Citation Needed - The Scopes Monkey Trial

Episode Date: May 22, 2019

The Scopes Trial, formally known as The State of Tennessee v. John Thomas Scopes and commonly referred to as the Scopes Monkey Trial, was an American legal case in July 1925 in which a substitute high school teacher, John T. Scopes, was accused of violating Tennessee's Butler Act, which had made it unlawful to teach human evolution in any state-funded school.[1]The trial was deliberately staged in order to attract publicity to the small town of Dayton, Tennessee, where it was held. Scopes was unsure whether he had ever actually taught evolution, but he purposely incriminated himself so that the case could have a defendant.[2][3]   Our theme song was written and performed by Anna Bosnick. If you’d like to support the show on a per episode basis, you can find our Patreon page here.  Be sure to check our website for more details.

He's mysterious, of course he's lying. Maybe they're reconing him. Into what? A boring alien good guy? I mean, it is Marvel. Okay, no, that's fair. And do you admit that it was you? Miss the scoops who stole the microscopes all along.

Objection sustained. Come on. It's gotta be in the form of a question. This is like jeopardy. You know the rule being a lawyer is not like jeopardy or old What's what's the score by the way 28 12 heath? Three Guys guys what the fuck are you doing? What's it look like Cecil the scopes monkey trial. It was on the calendar today. We're doing a slope just read. That's today's episode, guys. Today's episode is about the Scopes Monkey Trial. The famous legal battle over teaching evolution in schools. Oh, right. I'm sorry. What do you guys think the Scopes Monkey Trial was?

What do you think a trial is? Just in that. What you said? 100%. Yeah. What we're doing. Okay, everybody. Half time. Poor doesn't have half time. Yeah, are you sure about that? Yeah, pretty sure. Pretty sure. Pretty sure. Winning at halftime. Yes. Hello and welcome to Citation Needed. Podcasts where we choose to subject, read a single article about it on Wikipedia and pretend we are experts because it's the internet and that's how it works now. I'm Cecil and I'll be presiding today, but I can't try this case alone. Let me introduce our legal teams.

First up, the the zone defense Noah and Heath. All right, if you're trying to go be into playing man, Cesar, it's working. And it's working. Are we all fucking in like a basketball scenario? Is that right now? Half time. Half time.

I like my basketball or just like my steak warm pink center. Yeah. Also joining us tonight, the prostitution team Eli and Tom. All right, Cecil. Some people support the troops, some people support the swoops. I won't be ashamed. Okay, just point of clarification. If a prostitute hires a prostitute happily, is that vertical smile integration? Excellent. We want to thank all our patrons for joining up and donating to the show. Did you know that you can help pick out our topics?

All the patrons at the editor level or above get to submit to our suggestion box. So all those messages you send us suggesting topics outside of that? Yeah, we don't read those. If you want to join up on Patreon, stick around to the end of the show. Okay, let's call this court to order Eli for your opening statement. Can you tell us what person place thing concept phenomenon or event we'll be trying today? Well, to make the opening sketch make sense, we'll be talking about the scoops monkey trial. I thought it was just like a scoop name for a monkey with these scoops. I also did and then I put in a microscope joke there at the end.

If you go back and listen to the scoops, I get it. I feel like I, how did the microscope come in? And Noah, you knew all about this before you even started reading the Wikipedia. Are you ready to spank this monkey? No, but I wrote an essay that I can read during my refractory period. Can you tell us what the snopes monkey trial is? The Scopes monkey trial, also called the Scopes trial, or the state of Tennessee,

V. John Thomas Scopes, if you're verbose and boring, was an American legal case from 1925 in which a science teacher stood accused of teaching science. Herbose and boring. Right, duly noted, Noah, I'll assume you'll be referring to this case and it's original Etruscan format. I got it. You know, you know why I'm not doing Etruscans this week, week Tom because you weren't hosting. So this trial revolved around it. I just want him to have to ask me who the atrascals. I lost my train of thought Tom, what's that say about? Just remind me in the title.

