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May 26, 2023 - Sean Hannity Show
31:01
Civil Rights Under Attack - May 25th, Hour 1
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This is an iHeart podcast.
Welcome to the Sean Hannity Show.
I'm Greg Jarrett filling in for Sean over the next three hours.
I'm the Fox News legal analyst and a lawyer.
You can follow me on Twitter at Greg Jarrett.
You can also read my legal columns and other articles on my website, thegregjarrett.com.
Listen to my podcast, The Brief.
And I'm also happy to report that I have a new book coming out in just a few days.
It's called The Trial of the Century, the famous Scopes Monkey Trial.
It was a pivotal moment in American history when it actually became a crime to teach evolution in public schools.
And a young teacher was arrested and charged.
And the great Clarence Darrow, his brilliant, devastating cross-examination of fundamentalist icon William Jennings Bryant was the climax of the trial, described by the New York Times as, quote, the most amazing court scene in Anglo-Saxon history.
Well, the stunning outcome dramatically shifted public opinion in America and it spelled the beginning of the end for the kind of government abuse and intrusion that our Constitution forbids.
And the wonders and benefits of science were untethered.
Free speech rights were rescued and generations of Americans became Clarence Darrow's beneficiaries.
But it also foreshadowed today's fraught culture wars.
Our civil liberties, again, are in jeopardy.
So is history repeating itself?
You can actually find out in my new book, The Trial of the Century, available in bookstores nationwide beginning Tuesday.
You can order it right now.
It's available for pre-sale online.
Usual websites, Amazon.com, barnsandnoble.com, or simply go to my website, thegregjarrett.com slash book, and you can buy a signed copy of the book, courtesy of Premier Collectibles.
You'll find that at the top of my site.
And I'll be talking more about it on Tuesday with Sean when he returns.
And that's the day the book comes out.
I'll be back here on the Sean Hannity Show as his guest.
But for now, I'm pleased to be here filling in for Sean.
He's enjoying some well-deserved time off, and perhaps you are doing the same thing.
Maybe you're heading out for a long holiday weekend as part of Memorial Day.
Certainly a very important day of remembrance of the brave souls who died in service to this great country of ours.
Those immortal patriots fought for our freedom and to preserve our cherished rights.
But, you know, those rights seem to be under increasing attack in America, often by corrupt actors in government who we're supposed to trust.
But you know what?
Maybe we shouldn't.
This was no more apparent than when the long-awaited Durham report came out just recently.
Have you read it?
If you haven't, I assure you it shines a bright light on one of the most notorious episodes in modern American history.
The FBI willingly weaponized its authority to take down a duly elected president.
And if you read it, it's meticulous in detail.
It's corroborated by documents, thousands of them, and testimony from people who, under subpoena, were forced to tell the truth.
The special counsel reveals how the FBI never had any plausible or credible evidence or verified intelligence when it wrongfully launched a damaging investigation of Donald Trump.
And indeed, the FBI knew from the outset that it was all a pernicious lie, the collusion hoax invented by Hillary Clinton and her cronies.
It was surely the dirtiest trick ever perpetrated in American politics.
And in fact, it triggered the greatest mass delusion in political history.
I penned two best-selling books about it, The Russia Hoax and Witch Hunt, and everything I wrote in those books, and recounted here, by the way, with Sean on this program, was confirmed and validated by the Durham Report, a classic case of abuse of power by unscrupulous public officials, James Comey, Andrew McCabe, Peter Strzok, Kevin Kleinsmith, the whole gang at the FBI.
And yes, I get it.
They were fired from their jobs, but it should have been more than that.
And the sad coda to the Durham Report is that none of those people will ever be held accountable in a court of law.
That is the singular failure of the special counsel.
But you know what?
It's no wonder.
Corruption in Washington is endemic.
It's ingrained.
We see it in the current Department of Justice, where the Attorney General Merrick Garland is running, quite clearly, a protection racket for the Biden family criminal enterprises.
Think about this.
Tens of millions of dollars in foreign cash flowing like a river into Biden family coffers.
