The Cultural Judgments About Hank Aaron and Barry Bonds — A Model for Holding Trump to Account?
National Catholic Register, 30 January 2021
Bonds wasn’t sanctioned for his use of performance-enhancing drugs but he can’t get into baseball’s Hall of Fame despite his accomplishments, and it’s Aaron who was celebrated as the sport’s home run king when he died last week.
How to hold a president to account after he has left office? Perhaps Major League Baseball might offer a model, as it deals with miscreant players after their days on the diamond are over.
The impeachment trial of President Donald Trump will take place in about 10 days’ time. Conviction in the Senate after impeachment in the House of Representatives means immediate removal from office and a potential prohibition for holding office in the future. Given that Trump is no longer in office, does it makes sense to proceed?
That debate is being had. Perhaps Trump himself would like to answer the charges and be acquitted by the Senate. Or maybe he thinks it pointless. After all, no longer president, he has no immunity from whatever criminal charges might arise from the Jan. 6 events at the Capitol.
Then there are those think that the historical record demands a trial, even if Trump is acquitted. And of course there are those who desire a conviction and the “sentence” of prohibition from holding future office.
Finally, there are those who think that there should be a sort of reckoning, but fear that a Senate trial might only inflame, rather than reduce, the partisan passions that are dividing the country.
So what is to be done? That’s where baseball offers a lesson. Last week Hank Aaron died, most famous for breaking Babe Ruth’s career home run record in 1974. He hit his 715th home run that April, and finished his career with 755. In 2007, Barry Bonds passed Aaron’s record, finishing his career with 762 home runs.
Yet if you saw the news coverage of Aaron’s death, you may well have thought that he was still the all-time home run record holder. Barry Bonds, if he was mentioned at all, was passed over quickly.
Then this week the annual voting for the Baseball Hall of Fame was announced. Bonds did not get elected for the ninth straight year. Next year will be his last on the ballot.
The electors — baseball sportswriters — are expressing their view that Bonds disgraced the game by using performance-enhancing drugs and subsequently lying about it. His achievements are real — the record books prove that — but they are not considered authentic. Bonds’ position in baseball history is secure; he is one of the best to ever play. But he will not enjoy baseball’s honors.
It’s not a criminal conviction. It’s not even a suspension, as might be the case if he was still playing. Rather it is a cultural judgment, an expression of collective reprobation.
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