All right, so this trial revolved around a 1925 state law called the Butler Act, which said, quote, it shall be unlawful for any teacher in any of the university's normals. That's a term used at the time for teachers colleges and all other public schools of the state, which are supported in whole or in part by the public school funds of the state to teach any theory that denies the story of the divine creation of man as taught in the Bible and to teach instead that man has descended from a lower order of animal." Now, you'll often hear the law described as an injunction against teaching evolution, but that's not strictly true. Note that the law would allow for the teaching of evolution all the way up to humanity, right? Like, so you can go from single celled organism to ape and maybe even homohydeal

burgenzas, but, but you just couldn't add modern human to that process, I guess. Yeah. And there's a weird and statement in the law there. It says like you can't deny the creation and the Bible thing and then teach that man came from a lower order of animal. So technically, you could teach the Bible is completely wrong. As long as you also said that humans actually devolved from like super intelligent mutants of a higher order.

It's just, it's a weird loss. Man, Claire and Darryl could have used you. Hold on a second. Okay. So it's worth telling us. We're not going to use you hold on a second. Okay, so it's worth not. It's going to use. Now it's worth noting, by the way, that John Washington Butler, the guy who first introduced the law intended for it to prohibit the teaching of evolution in its entirety, it's just that Butler was some Tennessee hillbilly farmer that was

old in 1925. So he didn't know what the fuck evolution was enough to fully prohibit it with his law. He said later quote, no, I didn't know nothing about evolution when I introduced it. I'd read it into papers. It boys and girls was coming home from school and telling their fathers and mothers that the Bible was all nonsense. End quote. And the part that really bothered him was the primates thing is I guess so science contradicts the book that a based mind tire life on that's fine but i am a beautiful man i was made by a wizard a wizard

a grand wizard yeah probably all right so anyway Tennessee passes this law. And the ACLU goes, oh, hell no. So they immediately said about challenging it. And they find their chance in one John T. Scopes, a substitute teacher in Dayton, Tennessee, who basically walked into a police station and turned himself in. What? Yeah, hi. I'm Spartacus. It's just me.

I'm. I'm doing this. I'm Spartacus. So now scopes with later say that he didn't remember ever actually teaching students about human evolution. He was just willing to offer himself up

as a test case. He walks into the police station. Hi, I told children true things. Get the fuck on the ground. You know, I guess I appreciate his sentiment, but these fucking martyr types are the worst. You can't hardly sit down your fucking ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha for a lot of reasons most notably it's a useful starting point when you want to talk about the ongoing fight between fundamentalists and rationalists about evolution in the schools it's a big and divisive issue in this country even now because many of us are fucking

stupid and this trial marks a real turning point where rationality started to overtake tradition now to be clear the good guys lose this case but the public verdict was way more important than the one that the jury handed down, and the good guys won that one. Yeah, it just, it feels weird to tell this story in the past tense, right? Does English have a once in future tense just to make this episode a little more every moment? All right, so another one of the reasons, by the way, that this is so famous is that I have this hugely made for TV field to it from start to finish normally

for a court case to get their dramatic you would need hack writers and b actors, but this is a real case about a real crime with a real judge and everything. And it was a media sensation before the trial even began when it became clear that the two lawyers facing off would be probably the two most famous attorneys of their day, William Jennings Brian and Clarence Darrow. Yeah. And that was not great optics for the good guys because William Jennings Brian looked like a retired superhero and everybody's like favorite dad and Clarence Darrow looked like he

was, you know, wearing all 20 skin masks that he got while being a serial killer. So he is terrifying. He looks like a Nazi doctor. Oh god. That one's familiar, Paul. There's a famous attorney's of the day. One of them is putting a leather glove on a fin. If it does not transition, you must change your position. Oh, if it does not evolve, you must absolve.