Recently, the House Oversight Committee uncovered a single set of transactions that netted the Bidens $10 million from a single country that was then funneled into more than 20 shell companies and LLCs created for the Biden's financial benefit.
No legitimate purpose for any of these shell companies.
And much of the cash was then shoveled around various accounts before it finally lands in the hands of not one, not five, but nine members of the president's family.
I mean, the incriminating evidence comes from thousands of banking records, wire transfers, electronic transactions.
It's contained in more than 170 suspicious activity reports flagged by banks and then sent to the criminal division at the Treasury Department.
What is that?
Well, it smacks of money laundering, not to mention bribery, conspiracy, and violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
So how is it possible that no charges have been brought?
Well, the answer is simple and definitive.
Merrick Garland, the AG, is running interference.
A host of whistleblowers have come forward recently to testify that political rot has infected the FBI at the top levels.
But it also extends to Garland's DOJ.
The whistleblowers describe rampant political favoritism, partisan decision-making to cover up Biden wrongdoing and criminality.
Is there any doubt to it?
I mean, just look at what happened to the whistleblowers themselves.
They suffered retaliation and punishment, as one of them said under oath in a recent congressional hearing.
If you're honest and you complain about corruption, quote, the FBI will crush you.
It doesn't matter.
There are laws forbidding retribution.
The law has been tossed in the garbage by the Biden administration.
And all the while, Joe continues to mangle the economy, make a mess of the border, Americans suffering as a result.
They know who's to blame.
Take a look at his approval rating.
It's in the dumpster on the economy and border security and skyrocketing crime.
Joe has done nothing but make it worse.
And his poll numbers have dropped like the Hindenburg fast and burning.
But Joe doesn't care, mainly because he doesn't know.
I mean, this is a guy whose brain is so addled, he couldn't tell you what he had for breakfast.
If you ask him what color of tie he's wearing, he has to look down to check.
During a recent trip to Japan, Joe Biden told Marines stationed there, quote, my son was a major in the U.S. Army.
We lost him in Iraq.
Well, no, but that's not the first time that Biden said it.
Last October, you'll recall he made the same head-scratching remark.
The truth is, his son, Bo died of brain cancer in 2015 at Walter Reed Hospital in Maryland.
He didn't die in Iraq.
But look, is it any wonder that Biden's debt ceiling talks are faltering?
I mean, it's hard to negotiate with a guy who's not all there.
It's like trying to haggle with a zombie.
Nothing makes sense because, well, Joe has no sense.
He thinks everything at the border is fine and dandy.
No problems at the border.
No worries.
Meanwhile, some six and a half million illegals have crossed the border and vanished into the U.S. By the time Joe leaves office, you can double that number to about 13 or 14 million illegals, maybe more.
There's no reliable way of tracking them or even knowing who they are.
Murderers, rapists, thieves, violent criminals, drug traffickers.
We have done endless stories about innocent civilians, U.S. citizens terrorized by people who've come across the border.
Recently, a Maryland mother whose autistic daughter was raped and killed by an MS-13 gang member, and she directly blamed on Fox News Joe Biden and his border policy, saying, quote, if the president had secured the border, my daughter would be alive today.
Well, lots to talk about.
Coming up, I'll be discussing all of this with David Schoen, Civil Liberties Attorney, the great Peter Schweitzer, and Eric Eggers.
Also, John McLaughlin will join me to talk about the latest entrance in the presidential sweepstakes for the Republican nomination.
And Don Yeager will join me, who co-authored my new book, The Trial of the Century.
I hope you'll read it.
It's available now for pre-sale online.
It comes out in bookstores nationwide on Tuesdays.
So stick around.
Lots to talk about.
I'm Greg Jarrett, filling in for Sean on the Sean Hannity Show.
We'll be right back.
Welcome back to the Sean Hennity Show.
I'm Greg Jarrett, filling in for Sean.
You can follow me on Twitter at Greg Jarrett, or you can check out my website, thegregjarrett.com.
I have a new book.
I'm happy to say it's coming out next Tuesday.
