In the end, what you have to ask is not whether Al Campanis was a victim, but whether he was the only victim.
If he didn’t deserve to see 19 years as Dodgers general manager and more than four decades in the organization come to an end over his grotesquely expressed remarks regarding African Americans on the April 6, 1987, ABC broadcast of Nightline, was his fate any worse than that of the nameless people deprived of career advancement in baseball because of the attitudes seeping through Campanis’ inconsistent but telling comments? Even the most sympathetic interpretation of Campanis’ use of the word “necessities,” an interpretation that focuses on his contention that “you have to pay your dues,” was disingenuous, as littered as baseball is with white managers who did no such thing. Black men were not getting past the gate, and Campanis could express no fault with the gatekeepers.
And so if all Campanis was doing was channeling the prevailing attitudes of his time and his upbringing, does that make his forced departure unjust? There are undoubtedly those who got 19 fewer years as general manager than he did and who are less remembered, less celebrated, and less fulfilled than they might otherwise have been.
“I was shocked,” baseball legend Henry Aaron said in response to Campanis’ remarks, “and I think Mr. Campanis needs to apologize to every single black person in America for making comments like that.”
Campanis did. “My statements have been construed as indicating a belief that blacks lack the ability to hold such positions,” he said the next day. “I hold no such beliefs. However, I, and only I, am responsible for my statements. Therefore, I apologize to the American people, and particularly to all black Americans, for my statements and for my inability under the circumstances to express accurately my beliefs.... In my work and in my personal life, I have never distinguished a person by reason of his color, but only by reason of his abilities. For this reason, I feel that this is the saddest moment of my entire career.”
Whether Campanis’ failings were of discrimination or articulation, they should be considered alongside his humanity. They do not negate the way he openly befriended and supported Jackie Robinson when the two were the double-play combination of the 1946 Montreal Royals, at a time when that kind of support was anything but automatic. They do not eliminate the positive things he did, as a teammate, scout, and GM.
“There are a lot of racists in the world, on both sides, and he wasn’t one of them,’’ said Roy Campanella’s widow Roxie to Matt McHale of the Los Angeles Daily News. “He helped Roy so much when he was coming through the minor leagues. He molded a lot of young men into men.’’
Campanis’ legacy is necessarily two-pronged; it switch-hits on both sides of morality. No aspect of Campanis should be considered in a vacuum. It’s a reminder that those of us who sit in judgment of others on any level still need to reexamine ourselves. We might or might not have Campanis’ particular flaw, but we are all flawed, and we can all do better.
Excerpt from Ted Koppel’s interview with Al Campanis
Koppel: Why is it that there are no black managers, no black general managers, no black owners?
Campanis: Well Mr. Koppel, there have been some black managers, but I really can’t answer that question directly. The only thing I can say is that you have to pay your dues when you become a manager. Generally you have to go to the minor leagues; there’s not very much pay involved. And some of the better-known black players have been able to get into other fields and make a pretty good living in that way.
Koppel: Yeah, but you know in your heart of hearts—and we’re gonna take a break for a commercial—you know that that’s a lot of baloney. [Campanis laughs.] I mean there are a lot of black players, there are a lot of great black baseball men who would dearly love to be in managerial positions, and I guess what I’m really asking you is to, you know, peel it away a little bit—just tell me why you think it is. Is there still that much prejudice in baseball today?
Campanis: No, I don’t believe it’s prejudice. I truly believe that they may not have some of the necessities to be, let’s say, a field manager or perhaps a general manager.
Koppel: Do you really believe that?
Campanis: Well, I don’t say that all of them, but they certainly are short. How many quarterbacks do you have? How many pitchers do you have that are black?...
Koppel: Yeah, but I mean, yeah, I’ve got to tell you, that that sounds like the same kind of garbage we were hearing 40 years ago about players, when they were saying, “Ah not really…”
Campanis: Well—
Koppel: “Not really cut out”—remember the days when you hit a black football player in the knees. And you know—that really sounds like garbage if you forgive me for saying so.
Campanis: No, it’s not garbage, Mr. Koppel, because I played on a college team and the center fielder was black, in the backfield at NYU with a fullback who was black. Never knew the difference whether he was black or white—we were teammates. So it just might be that they, they...why are black men or black people not good swimmers? Because they don’t have the buoyancy.
Koppel: Oh, I don’t, I don’t—It may just be they don’t have access to all the country clubs and the pools….