If it does not evolve, you must absolve. Declarative, imperative, interrogative, it's my prerogative. The origin of species flinging feces. There's no wrong way to eat a Reese's monkey. Reese's monkey. Yeah, no, we got a monkey nailed it. So I don't know if everybody got. So before we get to the trial, let's take a second to introduce these two juggernauts. Now it would be really easy for me to paint William Jennings Brian as just the bad guy like,

like really super easy, but the story is more fun when you have a good sense of where he's coming from. Brian was born into Brasca in 1860 and at the turn of the 20th century, he was the dominant force in the Democratic political party. Um, he was also damn near the Buffalo bills of presidential elections. He kept winning his party's nomination, but lost the general election in 1896, 1900 and 1908. And uh, Darrow was the Buffalo bill of looking like Buffalo bill, the serial killer. So wait, he tried in 1896, 191908 and still lost. This guy gets fucking rejected more than the Jordan Peterson fan club president. Oh, shit. Jordan Peterson. All right. So. Also Reese's monkey just one more time.

That was Johnny McCockron earlier. Thank you. The cock is a type of monkey. Johnny Sokran was the lawyer that we were talking. We get it. We got it. So Brian was so Brian was reputed to be the best order in the country and his populist message earned him the nickname of the

great commoner. He was a big advocate of free silver which was basically the eat the rich of its day and and his cross of gold speech that he gave in defense of that position is still one of the most famous panagérics in American history. Like like there's audio of him giving this speech. And if you listen to it right now knowing nothing at all about the history or the policy, you're going to get to the end of it and be like, yeah, man, free fucking silver. Absolutely. I love that speech.

You love that speech? Yeah. Really? The speech he was just talking about, but William Jennings Bryan, your fan of that speech. Absolutely. Okay. You like, for $1,000, what is a panjuric? A person who can't use their legs?

Nope, so close. Really? No, no, not close at all, actually. Guys are also dumb. It's either in a Truscant sandwich press or October 11th in the Word of the Day calendar in 1998. Okay, okay. It could be both.

It's absolutely good. It's not. No. 1998 okay, okay, it could be both. Absolutely. It's not. No, I want that sandwich now though. Yeah. All right. So through his career, Brian Wood serve as a congressman, the leader of the Democratic Party, a journalist, a lawyer, secretary of state, and of course, an anti-evolution activist.

Just like the other side Papa Huckabee with an old timey voice. So, pretty much. Yes, yeah, pretty much. Except respected. Right. So, to be fair to Brian, which again, I'm not naturally inclined to do, I should point out that at this point, there was very little sunlight between actual biological evolution and social Darwinism. Right. So, yes, Brian was a fundamentalist Christian. He was the fundamentalist Christian, but it's way easier to draw a line between his progressivism and his opposition to evolution than it is to connect it to his religion. Social Darwinism was often used at that time to shoot down progressive causes like public assistance and federal inspection of food and drugs.

You know, humanity would get stronger as a whole if the dumber ones bought the cheap aspirin with the rat poison in it. Yeah. And that's true, but um. Yeah, what's your name? I was done. I was done. I was done.

I was done. I was done. I was done. I was done. I was done. I was done. I was done. I was done. I was done. I was done. I was done. A teenage Kenneth Copeland is like, if you get rid of the dumb ones, future me won't have two lear jets. What the fuck?

I love that his teenage already well done. So that was true, but. Yeah, so on the other side of the court, you have Clarence Darrow. Larry Dows. Yes, Kelly. That's so unlike Brian, he's not famous for being a congressman

or a public speaker or the secretary of state. He's famous for being the fuck out of a lawyer. And not in a bad way, right? So he first rose to prominence defending Eugene Debs when he was prosecuted for leading the Pullman's strike of 1894. And he had to quit a lucrative gig with the railroads to do it. So, you know, lawyer making the big bucks decides to quit to defend little guy. It made him a bit of a media darling. Okay, but I feel like the lawyer being the media darling is great for the lawyer, not always so good for the client. Like Stephen Avery's still gonna die in prison and his nerd lawyers run Ellen twice.

