You might have assumed the cameras were from ESPN, not C-SPAN, as the famous former baseball manager testified at the U.S. Senate hearing last week.
“Not only have I lived every schoolboy’s dream,” said Tommy Lasorda, now general manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers, “but I’ve also been present during a number of historic moments that have brought the country together in a way that few other events can.”
Hmm. Perhaps the 1976 Bicentennial celebration? The Challenger explosion? Pearl Harbor? The assassination of President John Kennedy?
“Like during the 1977 World Series, Reggie Jackson hit four towering home runs on four consecutive (at-bats) to lead the enemy Yankees past my Dodgers for the world championship.”
OK.
“And on September the 28th, 1988, Dodger great Orel Hershiser would need 10 scoreless innings to top the record for consecutive scoreless innings set by Don Drysdale in 1968. Locked in a scoreless pitchers dual with the San Diego Padres, sports fans from around the country tuned in to watch Hershiser break this longstanding record.”
All right, that might have galvanized citizens in Johnstown, Pa., and Ames, Iowa.
There was more, he recounted, such as a pinch hit home run an injured Dodger, Kirk Gibson, hit in the bottom of the ninth inning in the 1988 World Series against the Oakland A’s.
Yes, historic moments that brought us all together. Just like the American flag, right?
Which brings us to Lasorda’s real reason for playing out of position at a typically orchestrated hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee headed by Orrin Hatch (R-Utah).
Hatch is trying to get two-thirds of the Senate to pass a constitutional amendment against flag burning (actually, against flag “desecration,” which makes it muddier) and then get approval from three-fourths of the states.
He thus seeks a specific exception to the 1st Amendment and to overturn a 1989 U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down an anti-flag desecration law. By 5-4, the court said the law violated the 1st Amendment, with an unusual liberal-conservative majority including President Reagan’s two appointees, Antonin Scalia and Anthony Kennedy.
And savvy fellow that he is, Hatch was turning to one of the capital’s most moth-eaten tactics, namely beckoning a celebrity face for a public policy issue that might not otherwise attract more than the National Law Journal and Congressional Quarterly.
In this case, Hatch sought two B-list luminaries, Lasorda and actor John Schneider, star of the “Dukes of Hazzard,” a show so unlamented and long gone that yuppie aides encircling the senators did not have a clue who he was.
And now, Chicago Cubs fans, prepare for Lasorda’s neatly crafted segue, as they’d call it back in Tinseltown, to the issue at hand. After noting that the flag “means something very, very special to me,” he cited cases of desecration and asked the assembled to “contrast these occurrences with one of the most heroic acts ever to take place on a field during a major-league baseball game.”
Now, are you really ready, Cubs fans? Let me hear you . . . a one, a two, a three. . . .
“And I remember this on April the 25th, 1976, we played the Chicago Cubs at Dodger Stadium, and I was witness to a flag burning. In the middle of the fourth inning, as the fielders were warming up, two protesters ran onto the field, the men quickly ran past left fielder Jose Cardenal and stopped in left center field.
“One of the men stooped to his knees, unscrewed a cap to a can of lighter fluid and soaked the American flag with it. We all watched dumbstruck as the man pulled out a match and tried to light the American flag to burn it.
“To the astonishment of the protesters, the fans and those on the field, All-Star outfielder Rick Monday ran to the protesters, grabbed the burning flag and ran towards the dugout.
“As I screamed at the protesters from the third base coaching box, the fans immediately got on their feet to recognize Monday’s heroic act, and without any prompting that I can remember, the whole crowd stood and began to fill the stadium with an impromptu rendition of `God Bless America.’ “
One can, of course, stipulate that Cubby Monday deserved kudos but question the relevance of repeating the tale. After all, this push for an amendment seems a solution to a non-existent problem. Even amendment advocates offer few examples of flag desecration. A generous accounting lists just four this year. Those include a May 14 incident during New York’s Puerto Rican parade in which Puerto Rican and American flags were set aflame during a protest of an episode of “Seinfeld” at NBC headquarters.
The most recent example given me by supporters came May 21 in Somers, Conn., and is described like this: “Several flags were taken down, ripped, tied in knots and stuffed in toilets at the town’s park on Field Road. Town officials believe in the shadow of darkness some local kids destroyed the flags.”
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Still, the appearances of Lasorda and Schneider (who has recorded “I Love Old Glory,” a song written by, yes, Hatch) provide insights into an effort that is far from superficial or slapdash. Indeed, it’s a window onto bigtime Washington lobbying.
It’s the handiwork of a well-orchestrated effort known in the trade as “fertilizing the roots.” With adroit assistance of the public relations firm of Burson-Marsteller and several million dollars, the American Legion, the biggest veterans group, built a coalition of business and civic groups to push an idea that wasn’t on the radar screen of conquering Republicans after they took over Congress in 1994.
The coalition is the Citizens Flag Alliance. Burson-Marsteller helped craft many pieces to run on newspaper op-ed pages; marshaled sympathizers to call radio talk shows; persuaded the politicians to sponsor a bill; used satellites to send interviews with those congressional supporters back to television stations in their home districts and states; compiled huge computer databases to quickly galvanize its backers; and took polls in districts of on-the-fence legislators.
Those polls showed public support. Those polls moved some politicians off the fence. In the process, the coalition caused consternation for those politicians who never had much stomach for the whole idea. Indeed, the proposal failed to get the needed two-thirds majority in the House and Senate in 1990. But now it has passed the House and has at least 61 votes in the Senate. As for the states, 49 are on record supporting the idea.
Marty Conatser, an American Legion official in Illinois who heads the statewide effort, has spent at least 17 hours on talk radio of late. His colleagues have focused on smaller towns, making sure to respond to letters to newspaper editors from skeptics. They’ve made sure that the flag itself is displayed more often. “We’ve found that even negative press helps us by giving us a forum to respond. Public support in Illinois for this is strong.”
Then there are letters to the state’s U.S. senators, especially Democrat Carol Moseley-Braun (600 since Memorial Day, says her office). And Conatser makes sure that anytime a Moseley-Braun campaign solicitation comes their way, “members make clear that this one issue will determine whether they will give to the campaign.”
Moseley-Braun is against the amendment, as is Sen. Dick Durbin, who attended the Lasorda testimony. Durbin underscored his pride in the flag, nevertheless, and how he is moved when hearing the national anthem, as he had the previous week at Wrigley Field.
As for Lasorda, his analysis of the 1989 court decision, which he clearly was spoon-fed, was less portentous than his dramatic “final word for Sen. Durbin” before splitting. “If you don’t pull for the Dodgers, senator, there’s a good chance you may not get into heaven.”