WI: TR banned American "Gridiron" Football

Early Gridiron Football was a brutal sport. John L. Sullivan, the last heavyweight bareknuckle London Prize Rules boxing champion, once said of it "Football. There's murder in that game. Prizefighting doesn't compare in roughness or danger with football. In the ring, at least you know what you're doing. You know what your opponent is trying to do. He's right there in front of you. There only one of him. But in football--there 11 guys trying to do you in!"

In 1905, after a season that saw 18 college players killed and more than 150 seriously injured, Pressident Theodore Roosevelt demanded that game's rules be changed or he would ban it.

(Source for above history: http://wesclark.com/rrr/yank_fb.html )

So, what would US culture, especially sporting culture, look like if he'd simply outlawed football?
 
Baseball remains The American Sport?

Atlanta Braves outfielder and homerun king Victor Mick busted in underground "Gridiron" circuit? :p
 
Assuming the ban isn't overturned sharpish, I'd imagine an increase in the popularity of soccer in the States - if the United States national soccer team does well at the 1930 or 1934 world cups, soccer could end up becoming the national sport... and maybe England losing 1-0 against the United States in 1950 won't come as quite such a big shock.
 
Colleges obviously wouldn't have football teams (or the piles of cash that they provide). So college tuition would probably be much higher that it currently is, and fewer Americans would be able to afford a good college education.
 
Colleges obviously wouldn't have football teams (or the piles of cash that they provide). So college tuition would probably be much higher that it currently is, and fewer Americans would be able to afford a good college education.

I imagine some other sport would fill that void for college sports. Possibly soccer, baseball, or basketball.
 
Most of the extra cash generated by football, basketball and hockey get ploughed back into the sports that do not generate cash flows.
 
As much as we like to think otherwise, TR was still just a president, not a king. Any attempt to make the government ban something as trivial as a sport would probably die in Congress, and if it did pass would probably never really be enforced or followed by the people. Soccer and baseball would see a bit of a rise, but at the end of the day this really is just prohibition but with a sport...might even make football more dangerous and popular than it is now
 
In the '90s, mixed martial arts was banned in most states, with John McCain famously referring to it as "human cockfighting." Now, following several rule changes, it's one of the fastest-growing sports in the country. Similarly, banning gridiron football would probably just delay its rise, as rule changes would eventually be implemented, allowing it to become legal again.

However, there's also the chance that the ban would provide an opening for another sport, like soccer, rugby, or some version thereof, to become popular instead of gridiron football. By the time gridiron becomes legal again, time may have passed it by.
 
TR would get impeached by any university educated member of congress.

In 1905?

What percentage of Americans went to universities in this period?

No, if congress doesn't like this rule it doesn't draft it--there is no reason that this kind of really mind-bogglingly defective Impeachment attempt would ever be made.

Really that simple.
 

J.D.Ward

Donor
In the longer term, does an attempt to ban football in the U.S.A. produce an ATL in which Prohibition never happens?

The President is remembered as "Killjoy Roosevelt". An annoyed Congress might even pass a Sixteenth Amendment to the Constitution:

"No act of the Federal Legislature, whether of the President or the Congress, shall in any way diminish the usual amusements of the American People"

The anti-Prohibition party would have an additional case:

"The prohibition of good liquor is as repugnant to the good sense of the American people as Killjoy Roosevelt's attempt to ban football. The use of such good liquor is one of the usual amusements of the American People and is therefore safeguarded by the Sixteenth Amendment to the Constitution."
 
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