It's about a different kind of governmental abuse, a pivotal moment in American history when our cherished free speech rights were put in jeopardy, along with academic freedom and civil liberties.
The book is called The Trial of the Century, about the famous Scopes monkey trial.
And people have been asking me, why did you write the book?
It started actually, in a way, 55 years ago.
I was a young teenager, and I plucked a book off my father's densely packed shelf.
And it seemed like an important book, if you can judge a book by its cover, as the old saying goes.
And I sat down and I started reading it.
It was about the incredible life of the greatest trial lawyer who ever lived, Clarence Darrow.
And Darrow became my idol.
Yes, he was an agnostic.
He was a liberal, but it wasn't his politics that defined him.
It was his values, his principles.
He became known as the attorney for the damned, the despised, the oppressed, the underprivileged.
Those were his treasured clients.
He championed their cause.
Without him, they scarcely stood a chance against government overreach and government prosecutors.
It's the reason I became a lawyer.
That book, that moment, so random it seems, shaped the contours of my life.
Fast forward about 55 years, I obtained the original trial transcript of the famous Scopes monkey trial, digging through the archives of the old courthouse in Dayton, Tennessee.
The trial of the century tells the story of the most important criminal case in American history.
Yes, the press dubbed it the Scopes Monkey Trial.
That was a popular misconception about human evolution, but at stake was the teaching of science in American education, which came under sustained attack in the 1920s.
They began banning books.
Legislatures began passing a law.
Tennessee was the first to make it a crime to teach evolution, Darwin's cornerstone theory in public schools.
And a young biology teacher by the name of John Scopes was arrested and charged for teaching evolution, even though the state had a textbook that they approved with a chapter on the subject.
In other words, it was okay for students to read it, but a teacher could not teach it.
Scopes was being punished criminally for doing his job.
This is an incredible story with a climactic event in which Clarence Darrow calls the great William Jennings Bryan to the witness stand as an expert on the Bible and utterly destroys him.
Five days later, Bryant lays down to take a nap and dies.
It's an amazing story.
It's all in my new book.
I hope you'll check it out.
It's called The Trial of the Century.
It's available online right now.
It'll be in bookstores nationwide on Tuesday.
I'll be back here on Tuesday with Sean to talk about the book.
In the meantime, we're going to take a short break.
Coming up next, I'll be talking with my co-author of the book, Don Yeager.
Stick around.
We'll be right back on the Sean Hannity Show.
Working every day to remember the forgotten man.
This is the Sean Hannity Show.
Welcome to the Sean Hennity Show.
I'm Greg Jarrett filling in for Sean.
Be sure to follow me on Twitter at Greg Jarrett.
You can listen to my podcast, The Brief, read my legal columns and other articles on my website, thegregjarrett.com.
You can also go to my website and you just click on a landing page there about my new book.
We've been talking about it over the last half hour, The Trial of the Century.
You can pre-order it online through amazon.com, Barnesandnoble.com, or you can wait until Tuesday when the book will be in bookstores nationwide, The Trial of the Century.
Well, as I mentioned, my guest now is my co-author, Don Yeager, who has done incredible work researching the history of the trial of the century, the town of Dayton, Tennessee, where it all unfolded in 1925.
And Don, you focused a lot on the history of the characters.
Importantly, you know, William Jennings Bryant, three-time presidential nominee for the Democrats, lost all three times.
And the greatest trial lawyer who ever lived, Clarence Darrow, who became my idol, the reason I was inspired to pursue a legal career.
And I was telling listeners about the moment in the trial where Darrow is staring down a stack deck.
He knows that the jury is stacked.
The judges against him has held him in criminal contempt.
When Darrow questioned the judge's fairness, the judge clearly wants to convict John Scopes in the so-called Scopes monkey trial.
And Darrow doesn't give up.
In a bold and brilliant move, he decides to call his nemesis, William Jennings Bryant, to the witness stand to be an expert on the Bible.
And it was such a genius move, Don, because Darrow knew Bryant and knew Bryant's ego was as big as all outdoors.
And he could not resist taking the witness stand to show off his knowledge of the Bible and man's creation as depicted in Genesis.
