In a conflict reminiscent of the 1925Scopes "Monkey Trial" in Tennessee, on 19 June 1987 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a Louisiana state law requiring the teaching of creationism alongside evolutionary theory was unconstitutional. "The Balanced Treatment for Creation-Science and Evolution-Science in Public School Instruction Act" had been passed by the Louisiana House of Representatives in 1981 by a vote of 71 to 17, and it passed in the Louisiana State Senate by 26 to 12. The act never went into effect, however, because it was almost immediately challenged in the courts. In a 7—2 decision the United States Supreme Court's majority ruled that the Louisiana law's "primary purpose was to change the science curriculum of the public schools in order to provide persuasive advantage to a particular religious doctrine that rejects the factual basis of evolution in its entirety." Justice William Brennan, writing for the majority, noted that the...