This revolutionary effort, made by one of the promoters of the revolt of
1890, aided by two dismissed managers and a disgruntled star player
itching for notoriety at any cost, led the magnates of the National
League to adopt repressive measures calculated to put an end to any
future revolutionary efforts of the kind, by severely punishing any
League club manager or player who should prove recreant in fealty to the
laws of the National Agreement, or who should join in any attempt to
organize any base ball association opposed to the reserve rule, which
rule over ten years' experience had proved to be the fundamental law and
corner-stone of the professional base ball business. Without such a
repressive law it was evident that the League would be subject to
periodical attempts on the part of unscrupulous managers or players to
war upon the reserve rule for blackmail purposes. The necessity for some
such law was made evident by the recent efforts made to organize a new
American Association on the basis of not only warring upon the reserve
rule but of trespassing on the territorial rights of existing League
clubs.



#The League Manifesto of 1894.#

The finale to the annual meeting of 1894 was the issuing of a manifesto
by the National League, which was called forth by an effort at treachery
in the League ranks which required prompt action for its
repression. This manifesto was issued without regard to efforts to
organize a new American Association, any opposition of the kind to the
National Agreement clubs, with the major League at its head, being
looked upon as futile, owing to the character of the men alleged to be
at the head of the movement; the main incentive of the League magnates