So. So. Did they dance? Did they dance? Did they dance? So. All right, so after that, Darro had a-profile murder trials where he pioneered the course recognition of mental illness is a mid mitigating factor in a crime

um... in all he would defend fifty murder cases in his career and plenty of the motherfuckers to be found guilty but only one of them would be executed and that by the way was the first one he defended and he didn't even show up until they were all most all the way done with that trial And that's where he debuted the insanity defense after that it was he was flawless That must have been a fun moment debuting the insanity defense just being like okay, uh your honor My client is actually insane. Yes so so

Oh, yeah, so we're done. We're we're done great. Oh great great. Thanks for being so cool about this. Thank you. I was being so cool about this. Gonna March. Lunch. What? I said lunch. Yeah. What do you get? That is how the first one went. Yeah So this only made him famous in legal circles. But what made him a household name was his defense in the Leopold and Loeb case, which was dubbed by the media the trial of the century of the year. It was a case where two rich, brilliant and obviously bat shit crazy kids murdered somebody. Now, there was absolutely no question about their guilt and the prosecutor was looking for a death sentence. Darryl argued that we shouldn't be killing children. Keep in mind that you were considered a kid until age 21 at the time because they were

mentally ill. And when I say he argued that I mean he argued the ever loving fuck out of it. His closing argument in this case was 12 hours long. Jesus Christ overachiever. Now that closing argument would be, so your honor, Afluenza, the defense rations. We're done. Well, fucking hours of nagging later in the jury cleaned the cat box to the dishes and found him not guilty. Well, at least not murderable anyway. Of course, defending the murderous sons of millionaires made Clarence Darrow famous, but it didn't exactly make him beloved.

At nor did it stance on religion. He publicly questioned the doctrines of Christianity and the Bible at large in one of his most famous speeches later titled, Why I Am an Agnostic. Is your chicken shit? Well, it's chicken, chicken, $20 was a little different there. In that speech, he said, quote,

the fear of God is not the beginning of wisdom. The fear of God is the death of wisdom. Skepticism and doubt lead to study and investigation and investigation is the beginning of wisdom. Oh, slow clap. And quote, right? Slow. Motherfucking clap.

I got one more because he's kind of a personal hero. Quote, every man knows when his life began, if I did not exist in the past, why should I or could I exist in the future? End quote, which is fancy lawyer talk for when you die, it'll be just like before you were born. Well, he kind of pioneered that argument. Yeah. Okay.

To be fair, the answer to that question is before I was, I wasn't scared that I wasn't, but now that I am, I'm terrified not to be. And also, is there an Arby's in heaven? And that's why the atheist said it's so much harder because we have to say no. They're like, yes, there is an Arby's there. There's two happens. We don't let you, there's no lies. We don't let you. This looks no lines. I should also say that Darryl largely rejected social Darwinism too. He wrote a couple of really famous essays criticizing eugenics right about the same time that the Supreme Court was endorsing it in the Buck v. Bell decision.

That being said, he also wrote a piece for the Washington Post a decade earlier where he said, quote, chloroform unfit children. Show them the same mercy that is shown beasts that are no longer fit to live. And quote, so at that, we can say he came to the correct answer eventually. Oh, yes. Abortion is that. I love that. Quartermak. I get the quote framed and hang it in the kitchen to make my kids read it to me before bad as a reminder that I love. All right. So we have a trial here that pits rationalism against religion.

The prosecution is America's most famous fundamentalist and the defense is America's most famous skeptic. Needless to say, the reporters were camping out for tickets to this one and the defense is america's most famous skeptic needless to say the reporters were camping out for tickets to this one and the proceedings themselves didn't disappoint all right so thanks for reminding me with this episode was about no i was a trial so i guess i'll talk about that on the other side of apropos nothing All rise for the Honest Evolution Trial! You may be seated, I'm just a guy in a chair. Council?

