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Original Document
"The Brotherhood Manifesto"

TO THE PUBLIC:

At last the Brotherhood of Ball Players feels at liberty to make known its intentions and to defend itself against the aspersions and misrepresentations which for weeks it has been forced to suffer in silence. It is no longer a secret that the players of the League have determined to play next season under different management, but for reasons which will, we think, be understood, it was deemed advisable to make no announcement of this intention until the close of the present season; but now that the struggles for the different pennants are over, and the terms of our contracts expired, there is no longer reason for withholding it.

In taking this step we feel that we owe it to the public and to ourselves to explain briefly some of the reasons by which we have been moved. There was a time when the League stood for integrity and fair dealing; to-day it stands for dollars and cents. Once it looked to the elevation of the game and an honest exhibition of the sport; to-day its eyes are upon the turnstile. Men have come into the business for no other motive than to exploit it for every dollar in sight. Measures originally intended for the good of the game have been perverted into instruments of wrong. The reserve rule and the provisions of the national agreement gave the managers unlimited power, and they have not hesitated to use this in the most arbitrary and mercenary way.

Players have been bought, sold and exchanged as though they were sheep instead of American citizens. "Reservation" became with them another name for proprietary right in the player. By a combination among themselves, stronger than the strongest trust, they were able to enforce the most arbitrary measures, and the player had either to submit or get out of the profession in which he had spent years in attaining proficiency. Even the disbandment and retirement of a club did not free the players from the octopus clutch, for they were then peddled around to the highest bidder.

That the players sometimes profited by the sale has nothing to do with the case, but only proves the injustice of his previous restraint. Two years ago we met the League and attempted to remedy some of these evils, but, through what has been called League "diplomacy," we completely failed. Unwilling longer to submit to such treatment, we made a strong effort last spring to reach an understanding with the League. To our application for a hearing they replied, "that the matter was not of sufficient importance to warrant a meeting," and suggested that it be put off until fall. Our committee replied that the players felt that the League had broken faith with them; that while the results might be of little importance to the managers, they were of great importance to the players; that if the League would not concede what was fair we would adopt other measures to protect ourselves; that if postponed until fall we would be separated and at the mercy of the League, and that, as the only course left us required time and labor to develop, we must therefore insist upon an immediate conference.

Then, upon their final refusal to meet us, we began organizing for ourselves and are in shape to go ahead next year under new management and new auspices. We believe it is possible to conduct our national game upon lines which will not infringe upon individual or natural rights. We ask to be judged solely upon our work, and believing that the game can be played more fairly and its business conducted more intelligently under a plan which excludes everything arbitrary and un-American, we look forward with confidence to the support of the public and the future of the national game.

NAT. BROTHERHOOD OF BALL PLAYERS


Elwood Roff, Base Ball and Base Ball Players (Chicago, 1912), pp. 86-87
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