Background

Argued April 19, 1922; decided May 29, 1922. No. 204. Justice Holmes wrote for a unanimous Court. The case arose from the collapse of the Federal League: the Baltimore Terrapins (the plaintiff) refused to be bought out and sued, alleging that the established leagues conspired to destroy the Federal League. The opinion's reasoning that the interstate travel of players was 'a mere incident' to the local exhibition of baseball games is the doctrinal foundation of baseball's antitrust exemption, which has been characterized in subsequent SCOTUS decisions (Toolson, Flood) as 'an anomaly' and 'an aberration' but never overturned. Congress only partially addressed the exemption in 1998 via the Curt Flood Act, which removed the exemption only as applied to major-league players' labor relations.

Key provisions

• Holding (1): The business of providing public baseball games for profit, although necessarily involving the constantly repeated traveling of players from one State to another under the control of the employing organizations, 'is not interstate commerce' (259 U.S. at 208).
• Holding (2): An action for treble damages under the Anti-Trust Acts could not be maintained by a baseball club against baseball leagues and their constituent clubs for an alleged conspiracy to monopolize the baseball business (259 U.S. at 209).
• Holmes's reasoning: 'The business is giving exhibitions of base ball, which are purely state affairs.' The interstate transport of players is 'a mere incident, not the essential thing' (citing Hooper v. California, 155 U.S. 648, 655).
• 'Personal effort, not related to production, is not a subject of commerce.' (259 U.S. at 209.) — adopting the defendants' framing.
• Affirmed the D.C. Court of Appeals' reversal of the trial court's $80,000 verdict (trebled) for the Federal League's Baltimore club; judgment for defendants.

Notable provisions

The business is giving exhibitions of base ball, which are purely state affairs.— 259 U.S. 200, 208

That to which it is incident, the exhibition, although made for money would not be called trade or commerce in the commonly accepted use of those words. As it is put by the defendants, personal effort, not related to production, is not a subject of commerce.— 259 U.S. 200, 209

To repeat the illustrations given by the Court below, a firm of lawyers sending out a member to argue a case, or the Chautauqua lecture bureau sending out lecturers, does not engage in such commerce because the lawyer or lecturer goes to another State.— 259 U.S. 200, 209

If we are right the plaintiff's business is to be described in the same way and the restrictions by contract that prevented the plaintiff from getting players to break their bargains and the other conduct charged against the defendants were not an interference with commerce among the States.— 259 U.S. 200, 209

Further context

Federal Baseball Club of Baltimore, Inc. v. National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, et al.

The foundational case in baseball's federal antitrust exemption. A unanimous Supreme Court, in an opinion by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, held that the business of professional baseball was not "interstate commerce" within the meaning of the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 (26 Stat. 209) and the Clayton Act of 1914 (38 Stat. 730), and that the Baltimore Terrapins of the defunct Federal League therefore could not maintain a treble-damages action against the National and American Leagues and their constituent clubs for the alleged conspiracy that destroyed the Federal League.

Procedural posture

The Federal Baseball Club of Baltimore (the Federal League team that refused to be bought out when the Federal League dissolved in 1915) sued in the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia, alleging a conspiracy by the National League, American League, and the National Commission to monopolize professional baseball in violation of the Sherman and Clayton Acts. The plaintiff obtained a jury verdict of $80,000, trebled by statute to $240,000. The D.C. Court of Appeals reversed, holding that the defendants were not within the Sherman Act. The plaintiff appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The opinion

Holmes's opinion is short — barely two pages of substantive analysis. The core move is to characterize the playing of baseball games as a local, intrastate "exhibition" and the interstate travel of players as "a mere incident, not the essential thing." Drawing on Hooper v. California, 155 U.S. 648 (1894), Holmes concluded that the exhibitions themselves were not commerce in any commonly accepted sense; the interstate movement of teams to make exhibitions possible did not convert the underlying activity into interstate commerce.

The opinion adopts (and quotes) the defendants' framing that "personal effort, not related to production, is not a subject of commerce." The illustrations Holmes offers — a law firm sending a member to argue out of state, a lecture bureau sending speakers across state lines — recur in subsequent commerce-clause cases.

Doctrinal significance

This case created what is commonly called "baseball's antitrust exemption." The exemption has survived a century of repeated Supreme Court review:

• Toolson v. New York Yankees, 346 U.S. 356 (1953): per curiam reaffirmance on stare decisis grounds, leaving the exemption intact.
• Flood v. Kuhn, 407 U.S. 258 (1972): 5–3 reaffirmance, characterizing the exemption as "an anomaly" and "an aberration" but again declining to overturn on stare decisis grounds and inviting Congress to act.
• Curt Flood Act of 1998 (Pub. L. 105-297): Congress responded by removing the exemption only as applied to major-league players' labor relations, leaving the broader exemption (franchise relocation, minor-league labor, amateur draft, broadcasting) intact.

The exemption remains uniquely baseball's. No other professional sport in the United States enjoys equivalent treatment under federal antitrust law.

Related documents in the archive

• 1953-11-09_caselaw_toolson-v-new-york-yankees.md — first reaffirmance.
• 1972-06-19_caselaw_flood-v-kuhn.md — second reaffirmance.
• 1998-10-27_legislation_curt-flood-act-of-1998.md — partial Congressional response.

Research notes

The case is sometimes cited as "Federal Club v. National League" in the U.S. Reports (the running header), but the formal caption is "Federal Baseball Club of Baltimore, Inc. v. National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, et al." Both forms appear in scholarship.

The plaintiff is also sometimes called the "Baltimore Terrapins" — that was the franchise's playing nickname during the Federal League's two seasons (1914–15). The "Federal Baseball Club of Baltimore, Inc." is the legal entity.

Related documents

Cited by

Flood v. Kuhn

Related documents

Toolson v. New York Yankees, Flood v. Kuhn, Curt Flood Act of 1998

Source provenance

• Primary source
• Wayback Machine archive
• Library of Congress (U.S. Reports catalog record)
• FindLaw (Thomson Reuters)