ROME – Anyone who’s ever read or seen Inherit the Wind knows that almost 100 years ago, a celebrated trial took place in the American state of Tennessee, dubbed at the time the “Trial of the Century”, in which a teacher was accused of teaching evolution in a public school in violation of state law, thereby creating a classic showdown between science and religion.
It would take a true master of Trivial Pursuit, however, to recall the outcome: John T. Scopes was found guilty and fined $100, the amount stipulated by a 1925 state law that barred teachers from contradicting the Book of Genesis, though the result was later overturned on a technicality – under the state constitution at the time, a judge could not impose a fine exceeding $50, meaning the jury should have been asked to impose the penalty.
