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This chapter describes how a simple small-town misdemeanor trial of the Dayton substitute teacher, John Scopes, turned into a one of the greatest legal clashes between science and religion since the time of Galileo. The people of Dayton sought to depict themselves as the paragon of the American way of life, and invoked the theme of “science versus religion” conflict as a way to improve the image of their town as the appropriate venue for such weighty issues. The American Civil Liberties Union saw this as an opportunity to champion the cause of academic freedom and the rights of the teachers in the country. On the other side, William Jennings Bryan saw this as an opportunity to empower his antievolutionist crusade.

This chapter discusses the revision that George W. Hunter made for his controversial book, Civic Biology. The first revision of Civic Biology that George W. hunter provided to his publisher, ABC, before the Scopes trial was not nearly as sensitive to the antievolutionism as its competitors. The Scopes trial changed what people thought antievolutionism meant, and Civic Biology became related to Scopes himself, which tainted the public’s perception of the textbook. The new version of the textbook was largely influenced by the trial, but the adopted changes were neither quick nor simple. The textbook was uniquely positioned to help identify what would count as a response to the trial and how post-Scopes textbooks should be read.

Chapter four interrupts the analysis of the ASA and RSCF in order to review the developments within the creationist movement from the sixties to the eighties. During this period, which witnessed a resurgence of conservatism in both the United States and Great Britain, large numbers of evangelicals became convinced that Christianity required a rejection of evolution. These views were more prevalent in the US, but not absent from the UK. American groups such as the Creation Research Society and British groups such as the Biblical Creation Society succeeded in convincing many churchgoers of the weakness of evolutionary science and of the validity of a straightforward reading of the opening chapters of Genesis.

This chapter traces the origins of Young-Earth creationism by focusing on the Scopes trial of 1925, with particular emphasis on how it became a template for subsequent clashes over the irreconcilable issue of evolution versus religion. That template includes public schools as the battleground of choice as well as Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryan. The Scopes trial was not just a reaction against Charles Darwin and evolution, but against science in general. Despite creationism being suspect science, it is a model of political activism that took form at the Scopes trial. This chapter considers the rapid growth of antievolutionism in the early twentieth century and how antievolutionists worked their way into the cultural mainstream with savvy media campaigns. It also examines how Bryan and Darrow defined the subsequent place of antievolutionism for fundamentalists.

This introductory chapter discusses the theme of this volume which is about the history of antievolutionism in the U.S. It covers criticisms on Charles Darwin's “On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life” and discusses claims that his theory was a moral outrage. This opinion regarded natural selection was a cruel process and that it struck directly at certain foundational Judeo-Christian beliefs. It also explores the Scopes Trial of 1925, the role of militant Protestantism in the anti-evolution movement, the intersection of gender, race and regionalism with the antievolution impulse and the teaching of creationism in campus.

This chapter examines the origins of the foundations of the fundamentalism and antievolutionism in the U.S. in a crisis over gender and sex roles in the years before the Scopes Trial. It discusses the role of women activists in the antievolutionism and the wide range of secular responses generated by the threat of feminization. It also suggests that the modern creation science movement has dropped the ideal of maternalism as thoroughly as Scopes' defenders ever could have hoped.

This chapter examines the geographical aspects of antievolutionism in the U.S., particularly its shift to the American South from its origin in the urban American North. It discusses the impact of antievolutionism on the North-South divide, the effort of regional representatives to clarify their antievolutionist stand and the North's association of their regionalism with a willful anti-intellectualism. It also explores the ways in which ruralism and the rise of suburban antievolutionism in recent times complicate regional identifications and suggests that the South remains a geographical stronghold of Charles Darwin's detractors.

This chapter analyzes the ways in which antievolutionism led African Americans to examine more carefully the character and future of their race. It examines the impact of antievolutionism on African American pedagogues and preachers, the reaction and views of African American intellectuals such as W. E. B. Dubois and examples of black antievolutionism including Reverend Charles Satchell Morris Sr.'s well-publicized attacks on Darwinism before, during, and after the Scopes Trial. It also suggests that while the racial elements of the evolution dispute have become muted, evolution continues to highlight social conflicts within African America and highlights the rhetorical role of race in debates over Darwinism.

This chapter traces the strong continuities in antievolutionist ideology and then charts the strategic flexibility antievolutionists have developed in defending this vision. It discusses antievolutionists' defense of the Book of Genesis and the thematic continuity in antievolution which led American politician William Jennings Bryan into action for antievolutionism. It also analyzes the political purposes served by antievolutionism for conservative evangelicals and investigates the strategies antievolutionists have pursued against the threat of Darwinism, with particular attention to their claims of scientific expertise.