THE MONKEY TRIAL

With cogence aplenty for current national issues, a look at “monkeyshines” in an infamous 1925 Tennessee trial.

Sanchez expertly sifts a mountain of documentary evidence to present a coherent account of the event—which ballooned from a publicity stunt instigated by local businessmen to a “circus” featuring squads of lawyers, herds of reporters, hordes of spectators, and even a few trained chimpanzees—and to evenhandedly portray the profound clash of values it exposed. She carefully analyzes the characters of John Scopes, a naïve but intelligent and ultimately disaffected substitute teacher, and charismatic populist William Jennings Bryan, among other figures. She explains why all the jurors and other participants were White (and male) but notes some people of color among the crowds of spectators. Along with a generous array of contemporary photos, she also inserts substantial extracts from the high school biology textbook Scopes used—which, it turns out, promoted racist eugenics as well as evolutionary theory—and from the book of Genesis as well as scorching commentary from observers like H.L. Mencken and W.E.B. Du Bois. And if readers aren’t drawn in by the compelling views of courtroom battles and strategy, they will be absorbed by the issues of scientific versus religious truth, of rights to free speech, and divisive regionalism that motivated all the ruckus, being as contentious today as ever. As the author, mulling the question of “Who won the Monkey Trial?” concludes: “The jury is still out.”

Perceptive, well written and reasoned, and (unfortunately) at least as topical as ever.