Kirtley Mather

of Harvard University. More than 100 reporters were on hand, and even radio announcer s, who for the

first time in history were to broadcast a jury trial. "Don't worry, son, we'll show them a few tricks,"

Darrow had whispered throwing a reassuring arm round my shoulder as we were waiting for the court to

open.

The case had erupted round my head not long after I arrived in Dayton as science master and football

coach at the secondary school. For a number of years a clash had been building up between the

fundamentalists and the modernists. The fundamentalists adhered to a literal interpretation of the

Old Testament. The modernists, on the other hand, accepted the theory advanced by Charles Darwin --

that all animal life, including monkeys and men, had evolved from a common ancestor.

Fundamentalism was strong in Tennessee, and the state legislature had recently passed a law

prohibiting the teaching of "any theory that denies the story of creation as taught in the Bible."

The new law was aimed squarely at Darwin's theory of evolution. An engineer, George Rappelyea, used

to argue with the local people against the law. During one such argument, Rappelyea said that nobody

could teach biology without teaching evolution. Since I had been teaching biology, I was sent for.

"Rappelyea is right," I told them.

"Then you have been violating the law," one of them Said.

"So has every other teacher," I replied. "Evolution is explained in Hunter's Civic Biology, and

that's our textbook." Rappelyea then made a suggestion. "Let's take this thing to court," he said,

"and test the legalityof it."

When I was indicted on May 7, no one, least of all I, anticipated that my case would snowball into

one of the most famous trials in U. S. history. The American Civil Liberties Union announced that it

would take my case to the U. S Supreme Court if necessary to establish that a teacher may tell the

truth without being sent to jail." Then Bryan volunteered to assist the state in prosecuting me.

Immediately the renownedlawyer Clarence Darrow offered his services to defend me. Ironically, I had

not known Darrow before my trial but I had met Bryan when he had given a talk at my university. I admired

him, although I did not agree with his views.

By the time the trial began on July 10, our town of 1,500 people had taken on a circusatmosphere.

The buildings along the main street were festoonedwith banners. The streets around the three-storey

red brick law court sproutedwith rickety stands selling hot dogs, religious books and watermelons.

Evangelists set up tents to exhortthe passersby. People from the surrounding hills, mostly

fundamentalists, arrived to cheer Bryan against the " infidel outsiders" Among them was John Butler,

who had drawn up the anti-evolution law. Butler was a 49-year-old farmer who before his election had

never been out of his native county.

The presiding judge was John Raulston, a florid-faced man who announced: "I'm just a reg'lar

mountaineer jedge." Bryan, ageing and paunchy , was assisted in his prosecution by his son, also a

lawyer, and Tennessee's brilliant young attorney-general, Tom Stewart. Besides the shrewd 68-year-old

Darrow, my counsel included the handsome and magnetic Dudley Field Malone, 43, and Arthur Garfield

Hays, quiet, scholarly and steeped in the law. In a trial in which religion played a key role, Darrow

was an agnostic, Malone a Catholic and Hays a Jew. My father had come from Kentucky to be with me for

the trial.

The judge called for a local minister to open the session with prayer, and the trial got under

way. Of the 12 jurors, three had never read any book except the Bible. One couldn't read. As my father

growled, "That's one hell of a jury!"

After the preliminary sparring over legalities, Darrow got up to make his opening statement. "My

friend the attorney-general says that John Scopes knows what he is here for," Darrow drawled. "I know

what he is here for, too. He is here because ignorance and bigotryare , and it is a mighty strong

combination."

Darrow walked slowly round the baking court. "Today it is the teachers, "he continued, "and tomorrow

the magazines, the books, the newspapers. After a while, it is the setting of man against man and creed

against creed until we are marching backwards to the glorious age of the sixteenth century when bigots

lighted faggots to burn the men who dared to bring any intelligence and enlightenment and Culture to

the human mind. "

"That damned infidel," a woman whispered loudly as he finished his address.

The following day the prosecution began calling wit-nesses against me. Two of my pupils testified,

grinning shyly at me, that I had taught them evolution, but added that they had not been contaminated

by the experience. Howard Morgan, a bright lad of 14, testified that I had taught that man was a mammal

like cows, horses, dogs and cats.

"He didn't say a cat was the same as a man?" Darrow asked.

"No, sir," the youngster said. "He said man had reasoning power."

"There is some doubt about that," Darrow snorted.

After the evidence was completed, Bryan rose to address the jury. The issue was simple, he declared

"The Christian believes that man came from above. The evolutionist believes that he must have come

from below." The spectators chuckled and Bryan warmed to his work. In one hand he brandished a biology

text as he denounced the scientists who had come to Dayton to testify for the defence.

"The Bible," he thundered in his sonorous organ tones, " is not going to be driven out of this

court by experts who come hundreds of miles to testify that they can reconcile evolution, with its

ancestors in the jungle, with man made by God in His image and put here for His purpose as par t of

a divine plan."

As he finished, jaw out-thrust, eyes flashing, the audience burst into applauseand shouts of "Amen".

