By David L. Bristow, Nebraska State Historical Society
It was illegal to play baseball on Sunday until 1913. It was one of Nebraska’s so-called “blue laws” restricting Sunday activities.
Nebraska City ignored the law until a local group called the Law & Order League pressured the sheriff in 1902. But when the sheriff tried to stop a game, “an angry crowd surrounded him and hustled him violently,” in the words of the Nebraska City Daily Tribune. “His revolver was taken away from him.”
Nevertheless, the sheriff arrested four players and took them to the courthouse to post bond. “A number of the city pastors were at the justice’s office and when they left, friends of the players threatened and jostled them,” and one man was hit with a thrown rock.
Baseball was unquestionably America’s sport. It was also an intensely local sport. The major leagues existed, but without TV or even radio, the only way to enjoy a game was to attend in person. Many Nebraska towns had minor league or semi-pro teams, and even relatively small towns recruited out-of-state players.
But passion for baseball ran up against an older tradition of keeping the Sabbath. A state statute prohibited not only baseball, but any “sporting” on Sunday, including hunting and fishing.
Various Nebraska teams were arrested at one time or another, but some cities did not enforce the law. In 1902, the Lincoln Evening Journal noted that “Omaha is the principle one, but there everything is wide open on that day.” (“Everything,” meaning bars, brothels and gambling halls — Omaha had a reputation.) The Journal complained that the “inability to play Sunday baseball has kept Lincoln out of any league for some years,” because teams struggled to remain solvent without the big crowds a game could draw on Sunday.
Back in Nebraska City, the sheriff eventually ticketed the entire team, but a local judge threw out the case. The Otoe County Attorney appealed all the way to the Nebraska Supreme Court, which upheld the law and cited the Bible’s fourth commandment in doing so.
After that, Sunday baseball became as much of a hot-button issue as the death penalty or votes for women. In 1913, the Nebraska legislature changed the law to allow counties and towns to make their own decisions. Baseball bans and other Sunday laws began to go away as Nebraskans let their neighbors decide for themselves how to spend their day of rest.
Visit NSHS’s website at history.nebraska.gov.