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Summer for the Gods The Scopes Trial and America’s Continuing Debate over Science and Religion.  By Edward J. Larson  Larson does not begin his book by detailing the intense debates between Williams Jennings Bryan and Clarence Darrow. Nor does he talk about the long winded battle of science and religion that has been fought since the time of Galileo and Newton. Rather he outlines what the greater realities were, and exactly how the now infamous “Monkey Trial” came to ever occur at all. The answers are quite alarming in some cases, and the so called pivotal case occasionally appears anything but. The book begins with a brief history of how evolution first posed a substantial threat to Christianity, that is, much more so than ancient fossils or astronomy ever had. Nowhere in the Bible does it actually say the sun revolves around the earth, but it does explicitly state god created humans in his image. Evolution challenged the very heart of genesis, the creation of the human race, and the idea that we exist by will of the divine God. Larson outlined many controversies throughout the 19th century and then as the idea spread to North America. Under education in the war-torn American South led the vast majority of the population to reach out to religion as the only source of knowledge available. This is where the issue was born. Debates in bars and street corners were common in Tennessee throughout the 1920’s as education spread and with it the apparent undeniability of evolution. Kentucky was the first state to try to outlaw the teaching of evolution in public schools, but the legislation failed by a slim margin. When Tennessee successfully passed such legislation the following year however, there was very little public opinion on the matter, positive or negative. According to Larson, the general population took almost no notice of the bill, which provided a small misdemeanor offense for someone who taught ideas which “conflict with the divine creation.” Simultaneously, the book tells the story of the evolution of the American Civil Liberties Union, and in particular and individual named Arthur Hayes, who is more important to the Scopes trial than Darrow or Bryan, and for all the wrong reasons. Hayes was looking to make a name for the recently reestablished, post WW1 ACLU, and he chanced to come across the small article in the //Chattanooga Times// about the anti-evolution law. Hayes was not a biologist by any measure, but he sensed an opportunity to create public debate and in the process make a name for the ACLU. The ACLU sent out a press releases searching for any teacher willing to go on trial and challenge the state’s law against teaching evolution, and the young John Scopes answered the call. The ACLU even assured Scopes that they would cover the $100 fine for him should he be found guilty. Larson then goes further in indicating that the reason the rest of the state’s judicial system went along is not a matter of religion or principal either, but also completely materialistic. Dayton Tennessee was a small struggling town with high levels of poverty and unemployment, and everyone in a position of power knew that a major political/religious debate in the town’s small courthouse would attract enormous crowds and publicity. The town’s entire population would contribute to the housings and feeding of an estimated 30,000 spectators, deals were made with the local rail company to schedule extra trains to Dayton, there was even talk of building a stadium sized courthouse to house the event. The ACLU (Scopes’ future defense attorneys) contacted the state prosecutors to arrange a meeting in Dayton and sell the idea of a trial about teaching evolution. At a pleasant meeting in a local tavern, the prosecutors agreed to charge Scopes with teaching illegal material and likewise began planning for a major publicity event. What Larson indicates here significantly changes historical context of this great trial. The defense attorneys sat down with the prosecutors, and //requested// that their client be charged with a crime, as the state would have never wasted its resources on prosecuting such a petty crime normally. Scopes had also never received any complaints or warnings about what he had been teaching prior to his volunteering to be prosecuted. He was one of many teachers in the state of Tennessee who was unaware or had no concern for the fact that teaching something as obvious as evolution was illegal. The so called, “Trial of the Century” in reality began as nothing more than the 1925 equivalent of a stimulus package. Only after this long discourse on the reality of how this entire trial came to be does the book actually describe the now famous Scopes trial. The big guns of the trial are introduced, Clarence Darrow, a well known liberal defense attorney, and William Jennings Bryan, a three time presidential candidate and former federal prosecutor. Yet when these two gentlemen enter the courtroom, Larson mentions another surprise. The two democrats had worked alongside each other on many political matters in the past, and despite Bryan being far more conservative, they had found plenty of common ground. When they were reunited in the court chambers, they spoke pleasantly with their hands on each other’s shoulders, certainly not sworn enemies. Still before reaching the infamous speeches and cross examinations, the book mentions various early motions and jury selections, which once again put the trial in a new perspective. When selecting jurors, both sides discovered that many of Dayton’s population had no knowledge of what evolution was, much less how it related to the Bible or divine creation. As such Darrow had to bring forth expert witnesses just to explain to the jurors what this extremely relevant modern debate was about. He also mentions that the publicity stunts continued during the actual trial. Darrow began the first morning with an objection to the court opening with a prayer. By all accounts he had participated in prayers countless other times in his time as a lawyer, but only now did he choose to object, submersed in the notion of challenging religion. Only in a few short paragraphs does the book ever describe anyone debating about religion. It mentions the famous testimony of Bryan himself, where Darrow asks him if the world was really created in seven days or if Jonah could have really been swallowed by a whale. The issues that the trial will always be remembered for, that movies and documentaries have been made about, are given only a brief representation, as they were not even particularly relevant to the case, seeing has Scopes had broken the law whether evolution was accurate or not. The book tries very hard to capture what the true nature of the trial was, the heated arguments between lawyers is by no means the climax, rather the ACLU interviewing such well known academics as George Bernard Shaw and Albert Einstein is given center stage. As well as the people of Dayton, who went from poor farmers to building a boom town capable of supporting the thousands of spectators who arrived at the trial. Summer for the Gods, is perhaps not exciting in the way one might expect a book about a landmark trial to be. Readers hoping for page turning descriptions of heated debates and brilliant judicial strategies will likely be disappointed, but the book does have another appeal entirely. For a reader who wants to truly understand history, who wants to go beyond the famous and well known surface and understand how profound events like this come to be, Larson’s book is an excellent source of information. Larson presents numerous facts about the realities of the trial, all of which appear to be completely out in the open, but are ignored by most other sources as they dismantle the notion that this really was “The Trial of the Century” Larson is certainly a bold writer. He does not try to claim that this was not a profound step in the developing disagreements between the clergy and the scientific community, but he does show that as always, major events in history do not occur at random. He effectively captures the “culture” of this scientific revolution. The now infamous scopes trial which everyone knows as the beginning of a great American debate about science and religion, or literal vs. modern interpretation of the Bible. What was it really? It was an attempt by a publicity seeking liberal organization, and a poor war-crippled town, to make a name for themselves, and they happened to choose the mildly controversial issue of evolution versus creationism and just happened to create one of the most publicized and relevant trials in American history. Larson writes a book that takes what you know and turns it upside down, and shows you how science and history are truly related.