Yet something was lacking. Gone was the fierce fervour of the days when Bryan had swept the political

arena like a prairie fire. The crowd seemed to feel that their champion had not scorched the infidels

with the hot breath of his oratory as he should have. Dudley Field Malone popped up to reply. "Mr.

Bryan is not the only one who has the right to speak for the Bible, he observed. "There are other people

in this country who have given up their whole lives to God and religion. Mr. Bryan, with passionate

spirit and enthusiasm, has given post of his life to politics." Bryan sipped from a jug of water as

Malone's voice grew in volume. He appealed for intellectual freedom, and accused Bryan of calling for

a duel to the death between science and religion.

"There is never a duel with the truth," he roared. "The truth always wins -- and we are not afraid

of it. The truth does not need Mr. Bryan. The truth is eternal, immortal and needs no human agency

to support it! "

When Malone finished there was a momentary hush. Then the court broke into a storm of applause

that surpassed that for Bryan. But although Malone had won the oratorical duel with Bryan, the judge

ruled against permitting the scientists to testify for the defence.

When the court adjourned, we found Dayton's streets swarming with strangers. Hawkerscried their

wares on every corner. One shop announced: DARWIN IS RIGHT – INSIDE. (This was J. R. Darwin's everything

to Wear Store.) One entrepreneur rented a shop window to display an ape. Spectators paid to gaze at

it and ponderwhether they might be related.

"The poor brute cowered in a corner with his hands over his eyes, ” a reporter noted, "afraid

it might be true. "

H. L. Mencken wrote sulphurous dispatches sitting in his Pants with a tan blowing on him, and there

was talk of running him out of town for referring to the local citizenry as yokels . Twenty-two

telegraphists were sending out 165 000 words a day on the trial.

Because of the heat and a fear that the old court's floor might collapse, under the weight of the

throng, the trial was resumed outside under the maples. More than 2 000 spectators sat on wooden benches

or squattedon the grass, perched on the tops of parked cars or gawked from windows.

Then came the climax of the trial. Because of the wording of the anti-evolution law, the prosecution

was forced to take the position that the Bible must be interpreted literally. Now Darrow sprang his

trump card by calling Bryan as a witness for the defence. The judge looked startled. "We are calling

him as an expert on the Bible," Darrow said. "His reputation as an authority on Scripture is recognized

throughout the world."

Bryan was suspicious of the wily Darrow, yet he could not refuse the challenge. For year s he had

lectured and written on the Bible. He had campaigned against Darwinism in Tennessee even before passage

of the anti-evolution law. Resolutely he strode to the stand, carrying a palm fan like a sword to repel

his enemies.

Under Darrow's quiet questioning he acknowledged believing the Bible literally, and the crowd

punctuated his defiant replies with fervent "Amens".

Darrow read from Genesis: "And the evening and the morning were the first day." Then he asked Bryan

if he believed that the sun was created on the fourth day. Bryan said that he did.

"How could there have been a morning and evening with-out any sun?" Darrow enquired.

Bryan mopped his bald dome in silence. There were sniggers from the crowd, even among the faithful.

Darrow twirled his spectacles as he pursued the questioning. He asked if Bryan believed literally in

the story of Eve. Bryan answered in the affirmative.

"And you believe that God punished the serpent by condemning snakes for ever after to crawl upon

their bellies?"

"I believe that."

"Well, have you any idea how the snake went before that time?"

The crowd laughed, and Bryan turned livid. His voice rose and the fan in his hand shook in anger.

"Your honor," he said. "I will answer all Mr. Darrow's questions at once. I want the world to know

that this man who does not believe in God is using a Tennessee court to cast slurs "

"I object to that statement,” Darrow shouted. “ I am examining you on your tool ideas that no

intelligent Christian on earth believes."

The judge used his gavel to quell the hubbuband adjourned court until next day.

Bryan stood forlornly alone. My heart went out to the old warrior as spectator s pushed by him

to shake Darrow's hand.

The jury were asked to consider their verdict at noon the following day. The jurymen retired to

a corner of the lawn and whispered for just nine minutes. The verdict was guilty. I was fined 100 dollars

and costs.

Dudley Field Malone called my conviction a "victorious defeat." A few southern papers, loyal to

their faded champion, hailed it as a victory for Bryan. But Bryan, sad and exhausted, died in Dayton

two days after the trial.

I was offered my teaching job back but I declined. Some of the professors who had come to testify

on my be-half arranged a scholarship for me at the University of Chicago so that I could pursue the

study of science. Later I became a geologist for an oil company.

Not long ago I went back to Dayton for the first time since my trial 37 years ago. The little town

looked much the same to me. But now there is a William Jennings Bryan University on a hill-top over

looking the valley.

There were other changes, too. Evolution is taught in Tennessee, though the law under which I was

convicted is still on the books. The oratorial storm that Clarence Darrow and Dudley Field Malone blew

up in the little court in Dayton swept like a fresh wind through the schools and legislative offices

of the United States, bringing in its wake a new climate of intellectual and academic freedom that

has grown with the passing years.