WASHINGTON -- Those old enough to have witnessed even an aging "Shoeless Joe" Jackson play baseball still marvel at a man with one of the sweetest strokes the game has ever seen.
Part of it, they say, was the size of his hands. They were so large that they seemed to envelop "Black Betsy," the slightly curved, stained hickory bat that he swung so fluidly and had lovingly mounted on a wall of his South Carolina home after he retired.
But for all his baseball acumen, Jackson would probably have had a hard time grasping that the debate over his banishment from the game would continue, with Congress playing a role, 85 years after he was among eight Chicago White Sox players banned in 1920 for allegedly conspiring to fix the 1919 World Series.
With the White Sox back in the World Series beginning tonight - they haven't won one since Jackson hit .304 to lead them to the 1917 title - the debate is as vigorous as it has been in years. Baseball is about nothing if not timing, and Jackson's backers have seized on his old club's ascent to make the case, again, that he wasn't part of the conspiracy and that, even if he took tainted money, he paid his dues.
Yesterday, Sens. Jim DeMint and Tom Harkin introduced a resolution, expected to be considered on the floor next week, expressing the "sense of the Senate" that Jackson, who died almost 54 years ago, "should be appropriately honored for his outstanding baseball accomplishments."
Said DeMint, a South Carolina Republican: "Every time I talk to [Commissioner] Bud Selig, I remind him about this. [Jackson] never got a hearing from baseball. Regardless of what they do to Pete Rose or in steroids cases, Shoeless Joe didn't even get two strikes."
Baseball doesn't seem to be swinging at pitches on Jackson's behalf, saying only that his case is under review - as it has been for at least six years.
The "Black Sox" episode remains the biggest scandal in baseball history. Two years after winning the title, owner Charles Comiskey had a powerhouse in 1919 despite underpaying some key players. Comiskey once promised a bonus if the club won the pennant. "When they did win, the bonus turned out to be a case of cheap champagne," said a Chicago Historical Society account.
"Comiskey even charged his players for laundering their uniforms," the society said.