We actually, you and I actually decided after some discussion with the publisher, let's open the book with a portion of the end of the trial, this wonderful climactic moment.
Take it from there, John.
You know, thanks, Greg, by the way, for having me.
And it's just always a treat to be with you because you are, I've had the chance to work with a lot of folks and few have just been such a great partner as you have.
So thank you.
But I have to tell you, the idea of ending, of beginning with the end, right, which can sometimes, you know, it's very movie-like and there's a lot of opportunities there, was just so natural here because it was,
as you've just so well described it, it was that moment in which it took genius and it took an understanding of all the players, The pieces on the board in order for Darrow to choose to make that kind of the hill he would, where he would go to, you know, to, if he was going to go to die, he wanted to make sure he did it on the right hill.
And this was the place, right?
You get William Jennings Bryan out there, you begin asking questions.
And look, we're people of faith here.
And so I get it.
I mean, the one thing about it is it's sometimes it's hard to describe or really explain why you believe certain things to be true because there's parts of faith that require exactly that, right?
Your ability to show faith.
And Darrow knew that if he got into a logical debate about certain things that were biblical about creation, that Brian would look as he ultimately did as he would embarrass himself, which he did.
Right.
And his audience was stacked with people, his supporters.
I was standing outside with signs, you know, saying, here's my Bible, and don't try to, you'll pride away with my, you know, and they were expecting this brilliant recitation about the Bible from Brian.
And he fumbled and stumbled and mumbled.
And he, you know, the expectations were not there.
And the funny thing about it is that, you know, Clarence Darrow, who was this famed agnostic, not an atheist, but an agnostic, actually knew a lot about the Bible.
His father had gone to seminary school.
He grew up with it.
His mother was deeply religious.
You know, Clarence Darrow knew entire passages from the Bible by heart.
And he had this brilliant mind.
And he understood, as theologians did and still do, that the book is filled with parables and allegories.
And not everything written is literal.
They're there to teach us important moral lessons about life and how to conduct ourselves in society and our fellow human beings, which is, by the way, how Darrow conducted himself.
And yet, Bryant couldn't recognize it.
It's so amazing.
Well, but I think that's true of a lot of folks who become a little full of their knowledge of a certain space that they don't see the potential weakness in their position.
But I think that the beauty of it was that Darrow, as a good lawyer would do, and that's been the fun of working on this book with you because you think of it.
I think of it as a journalist.
I think of it as a writer.
You come at it with an understanding of legal approach.
A good lawyer sets you up, right?
They're kind of bringing you, they're asking a question here, and then there's a little greater nibble there.
And if you read that portion of just, if you just read that opening portion of the book and you understand that story, you see the genius.
You see why, because I was always fascinating, Greg, when you and I first started talking about doing this book, that Clarence Darrow was your hero, right?
For some people, that would seem odd.
You're a solidly conservative, you know, you understand and you see things through your lens, which is wonderfully conservative.
And Darrow was not always that.
In fact, he's self-he was a liberal.
But it wasn't his politics.
It was his principles and values that I so revered.
And his process.
I think what I saw in you was an appreciation of his mind and the way he took the subject on in a way that allowed him to lose and win at the same time.
Yeah.
So here's Daryl.
knows Genesis you know like the bag of his hand I mean he so he starts off with Jonah and the whale and then he moves on to Joshua stopping the Sun and And then he begins to pick apart Brian about the Garden of Eden and the talking serpent and so forth.
And, you know, it becomes apparent, not just to the reader of our book, but to the thousands in that outdoor audience as they're watching this unfold, that Bryant can't justify his interpretation of those passages in the Bible.
And they turn on him, don't they?
They begin laughing at him.
And there was nothing.
Which only inflames his pain.
Nothing would pain him more, right?
If you imagine, right, somebody with great ego, someone with great confidence, maybe that when the audience would turn to a place that they would be laughing at you, that's maybe the greatest insult of all.
It would be worse than even if they just plain walked away.
As he sat out there in that heat and his, you know, and his wool suit, all of that had to make him uncomfortable.
