John Montgomery Ward: the Lawyer Who Took on Baseball
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Chicago-Kent College of Law Scholarly Commons @ IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law 125th Anniversary Materials 125th Anniversary 2-23-2013 John Montgomery Ward: The Lawyer Who Took On Baseball Christopher W. Schmidt Chicago-Kent College of Law, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.kentlaw.iit.edu/docs_125 Part of the Legal Commons, Legal Education Commons, and the Legal History Commons Recommended Citation Schmidt, Christopher W., "John Montgomery Ward: The Lawyer Who Took On Baseball" (2013). 125th Anniversary Materials. 8. https://scholarship.kentlaw.iit.edu/docs_125/8 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the 125th Anniversary at Scholarly Commons @ IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law. It has been accepted for inclusion in 125th Anniversary Materials by an authorized administrator of Scholarly Commons @ IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. 44 Then & Now: Stories of Law and Progress Photo of John Montgomery Ward, 1922, Bain Collection, Library of Congress. JOHN MONTGOMERY WARD: THE LAWYER WHO TOOK ON BASEBALL Christopher W. Schmidt s 1888 drew to a close, John with “few equals and no superiors,” Montgomery Ward stood and “by long odds the most popu- atop the world of profes- lar player in the profession.” These Asional baseball. The star shortstop accomplishments would eventually had just led the New York Giants earn Ward a place in the Baseball to the National League pennant, fol- Hall of Fame. lowed by a triumph over the St. Louis Ward’s skills on the ball field were Browns of the rival American Asso- only a part of what made him such a ciation in what even then went by remarkable figure. Contemporaries the inflated title of baseball’s “World and historians alike have struggled to Series.” A dominating pitcher early describe him. One adjective-happy in his career (he threw the second biographer took the saturation ap- perfect game in major league his- proach: he was a “jug-eared, willowy, tory), an arm injury forced Ward peach-fuzzed, overreaching punk” to recreate himself as an infielder, as well as “honorable, smart, and te- where he became one of the best nacious.” More admired than liked fielders and hitters of his era. He was seems to have been the consensus lauded in the press as a ballplayer view of Ward contemporaries. In a Christopher W. Schmidt 45 profession not known for intellectu- ported the New York Times. “But alism, he stood out. Although Ward the thousands of spectators who ob- left school at the age of thirteen in served Miss Dauvray’s emotions lit- order to pursue his baseball career, tle suspected that one of the Giants he eventually earned, in his spare had any precedence over the others time, degrees in political science and so far as her affections were con- law from Columbia. He was said to cerned.” She had donated the Tiffany speak five languages. A regular con- trophy that went to the World Series tributor to newspapers and periodi- champion; it was the “Dauvray Cup” cals, in 1888 he published Baseball: that her husband brought home at How to Become a Player, which he the end of the 1888 season. In How described as a “handbook of the to Become a Player, the ever gallant game, a picture of the play as seen by Ward included a chapter explaining a player.” the basics of the game “for the ben- Ward was also a pioneering labor efit of those ladies whose escorts ei- leader. In 1885, he established Amer- ther cannot, or will not, answer their ica’s first sports union, the Broth- questions.” He also offered advice for erhood of Professional Base Ball his gentleman readers: “Whoever Players. Initially designed to help has not experienced the pleasure of sick, injured, or hard-up ballplayers taking a young lady to her first game and promote professional standards, of ball should seize the first opportu- the Brotherhood quickly evolved nity to do so.” into something approaching a craft Life was not all three-hit games union for ballplayers. Ward had for- and celebrity life for the great Mon- ward-looking attitudes on race as te Ward, however. His relationship well. At a time when the color line with Helen Dauvray was strained was hardening in American society, almost from the start. He was carry- and organized baseball had become ing on an affair, and she knew it; she a whites-only affair, Ward urged the wanted to return to the stage, and he Giants to sign an African-American didn’t want her to. They lived togeth- pitcher. er for only a year and soon divorced. If all this wasn’t enough, Ward’s His baseball career too was about social life was also noteworthy. In to