April 1968: The Phillies Respond to MLK Assassination

Given their respective histories, it may be surprising that the Philadelphia Phillies got on the right side of baseball's racial history in a controversy with the Los Angeles Dodgers over the assassination of Martin Luther King. Dr. King was assassinated on April 4, 1968. His funeral and interment were set for Tuesday, April 9. All major sports, including basketball, hockey, horse racing, soccer, and golf announced they were rescheduling activities in deference to the funeral of the civil rights leader.

The Phillies were scheduled to play their season opener in Los Angeles against the Dodgers that evening. Alone among Major League baseball teams. the Dodgers announced they would go ahead and play. 

The Phillies brass, including President Robert R. M. Carpenter and General Manager John Quinn, said they would refuse to play and risk forfeiting the game. As the home team, the Dodgers had the right to insist the game be played, and with no word from baseball's league office, it appeared that the Phillies might have to forfeit.

On Sunday morning, April 7, Quinn told the press, "We have already informed the Dodgers we will not play Tuesday night. Mr. Carpenter and I discussed it. The players had nothing to do with it. We are not going to play Tuesday. The decision is irrevocable."

Reached at a Dodgers exhibition game in San Diego on Sunday April 7 (the only major professional sports event that had not been cancelled that day), Dodgers General Manager Buzzy Bavasi said, "It is unfortunate that a premature announcement has been made, because as far as the Dodgers are concerned the game will be played on Tuesday." 

Quinn shot back, "The Dodgers have the right as the home team to have the game played, but we have decided not to participate. If we do not field a team..., then the league president [Warren Giles] could forfeit the game to the Dodgers. We have made our decision and it is entirely up to the Dodgers whether or not they want to play the game."

Bavasi told the Philadelphia Inquirer, "I have talked with Willie Davis and coach Jim Gilliam (the Dodgers two African American team members). They said as long as the game would not be played before Dr. King's interment, there was no sense in canceling it."

African American players on the Phillies, Bill White, Grant Jackson, Dick Allen, John Briggs, and rookie Larry Hisle, applauded the team's decision. The veteran White acted as their spokesperson. "Mr. Carpenter showed me a lot," White said. [Dodger President] O'Malley showed me nothing. It angers me that the team that pioneered the advent of the Negro into baseball would take such a stand. Here you have an owner like O'Malley who wants to count dollars and a sportsman like Carpenter who wants to do the right thing. It's an affront to the 150-160 Negroes who play in the National League."

White wasn't finished. "I suppose that Giles and the O'Malleys have their side, but if I was a Dodger, I would not play this ball game. I would tell them where they could put their uniforms."

Finally on Monday, April 8, the Dodgers relented and agreed to postpone the game. The two teams would make up the game on April 16, meaning that both teams would lose a scheduled off day for travel to Philadelphia.

When the season finally did begin one day late on April 10, the Phillies added insult to injury by beating the Dodgers, 2-0. Chris Short pitched the four-hit shutout, besting Claude Osteen. Rookies Larry Hisle and Don Money were the hitting stars. 

As a footnote, I would point out that in 1968, Bill White said there were "150-160" African Americans in the National Leage alone. Today there are approximately 68 in all of Major League Baseball.