American Notes: Scopes Returns

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Driven out of his profession for teaching Darwinism to high school biology students, John Thomas Scopes left both pedagogy and Tennessee in 1925. He became an oil company geologist, prospected for oil in South America, wrote a book and lived to see the "monkey trial" re-created for Broadway and Hollywood. Last week, accepting an invitation from students at Nashville's George Peabody College for Teachers, Scopes, 70, found himself back in a Tennessee classroom for the first time in 45 years—addressing a biology class.

History has treated Scopes well, and he was greeted like a returning hero. A state representative and a judge even gave him the long-delayed evidence that his battle for academic freedom had been successful: a copy of the 1967 state law repealing the old anti-evolution statute. For his part, Scopes remains outspoken. Self-billed as an "oldtime Socialist," he backed sex education in the school, warned that the U.S. is "controlled to a large degree by fanatics" and cautioned that the nation is moving not toward Communism but fascism. Yet the man who was once accused of undermining the Book of Genesis made a plea for allowing prayers in the classroom, provided that is what the individual class wants.