veer off in some unexpected direc- 1887 he married a New York actress tions. Following his World Series tri- and socialite, Helen Dauvray, who umph, Ward captained a team of Na- also happened to be a passionate tional League all-stars that traveled baseball fan. “Her tiny hands beat around the globe between October each other rapturously at every vic- 1888 and April 1889 in an effort to tory of the Giants and her dark eyes promote the game overseas. It was a were bedewed at every defeat,” re- grand gesture, fitting for an emerg- 46 Then & Now: Stories of Law and Progress tional League in addition to a bur- geoning sporting goods empire. The game never had a more effective and more passionate salesman. Baseball, he once wrote, captured the nation because “it is the exponent of Amer- ican Courage, Confidence, Combat- iveness; American Dash, Discipline, Determination; American Energy, Eagerness, Enthusiasm; American Pluck, Persistency, Performance; American Spirit, Sagacity, Success; American Vim, Vigor, Virility.” (Spalding also basically created base- ball’s all-American birth myth, which conveniently featured a future Civil War hero, Abner Doubleday, in 1839 dreaming up the game in bucolic Cooperstown, New York. In fact, baseball had largely evolved from various children’s games; if it ever had a proper birth moment, it was among young professionals in 1840s ing era of American nationalism New York City.) Spalding envisioned and confidence on the international the world tour as an opportunity to scene. But the world tour also helped sell two things he loved above all: set in motion one of the most signif- the game of baseball and the equip- icant upheavals in baseball’s history. ment that bore his name. Despite his The man who organized and led the background as a player, and despite tour around the globe was Albert his overwrought romanticism about Goodwill Spalding. Soon after they the national pastime, Spalding ap- returned home, he and Ward would proached his role as a team owner face off in an epic struggle for the fu- from the perspective of the captain ture of the game. of industry that he had become: the Spalding, a star pitcher in his players were employees, and com- younger years, now owned the Chi- fortably paid ones at that; and it was cago White Stockings of the Na- the owner’s job to control costs and John M. Ward, New York Giants baseball card por- ensure a compliant workforce. Need- trait, 1887, Library of Congress. Facing: Photo of Albert Goodwill Spalding, 1910, Bain Collection, less to say, he didn’t think much of Library of Congress. Ward’s efforts with the Brotherhood. Christopher W. Schmidt 47 he world tour had just reached TCairo, Egypt, in February 1889 when the players received news that, at their winter meetings in New York, the National League owners had adopted a major reform de- signed to reign in player salaries. They created a player classification system under which “Class A” play- ers earned $2,500, “Class B” players $2,250, and so on, down to “Class E” players who earned $1,500. The clas- sifications scheme took into account not only player ability, but also “con- duct, both on and off the field.” Ward, who had already estab- lished himself as his generation’s most outspoken critic of baseball’s sential to ensuring the stability of distinctive labor practices, saw the the game. It did indeed further this plan as an affront to the players. goal. But there was another reason, What made working as a profes- one they didn’t trumpet so proud- sional ballplayer different from any ly: it kept down player salaries. And other occupation was the “reserve here too it was effective. In the late clause,” a provision in player con- 1880s, as club profits tripled, player tracts under which an owner could salaries grew by only 30 percent, a “reserve” a number of players when fact at least partly attributable to the the term of their contracts ended. reserve system. The clause prohibited the player In 1887, Ward had a scathing at- from negotiating with another team tack on the reserve clause, titled “Is unless his team released him. As the Base-Ball Player a Chattel?” He professional baseball was controlled compared the reserve clause to “a fu- by an agreement between the teams gitive-slave law”: it “denies [the play- under which each team agreed to er] a harbor or a livelihood, and car- respect the player contracts of oth- ries him back, bound and shackled, er teams, the reserved player faced to the club from which he attempted three options: sign a new contract to escape.” The remedy, according to at the terms dictated by the owner; Ward, was simple: get rid of “base- hold out and hope for better terms; ball law” and allow “the business of or stop playing baseball.