When Branch Rickey integrated major league baseball in 1947 by hiring the great Jackie Robinson to play first base for the Brooklyn Dodgers, he did not do so because he was forced into it by any “civil rights” law.  The federal civil rights laws at that point were almost twenty years into the future.  Nor was he motivated by a sudden enlightenment on the issue of race.  As the president and general manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers, Rickey was paid to make the Dodgers as profitable as possible.  In order to do that, he had to recruit and develop the … Continue reading How the Free Market Ends Discrimination