US judge bans intelligent design from science lessons

· Victory for parents on teaching of evolution
· Theory ruled to be religion by the back door

A courtroom battle seen as a test case for the teaching of science in America ended in a decisive victory for evolution yesterday when a federal judge in Pennsylvania ruled that it was unconstitutional to teach "intelligent design" in biology class.

In a 139-page decision that was scathing about the area school district and dismissive of the science of "intelligent design", US district judge John Jones III ruled that the school district of Dover, Pennsylvania, had violated the constitution by ordering teachers to read a statement which challenged Darwin's theory of evolution.

Yesterday's verdict concludes a trial that was seen as the most important legal review of science and religion since the 1920s. It arrives at a time when the teaching of evolution is under attack in school districts from Georgia to Kansas and when the school district in Dover was seen as the cutting edge of a new effort by the religious right to inject its views into America's state school system.

Judge Jones's verdict was ambitious in scope, dealing not only with the actions of the Dover school district but also with the very notion of "intelligent design", an idea which surfaced 15 years ago following the failure of earlier efforts to introduce traditional biblical creationism in public schools.

Anticipating that his decision would come under attack from the religious right, the judge, who was appointed by President George Bush, was careful to state that he was not an activist judge, but dealing with proceedings provoked by the actions of the school district. The judge wrote that "intelligent design" was a religious notion that advances Christianity, and so was in violation of constitutional provisions against the establishment of religion.

"The evidence at trial demonstrates that 'intelligent design' is nothing less than the progeny of creationism," Judge Jones wrote.

He accused members of the school board of concealing the real purpose behind their insistence on introducing a passage deriding evolution to high school students. "We find that the secular purposes claimed by the board amount to pretext for the board's real purpose, which was to promote religion in the public school classroom," Judge Jones wrote.

The verdict was immediately hailed as a "complete victory" by the American Civil Liberties Union. "This will make the teaching of science a lot easier," said Eugenie Scott, the executive director of the National Centre for Science Education.

The roots of yesterday's landmark verdict go back to October last year, when the school district in Dover, Pennsylvania, ordered high school teachers to read a statement to students which cast doubt on evolution as a theory. "Gaps in the theory exist for which there is not evidence," the statement said.

Eleven parents filed a suit, resulting in a six-week trial in which Judge Jones led an exhaustive examination of the events in Dover as well as the intellectual underpinnings of the "intelligent design" movement, which has led the incursions into classrooms in Dover and elsewhere.

Unlike in Dover, where the judge said the religious inclinations of the school board members were transparent, the leaders of the Intelligent Design movement have been careful to avoid direct reference to God but argued that the universe was too complex to have come into being without the guiding hand of a creator.

The judge did not accept that yesterday. "The overwhelming evidence at trial established that ID is a religious view, a mere relabelling of creationism, and not a scientific theory," he wrote.

Proponents of intelligent design have also shied from demanding an outright ban on evolution in the classroom, but have called instead for teaching about the "controversy" surrounding Darwin.

The approach - or stealth creationism as its critics called it - was endorsed by President Bush, who told reporters last August that he favoured open debate in the classroom.

But in his verdict yesterday, Judge Jones was categorical that "intelligent design" was not science, and that its attacks on evolution should not be admitted into the classroom. "This tactic is at best disingenuous and at worst a canard. The goal of the [movement] is not to encourage critical thought but to foment a revolution which would supplant evolutionary theory with ID."


In October 2004, the school board in Dover, Pennsylvania, ordered teachers to read a statement to ninth grade biology students (14-year-olds) describing evolution as a theory still in the process of being tested and for which there were "gaps" in evidence. Eleven parents sued, with support from the American Civil Liberties Union. The dispute was seen as a test case for efforts by supporters of a new version of creationism, intelligent design, to overturn the constitutional principle of a separation between church and state. US courts since the 1960s have banned the teaching of creationism in state schools. The federal judge yesterday said state schools can not teach intelligent design in science classes, and that the Dover school board had violated the constitution.

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