Oct. 22, 1964 - The transfer of the Milwaukee Braves to Atlanta was sidetracked today “out of respect” for a temporary restraining order won by the Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors.
While the Mayor of Atlanta and civic officials waited expectantly in the wings, officials of the Braves told a special meeting of National League owners in New York that they would delay their request for permission to move until they were “legally free.”
However, they said they had every intention of pursuing the transfer to Atlanta, where a new $18 million stadium and a seven‐state TV network await them in major league baseball’s first penetration into the Deep South.
The restraining order, issued by Judge Ronald Drechsler of the Wisconsin Circuit Court, was based on the county’s complaint that the transfer would be “unconscionable” and would break a contract that specified that the Braves play all their home games until the end of 1965 in County Stadium, Milwaukee.
The Braves, who must show cause Tuesday why the order should not be extended into a permanent injunction, immediately countered with the following actions:
— They filed a notice of intention with the commissioner of baseball, Ford Frick, to draft the Atlanta territory from the International League. This was necessary to help avoid yet another legal fight over jurisdictional matters with minor league teams that have played in the Atlanta area since 1901.
— They then told the three-hour meeting of all 10 National League owners that they would postpone their request to move until legally untangled. The Braves need six votes besides their own and are expected to get them.
— They immediately began to make plans to upset the restraining order in Milwaukee because, said John J. McHale, president of the club, “we still consider the transfer a great and exciting challenge.”
Both McHale and William Bartholomay, chairman of the board of the Braves, said they should be “free” soon. And Warren Giles, president of the National League, said he expected another meeting to be convened “before very long.”
Giles, openly supporting the move to Atlanta, said:
“We do not consider we are depriving an area of major league baseball with two teams 85 miles away in Chicago and another 285 miles away in Minnesota. It would mean a team in the great South — a public service.”
Bartholomay expressed the situation in these terms, “Economic considerations are always the big ones, whether you're getting married or running a baseball club.”

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