Follow @RoyalsBlue_com Won by One:  How April 8, 1969 Changed the Game of Baseball by Tavish Whiting How It Began:  A Brief History of the 1969 Baseball Expansion One could argue that the 1969 Baseball Expansion began on December 19, 1960 when Charles O. Finley purchased a controlling interest in the Kansas City Athletics from the estate of the late-owner Arnold Johnson.  Despite assuring the Kansas City fans that he would keep the team in Kansas City, Finley immediately started looking for a new home in which to make more money. He considered several venues such as Dallas-Fort Worth, Milwaukee, New Orleans, San Diego, and Louisville.  In 1964, he asked the American League owners permission to move the team to Louisville, Kentucky, which was voted down 9 to 1. Several weeks later, Finley requested to move the team to Oakland, California which was again voted down 9 to 1. By the end of the 1967 season, the American League owners voted to allow Finley to move the Athletics baseball team to Oakland.  Upon learning of the team’s move, Missouri Senator Stuart Symington became enraged. Symington had been a businessman in St. Louis before entering into politics.  He was first elected in 1952 and had won reelection twice since. He was a very powerful member of the Senate Armed Services Committee and the Foreign Relations Committee.  In 1959, he decided to run for President, but lost the Democratic nomination to future-President John F. Kennedy. Symington threatened to revoke the antitrust exemption that baseball enjoyed thanks to the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890.  This landmark law allowed the federal government the power to protect competition in the marketplace. This law, however, was brought before the United States Supreme Court in 1922 by the sole surviving team of the defunk Federal League.  The Federal League, which was started in 1913 as an alternative to the American and National Leagues, boasted eight teams throughout the United States. However, the teams of the Federal League argued that the American and National Leagues were interfering in their operations.  After the 1914 season, the owners of the Federal League brought an antitrust lawsuit against both the American and National Leagues under the Sherman Antitrust Act. The case was brought in front of Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis, District Judge of the Federal District Court of Northern Illinois.   Judge Landis was a big baseball fan.  On days he was supposed to be in the courthouse, Landis was known to slip away to watch games of the Chicago Cubs or White Sox.  Landis was quite worried that the ruling would ruin what he called a “national institution.” Landis decided to “sit” on the case for the entire 1915 season with no ruling.  By the end of the season, the Federal League reached a settlement with the American and National Leagues as the Federal League was disbanded. Landis would go on to be the first Commission of Baseball in 1920. The owner of the Baltimore Terrapins had different plans.  Two of the eight owners of Federal League teams were allowed to buy major league teams as part of the settlement.  The other six teams were offered a buyout settlement. Of the six remaining teams, only the the Baltimore club refused.  They brought an antitrust lawsuit against the National and American Leagues in the Federal District Court of the District of Columbia.  The Baltimore team won $80,000 in a ruling in federal court that the major leagues violated provisions of the Sherman Antitrust Act. This amount was then tripled to $240,000 due to a more recent antitrust law called the Clayton Act, passed in 1914.  The National and American Leagues...