Happy Chandler - Commissioner of Baseball

Commissioner of Baseball

Following the death of Baseball Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis in November 1944, John O. Gottlieb, a friend of Chandler's in the War Department, suggested Chandler as a successor. Baseball owners who had been afraid that their players would be made eligible for the draft during the war had decided that their new commissioner needed to have the skills and influence to represent baseball's interests in Washington, D. C. As a senator, Chandler had advocated on behalf of baseball during the war, endearing him to the owners. Furthermore, the commissioner's $50,000 annual salary—about five times that of a US senator at the time—proved a significant enticement, and Chandler agreed to be considered for the job.

Other candidates being considered for the position included National League president Ford Frick, Democratic National Committee chairman Robert E. Hannegan, former Postmaster General James Farley, US Senator John W. Bricker, FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, former federal judge Fred M. Vinson, Ohio Governor Frank Lausche, and Undersecretary of War Robert P. Patterson. After Cincinnati Reds owner Warren Giles and Chicago Cubs owner Philip K. Wrigley raised strong opposition to Frick, formerly the front runner, New York Yankees co-owner Larry MacPhail began to advocate for Chandler. When the owners met in Cleveland, Ohio on April 24, 1945 to vote for a new commissioner, Chandler's name was not on the short list; the candidates were Frick, Farley, Hannegan, Vinson, Lausche, and Patterson. None of the candidates received the required two-thirds majority, and after lobbying by MacPhail and New York Giants owner Horace Stoneham, the owners took an informal vote to see if anyone had the potential to be elected. Chandler's name appeared in the top three on each of the sixteen ballots. Encouraged, the owners then held another formal vote. After two ballots, Chandler received the necessary majority; a third vote was taken to make the choice unanimous.

Chandler remained in the Senate for several months after his election as commissioner because he wanted to cast his vote on the Bretton Woods Monetary Agreement and the Charter of the United Nations. He received only his Senate salary until his resignation on November 1, 1945, despite claims to the contrary by the press. Nevertheless, his delay in assuming the commissioner's job upset many team owners, as did his late arrival to Game 3 of the 1945 World Series, which rendered him unavailable to rule on whether the weather was clement enough to begin the game. Many owners believed Chandler had been attending a political meeting; the actual cause of his delay was his attendance at a Detroit Athletic Club luncheon, where he was representing Major League Baseball.

Chandler's election was also met with disdain from much of the press in the Eastern United States, where most of baseball's teams resided at that time. His southern drawl and willingness to sing "My Old Kentucky Home" with very little encouragement led some sportswriters to opine that he was too undignified for the office. Others resented his folksy, political style, calling him "a preening politician", "the Kentucky windbag", and "a hand-shaking baby-kissing practitioner of the arts". Chandler further alienated the press by moving the commissioner's office to Cincinnati from Chicago in 1946.

In early 1946, Jorge Pasquel and his four brothers, owners of the Mexican baseball league, siphoned campaign funds from the upcoming Mexican presidential election and used them to offer large salaries and signing bonuses to American baseball players. In some cases, the offers were triple the salaries being paid in the Major Leagues. Chandler deterred players from considering Mexican League offers by imposing a five-year ban from Major League Baseball to anyone who played in the Mexican League and did not return by April 1, 1946. In all, eighteen players played for the Mexican league despite the ban, including Mickey Owen, Max Lanier, and Sal Maglie. Vern Stephens initially agreed to play in Mexico as well, but returned before Chandler's April 1 deadline. Ted Williams, Stan Musial, and Phil Rizzuto were also offered lucrative contracts and incentives, but all eventually declined to play in Mexico.

Shortly after the Mexican league incident, Robert Murphy, a former negotiator for the National Labor Relations Board, attempted to organize the Pittsburgh Pirates into a guild for purposes of collective bargaining. Murphy decried the reserve clause in player contracts that gave team owners unlimited control over the player's services, and demanded more rights for players, including the right of contract and the right of salary arbitration. Chandler worked with Pirates officials to avoid a threatened strike by the players. Part of Chandler's intervention included organizing a team of replacement players as a contingency plan; the team would have included Honus Wagner, who was 72 years old at the time.

The defections to the Mexican league and the threat of a strike by the Pirates prompted owners to form an advisory committee, chaired by Larry MacPhail, to suggest needed changes that would calm the discontent among the players. On August 27, 1946, the committee presented a draft a document outlining the changes. Language in the original draft admitted that baseball was operating as a monopoly and that racial bias was the sole reason for segregation in baseball. Baseball's attorney's stripped this controversial language from the version eventually adopted by the owners.