Yes! You're on a I and 100% aware that I'm lying right now, but I've got, I don't know, probably 20 years left to use in everyone's stupid grandmas money to pursue this kind of thing. So, uh, you know, Bibi Bobbittibu, I think a Bronze Age book nails how the universe was created. I'm an adult who can drive a car. Oh, yeah. That's a good car. I was appointed by a political party. So I'm pretending that's a legal argument prosecutor Literal magic isn't real Quiet quiet well like I said I'm a political appointee so I find the other guy's guilty of being mean

What courts adjourned let's all go use our cell phones. It's 2019 Okay, we're back we have a Compelling backstory of two lawyers, but Noah, you promised us a monkey. Not the first time he's lying about this kind of thing, Cecil. I'm here for you. All right, well, at that, you threatened to soar off the dude's head at Staples. What was I supposed to do? Buy me a monkey.

Okay. Okay. So now, we've met the defendant. We've met the opposing councils. But perhaps the most important character in this tale is one that we haven't met yet. And that would be George Rappel Yea. I have no idea if I'm saying his name right. Um, he was the local manager for the Comberland Coal and Iron Company in Dayton, Tennessee. Uh, so now this guy's hearing in the news about

the ACLU battling with the new Tennessee state law. And he thinks to himself, you know, a trial like that'd be great for local business. So he gets together with the county superintendent of schools and says, Hey, get one of your guys to violate this law. What? That's awesome. The superintendent hated the law. So he's like, yeah, what the fuck, either you get your trial or I get repeal, I'm in. No, I cannot overstate how much of a wanton publicity stuff this was.

There's a well documented meeting between Rappel, Yehya and this superintendent that took place in the back of a local drugstore after hours and john scopes was at that meeting he then went back to the school and urged his students to testify against him and even coach them on what answers to give to the nice grand jury all right kids what do I always say uh... god is dead and Negroes should be allowed to play baseball. Tell your parents. My parents are in the jury.

Tell them all I said that. Yeah, I'll be the second thing. All right, so on May 25th, he's indicted after three students testify against him. According to the book Summer of the Gods, the Scopes trial in America's continuing debate over science and religion. Or as we call it, the monkey book, that's not what we call it. Thank you. Judge John T. Rolston was eager to get this shit going before the summer.

Tourist season started and quote, all but instructed the grand jury to indict scopes, despite the meager evidence against him and the widely reported stories questioning whether the willing defendant had ever taught evolution in the classroom. And quote, uh, you're honored. The only evidence we have is these flyers. You keep handing us for the city's brand new water. I just awaited a judge fast track to trial without any evidence, but here say in Tennessee. It's so, no, it's so, no. It's so, no, it's so, no, it's very weird. He was a white guy.

So, okay. All right, so this show trial is all set. And the attorneys are originally gonna be a couple of brothers that were friends with scopes, but Raboye, he's thinking big. So he sets out on finding the biggest celebrity names he can to join the two legal teams. In fact, he apparently even wrote a letter to hg wells asking him to join the defense and well hg wells told him to fuck off

william jennings brion was more than happy to join the prosecution even though he hadn't tried a case in thirty six years okay so it's basically the plot of demolition man yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah man. Yeah. Like, the one is William Jennings Brian and Wesley snipes the evil bad guy is science. Yeah. So yeah. Yeah. Sandra Bullock's the monkey. Now he's on the stand. Sir, can you explain these three seashells to us, please, sir? Just shitting into him and throwing him. Yeah. That's what a monkey, a racist monkey. Of course. Of course, Clare and Stereo is the obvious choice to counterbalance Brian's celebrity.

So they reach out to him. And originally he turns him down because he's afraid that if he gets involved, his fame would distract from the austerity of the court's proceedings. But, but then he realizes that these court proceedings weren't going to have any austerity anyways. He says, fuck, it sounds like fun. And he signs up. I was sad, am I on? You know what doesn't matter?

