CHATTANOOGA, Tenn. - A judge on Friday ordered a halt to public school Bible study classes in the same Tennessee county where the landmark Scopes "Monkey" trial favored the teaching of biblical creationism over evolution 77 years ago.
U.S. District Judge Allan Edgar ruled the once-a-week classes for students in kindergarten through fifth grade in three Rhea County public schools amounted to "proselytizing," and violated the U.S. Constitution's separation of church and state.
The plaintiffs in the case were the unnamed parents of two students. The parents are members of the Freedom From Religion Foundation, an advocacy group for free-speech rights.
The Rhea County school board argued the Bible classes were aimed at building character and had a secular purpose. The classes have been taught for the past half-century by students from the nearby Christian-oriented Bryan College -- named after the Scopes prosecutor William Jennings Bryan.
In his ruling granting summary judgement prior to a trial, Edgar said the constitutional requirement separating church and state was simple and clear-cut in the current case.
"Hopefully, character is indeed a byproduct of religious instruction," Edgar wrote. "However, even if the defendants assert a secular purpose, and even if the classes do promote character, this does not legitimize proselytizing religious activity in the schools."
Conscious of the historic Scopes trial held 40 miles away that featured famed lawyers Bryan and Clarence Darrow, Edgar wrote: "The legacy of that trial in some respects gives rise to this lawsuit."
Darrow eloquently defended local teacher John Scopes' teaching of evolution, the then-controversial theory that apes and humans share common origins. The theory contradicted the preeminent biblical belief in divine creation.
Scopes was convicted and ordered to pay $100 in the trial held in Dayton, in Rhea County, though Darrow's passionate arguments won the day and the verdict was later overturned.
The plaintiffs in the latest case were awarded $1 in damages and attorney's fees.