Curt flood :: essays research papers

Curt rising tide was as critical to the economic rights of ballplayers as Jackie Robinson was to breaking the color barrier. A three- quantify All-Star and seven-time winner of the funds Glove for his defensive prowess in center field, Flood add up more than .300 six times during a 15-year major league life history that began in 1956. Twelve of those seasons were spent wearing the uniform of the St. Louis Cardinals. After the 1969 season, the Cardinals move to trade Flood, then 31 years of age, to the Philadelphia Phillies, which coiffure in effect his historic challenge of baseballs infamous " coldness article." The reserve clause was that part of the standard players contract which indentured the player, one year at a time, in perpetuity to the fraternity owning his contract. Flood had no interest in moving to Philadelphia, a urban center he had always viewed as racist ("the nations north southern city"), but more importantly, he objected to being hard ened as a piece of property and to the restriction of freedom plant in the reserve clause.Flood was fully aware of the social relevancy of his rebellion against the baseball establishment. Years later, he explained, "I guess you actually have to understand who that person, who that Curt Flood was. Im a child of the sixties, Im a man of the sixties. During that period of time this country was coming apart at the seams. We were in Southeast Asia. just men were dying for America and for the Constitution. In the southern part of the join States we were marching for civil rights and Dr. King had been assassinated, and we lost the Kennedys. And to think that merely because I was a professional baseball player, I could ignore what was going on outside the walls of Busch Stadium was truly hypocrisy and now I nominate that all of those rights that these great Americans were dying for, I didnt have in my own profession."With the backing of the Players Association and with former U.S. Supreme Court arbiter Arthur Goldberg arguing on his behalf, Flood pursued the case known as Flood v. Kuhn (Commissioner Bowie Kuhn) from January 1970 to June 1972 at district, circuit, and Supreme Court levels. Although the Supreme Court finally ruled against Flood, upholding baseballs exemption from antitrust statutes, the case set the stage for the 1975 Messersmith-McNally rulings and the advent of free agency.The financial and emotional costs to Flood as a result of his unprecedented challenge of the reserve clause were enormous.