Let's fucking party. Clarence Daryl, the monkey book Oh, well, that's signed me up. Yeah, but what exactly, that was the exchange. So go into this thing. The defense intended to challenge laws on constitutional and the grounds that have violated the teacher's right to academic freedom.

But Darrow pushed in another direction and sought to prove that the teaching of evolution doesn't actually conflict with the biblical narrative. Basically, he figured a jury would be more willing to acquit if they were given a way to have their religion and eat it too. So they try to bring in a whole bunch of evolution experts that were willing to say, sure, maybe God did some of it too. I don't know. But with only one exception, the judge wouldn't allow them to testify in person. And instead, they were only allowed to submit written statements that

could be used as evidence at the inevitable appeal. Then the judge changes mind again, and the only allowed testimony could be used as evidence at the inevitable appeal. Then the judge changes mind again and the only allowed testimony could be cross stitch then. So he wound up with all these experts sending in various combinations of live laugh love. The three stages of evolution. Yeah. I kind of actually. Yeah. Kind of. All right. So the trial finally gets underway and it's every bit the media circus that rebel yaya was hoping for in fact it was the first america trial to be broadcast

on radio uh... so this local judge terrified of seeming hostile to religion in small town tenisey is biased as fuck against the defense and you know it right away because before the trial even started the mother fuckers quote from the bible to the media let me guess the part about the donkey Dexon horsecom. Is that the part? So Brian opens things up, bemoaning the evils of evolution,

which isn't the fucking focus of the trial, but what have and during his opening statement, he utters probably my favorite quote from the entire trial. He's talking about how evil it is to teach kids that they're descended from monkeys and he adds quote Not even from American monkeys, but from old world Look at the skull dimples on this proud hot new world amoeba Now for all their renown as orators neither dare or nor brian delivered the best

speech of the tricep is the monkey please say it was the muggles no monkey every observer including william jennings brian seems to agree that the oratory climax of the trial come came from the a c l u attorney deadly field malone who answered brian's opening statement uh... he invoked fears of american inquisitions he urged that the Bible remain in the realm of theology for the sake of both science and the Bible and by the time he's done the courtroom is erupting with applause for this guy. So the trial goes on through six days of defense witnesses, but every time anybody says anything about the Bible or evolution, the judge strikes it from the record and tells the jury to disregard it. So he's super clear throughout that this isn't a trial about the merits a little, but rather about whether scopes violated it.

Of course, this puts Darrow in a bind because he's trying to argue that evolution and the Bible are compatible, which, first of all, it's just fucking wrong, so he's already in a bind. But beyond that, the judge won't allow anybody to say anything about either evolution or the Bible. So, like, what are they doing all day? Just like interpretive dance battle case racist

dictionary. I can't. Like racist pictures fucked up. And the clan it is keeping insisting and only using the white markers makes for a much harder game. All right. No, that sounds pretty interesting, but can we have class outside? Is that possible? We sure can see so. All right, so it's the seventh day of the trial.

The judges move the trial outside because the reporters would have a better view of Dayton's lovely downtown area. Let's slash it was too hot in the courtroom. And a front street and Clarence Darl calls his surprise witness, the monkey, kind of, uh, Jennings, Brian. Okay. All right. Crazy. So the whole case, his case, Darryl's case requires a biblical expert. Brian is one of the most famous Christian fundamentalists in the country. He's already there in the courtroom. Law on it's perfect.

