In honor of Charles Darwin’s 200th birthday, the Freethinkers of Colorado Springs will have Susan Epperson as our guest speaker in February.

On May 5, 1925, John Scopes was charged with teaching ideas from Darwin's book on the Origin of Species. Under the Butler Act it was unlawful in any state-funded educational establishment in Tennessee, "to teach any theory that denies the story of the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead that man has descended from the lower order of animals." The trial was held in Dayton, Tennessee, and was world famous. That same year Arkansas adapted its own "anti-evolution" statute based upon the Tennessee law.

According to Wikipedia, “in the mid-1960's, Forrest Rozzell, the secretary of the Arkansas Education Association, sought someone to challenge the law as a violation of the Establishment Clause of the United States Constitution. Rather than have someone break the law as in the Scopes case, the AEA's lawyers instead tried to find a person to request a declaratory judgment on the law. Susan Epperson, a Little Rock high school teacher and theistic evolutionist, agreed to be that person.”

Susan Epperson obtained her M.S. degree in Zoology from the University of Illinois in 1964. She taught 10th grade biology at Central High in Little Rock, Arkansas. In 1968 appellant Epperson's challenge to the constitutionality of Arkansas' "anti-evolution" statute was heard in the U.S. Supreme Court which ruled the statute was invalid.

Currently Ms. Epperson teaches science at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs. The Freethinkers of Colorado Springs is pleased to have Ms. Epperson present the story of Epperson vs. Arkansas at our February meeting.

Freethinkers of Colorado Springs

Membership Meeting

7:00 to 9:00 PM

315 East Costilla in Colorado Springs