NSU Newsroom
SharkBytes
Horizons
This version of NSU News has been archived as of February 28, 2019. To search through archived articles, visit nova.edu/search. To access the new version of NSU News, visit news.nova.edu.
This version of SharkBytes has been archived as of February 28, 2019. To search through archived articles, visit nova.edu/search. To access the new version of SharkBytes, visit sharkbytes.nova.edu.
NSU Law Professor Co-Authors “Baseball and the Law” Textbook
Robert M. Jarvis, Professor at Shepard Broad College of Law
Baseball’s entire history could be told through its court cases. And now, it has been in a new textbook, “Baseball and the Law: Cases and Materials,” written by Bob Jarvis, professor, Shepard Broad College of Law, and Louis Schiff, a Broward County Court judge.
“We thought it was important for law students to know more about baseball than just box scores and statistics,” says Jarvis, a faculty member since 1987. “With this book, professors across the country have an exciting new way to teach their students the law.” Professor Jarvis will be offering “Baseball and the Law” during NSU’s Summer 2016 semester which begins May 9.
As Jarvis and Schiff point out in their book, baseball’s legal roots stretch all the way back to 1791, when Pittsfield, Massachusetts, passed an ordinance prohibiting baseball from being played within 250 feet of the local church to protect the building’s windows. Offenders were forced to pay a fine of five shillings — the equivalent of about $25 today.
Since that early connection, baseball and litigation have become two favorite American pastimes. “Like baseball, law touches every aspect of society,” according to Jarvis. “So what better way to prepare tomorrow’s lawyers than by studying baseball?”
Jarvis and Schiff are hoping that their book will lead the nation’s 205 law schools to add baseball law to their curricula. As Jarvis notes, “Since 1990, there have been roughly a dozen law schools that, at one time or another, have offered such a course. But until now, every professor had to piece together his or her own materials which is a daunting task. Our book collects everything in one place that a teacher needs to teach baseball law.”
After an introductory chapter that details the role lawyers and judges have played in baseball’s evolution, Jarvis and Schiff examine player salaries, franchise relocations, steroids, fan safety, broadcast rights, and gambling. Other key topics covered include racial and sexual discrimination, tax planning, asset protection, bankruptcy, and the expanding use of technology. The final chapter focuses on the legal issues surrounding amateur and youth baseball.
Published by Carolina Academic Press, the 1,040-page work, which took nearly three years to write, is encyclopedic in its scope. “We really tried to be exhaustive,” Jarvis says. “So students will find between the covers lawsuits as old as Mahn v. Harwood, an 1878 patent dispute, and as new as City of San Jose v. Office of the Commissioner of Baseball, a 2015 antitrust case. We also included a great deal of pop culture—everything from movies like A League of Their Own and Field of Dreams to characters like Charlie Brown and George Costanza.”
Professor Jarvis will be offering “Baseball and the Law” during NSU’s Summer 2016 semester (which begins May 9). To learn more about the book, please visit http://www.cap-press.com/books/isbn/9781611635027/Baseball-and-the-Law