All right, I don't know much at all about the law, but what I inevitably go to trial for something, I'm just going to call every officer of the court up as a witness. Well, don't be surprised if that doesn't work. See, in any normal trial, the judge would tell Darrow to fuck off retort law. That's right. Yeah, exactly. in any normal trial the judge would tell Darrow to fuck off retort law that's but this is as much spectacle as legal proceeding by now so Ralston decides to allow it and by the way pretty much any prosecutor where the shit would have refused to take the stand but the lawyer in name only Brian is still kind of pissed that the Malone kid had gotten the best of him during the opening

statements so he agrees to take the stand as a defense witness against his own client. Basically, it's the worst mistake he's made in his career. I'm sure he's going to have plenty of time afterwards to redeem himself after this trial. No big deal. No big deal. Fast forward. Exactly. Okay. So Brian takes the stand and and Brian's an empowered biblical literalist. So Darrow based on it is lays so an idiot. Yeah. All right. Yeah. Well, and that it will in the exact right way Darrow needs him to be too, right? So Darrow basically just lays into him like trying to get him to admit that's something in the book of Genesis is nonsense, which if you've ever read the book of Genesis, you

know, which Brian in the awkward position of being a full grown adult defending Jewish fairy tales in a court of law. This line of questioning, by the way, would go on to be all of our jobs. Yeah. Alright, so for two hours, Darrow grills Brian on the courthouse lawn, asking shit like, you know, where did Cain's wife come from, until Brian has completely lost his shit at one point the prosecution objection demands to know what the legal purpose of deros line of questions is and brion snaps back from the witness stand and he says quote to cash ridicule on everyone who believes in the bible and quote and then deros response quote we

have the purpose of preventing bigots and ignoramuses from controlling the education of the united uh... that's that's a uh... so yes to cast for the people on every one believes in the bible different ways of saying the same thing yes sir and i should put out that this uh... light of questioning

uh... of brian didn't and because Darrow ran out of dumb shit in the Bible The challenge him on or because the judge decided to put a stop to it. They literally ran out of day Should have just had Joshua ask God to make more daily That was probably one of Darrow's questions It's the first day of the trial and we're calling it evening. We don't make Sun until the fourth day. What the fuck? All right, so Darrow wanted to keep going the next day, but ultimately the judge said it was irrelevant and had the whole thing expunge from the record. And that really pissed off Brian because part of the deal was that if he would testify for the death, defense

Brian would get a chance to cross examine him. He was going to cross examine himself. No, he was going to cross examine Darrow, but given how the trials unfolded to this point, I see why you needed a clarification should have been more clear in that. Also, not only does the judge deny Brian a chance to do this cross examination that he was really looking forward to, but Darrow waved his right to a summation, which meant that under Tennessee law, Brian wasn't allowed to give any closing arguments either. Okay. So, right?

You ran out the clock. That's the big deal. So, for the sake of accuracy, the actual final words of the legendary scopes monkey trial where, guys, it's actually getting a little dark and we picked us up tomorrow. More or less, more or less. Yeah, mom said no more trial after the street lights come on guys. Come on. Trouble.

All right, so the trial wrapped up the next day and ultimately the jury deciding on the very narrow question of did the guy who emphatically admitted he taught evolution in public schools teach evolution in public schools deliberated for all of nine minutes before they found scope skillty. He was fine $100. That's about $1,400 in today's money, but ultimately that fine was overturned on a technicality. Yeah, the technicality is called the first amendment. Unfortunately, no. So Darrow did agree, by the way, to still be cross-examined by Brian, who challenged him to defend the agnostic position in a written challenge that would be published later. The exchange was never published, though, because Darrow just wrote, I don't know for all

the answers. This is the agnostic position. Oh, technically, it directs the best kind of correct. Yeah. Um, in a wacky side note, uh, Brian died five days after the end of the trial. Wow. According to Wikipedia, quote, the connection between the trial

and his death is still debated by historians and, quote, I mean, sure it was a tough week, but was there like a part of the trial where the defense insisted on stabbing him with a gom Jabbar? What's the consciousness there? What? Uh, all right. So the good news, though, that the silver lining here, the happy ending, the Butler Act was eventually repealed. It did remain the state law in Tennessee until 1967.