Nothing would make it more so than to have the audience realize, oh, this genius of a man maybe isn't as genius as he says.
Yeah.
In the end, Bryant is utterly defeated and destroyed.
And then the press at the time destroyed him further.
You know, all these major newspapers, banner headlines, covering it every day.
It is the first trial that is live on radio across the nation.
People actually stop what they were doing to listen to the trial.
And here is this defeated man, this once great American statesman, and he's a broken man.
And as you and I write in the book, the crowd, instead of converging and congratulating Brian, does it to Daryl.
And Daryl looks back up on the platform in the witness stand, and there is Brian, a lone, solitary figure, you know, with no friend by his side.
I mean, it is such a dramatic moment.
If you were to make a movie, it would not be a bad opening scene.
I think that's the, again, I think that was what worked so well as the book started to come together and the decision about how to craft it, how to tell the story in a way that would draw the audience most completely and most compellingly in with us on this journey.
That was the perfect opener.
I think it was a great choice.
It really was.
Don Yeager is my guest, co-author along with me of my new book, our new book, I should say.
Sorry, I'm adopting some of Brian's arrogance.
Look, it was your idea, buddy.
It's called The Trial of the Century.
It comes out next Tuesday.
It's available now online, barnsandnoble.com, Amazon.com, or just go to my website, thegregjarrett.com slash book.
You can order it there.
Don, stick around for just a moment.
Got lots more to talk about.
You know, a moment ago, we were saying, oh, this cross-examination outdoors with thousands of people looking on.
Our listeners are probably saying, wait a minute, I thought it was in a courtroom.
We'll explain it when we come back with my co-author, Don Yeager.
I'm Greg Jarrett, filling in for Sean on the Sean Hannity Show.
Back again to the Sean Hannity Show.
I'm Greg Jarrett, filling in for Sean.
My new book, The Trial of the Century, comes out next week on Tuesday.
You can find it in bookstores nationwide, or you can order it now online.
My guest is my co-author, Don Yeager, co-author of The Trial of the Century.
And, you know, Don, part of what made it the trial of the century were the throngs of people who converged on this tiny town of Dayton, Tennessee.
And they were jammed inside this courtroom, a cavernous courtroom, by the way, on the second floor of the courthouse there in the town square in Dayton, Tennessee.
But the cross-examination of William Jennings Bryant by the legendary Clarence Darrow actually took place outdoors.
Explain that.
Well, because in many ways the case had already been decided, everybody knew where it was going.
When Darrow made this very bold decision to ask for the opportunity to put opposing counsel on the witness stand, right?
Think about the odds of that in any world today.
And knowing that he was not going to pass on William Jennings Bryant was not going to pass on that.
They also knew that it was bigger than the courtroom.
And so there happened to be on the back steps of the courthouse an opportunity to set up a stage and let more people than would normally be allowed in to witness and to say they were part of that moment.
And the judge agreed.
And so the entirety of the front of the courtroom moves down these backstairs and they make their way outside to this makeshift stage.
Leftover from 4th of July festivities.
It was already there.
Let's make use of it.
And then, you know, of course, WGN was broadcasting the trial on radio and they had to scramble to remove the microphones and rewire them and put them outdoors and so forth.
And there's this iconic picture, and we have it in the book.
There are 38 photographs that I got from the archives, and I downloaded in high resolution and scanned them.
And so they're in the book.
And there is on the stage, Clarence Darrow cross-examining William Jennings Bryant.
And it's just an amazing moment, an amazing story.
And I'm afraid we're out of time.
But Don Yeager, thank you so much for being with us today.
And thank you so much for your stellar work on the book as my co-author.
Much appreciated.
Well, you're the ultimate partner, Greg.
It's been fun to work with you.
And the idea that you would pick this as the story that we get to do together was fascinating.
Thank you very much.
You can pick up the book, The Trial of the Century, by simply going to a bookstore on Tuesday nationwide.
It'll be everywhere.
Or just go online.
Go to my website, dgregjarrett.com slash book.
You can order it right there.
We'll be right back talking with the pollster John McLaughlin in a moment.
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