What? But I guess by that point, even Tennessee and then started to evolve from whatever lower order of animal they had to be in order to think just stupid fucking law needed to exist. Why are there still Tennesseans then? Yeah, right? Right?

Right? All right. All right, no, if you had to summarize it, you learn in one sentence, what would it be? That we did in fact evolve from filthy monkey. That's our show. Uh, sweet other reference. Are you ready for the quiz?

I've never been more ready. I'm ready to spank the monkey actually. The refractory period wasn't as long as the essay. Let's get this over with. All right. No, obviously, this was just a stunt to showcase the stupidity of basing public policy and religious principles, which is why we don't do that anymore. Except a, religious exemptions for vaccines, otherwise known as the right to disease.

B, the heartbeat bill now being passed everywhere where high school is considered an accomplishment. Not see the halting of stem cell research. That was good. Glad to do that for a little while. D the knee jerk support of Israel at any cost or any textbook in Texas. I'm going to go secret answer for far. We haven't come very far. All right. Next question. Uh, Donald Trump looks like he developed into a tamarind monkey and got a bunch of cancer treatment. And he should definitely

be taught in schools. That's a fact. Um, what should be the title of that monkey trial porn? Is it a macock work orange? is it a McCock work orange. You can stop there. I don't need another answer, sir. It is a McCock work. Or it is a problem. It is a problem. Also, guys, I didn't cut you off from anything.

He didn't write in any more answers. So I was just a him provide to guerrilla's one cup. I don't know. 12 angry monkey man. That would have been good. Oh. All right, no, I think it's fair to say we're all a little biased against religion on this podcast, so let's give some counter-apologetics there, do.

Which of the following is a good argument that evolution and religion can coexist? A, you don't get to tell me what to believe. B, starting a story about someone dying and then very clearly starting to cry in the hopes that you'll buck down out of social contract. C, some religions have non-white people in them. You're racist. Or D, according to all of our experiences, all of the above. Oh, okay. Conflicting instructions. You said we were going to give anti-evolution or D according to all of our experiences, all of the above. Oh, okay.

Conflicting instructions, you said we were gonna give anti-evolution apologetics there do, and then you kept talking and prompted me to do the same. So wrong is my answer. Just wrong. That is correct, secret answer wrong. Okay, Noah, what's the best way for evolution to win its court case?

A, DNA evidence. B, don't strike the fossil record. C, jury selection over 10,000 generations. Survival of the witness. Secret answer E, it wins when natural selection makes a smarter, which will happen soon, because it's only a matter of time before I snap and kill all these stupid motherfuckers You know what it's it's e but I still win. How's that? Okay, and I'm gonna pick Tom for next week so Tom you're it all righty. Okay

We're gonna leave now and before I do I'm gonna say goodbye so I'm gonna say goodbye. So I have a whole paragraph written just for this purpose. There it goes. We know. Well, no one knew anything was wrong. Well, he's a weight of vamps. Would you sign off for all of us please? I will right now.

I'm going to say your name next. Thank you. No, I'm Cecil. Thank you for hanging out with us today. We'll be back next week. You're welcome. It's me. It'll be an expert on something else.

Between now and then, you can check out other shows. Go to CitationPod.com for full list. And if you'd like to keep the show going, you can make a per episode donation at Patreon.com slash citation pod. Or leave us a five star of you everywhere you can. If you'd like to get in touch with us, check out past episodes,

contact us on social media, or check the show notes. Be sure to check out citationpod.com. He said you first. Everyone always says you first. Good. TEE! Ha ha ha!

Ha! The defendant is free to go. Where did you even get a monkey? Oh, my elephant guy from last week's episode, the elephant thing he threw him in, just sweetened the deal. Oh, my elephant guy from last week's episode, the elephant thing he threw him in to sweeten the deal. Oh, score. Right? I named him Heath.

What? Right? You named him Monkey after yourself? Good name. Right? Isn't it Heath? Good monkey. Thank you.

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