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DISSATISFIED WITH DOUGLAS PARK DATES. Louisville, Ky., October 2. General Manager John Ilaehmeister, of the Douglas Park and La-tonia Jockey Clubs, in commenting on the friendly suit which was filed last Thursday in the chancery branch of the circuit court here by the Douglas Park Jockey Club against the Kentucky State Racing Commission seeking the judgment of the court as to the validity of the rule recently adopted by tho commission, requiring the Louisville and La-tohia racing associations to give purses of not less than each and the Lexington track 1916.sh00, stated: "This suit is the culmination of a long series of objections made by us to what we have uniformly claimed to be unfair treatment in the matter of assignment of racing dates. "In brief, we claim that Churchill Downs has been favored by the commission to the exclusion of Douglas Park Churchill Downs having a representative on the commission in the person of Charles F. Grainger, while Douglas Park has been compelled to contribute as much in purses with scant opportunity to earn it. We have repeatedly protested to the commission against this treatment, hut our position is clearly set forth in a written protest filed by us with the commission on April 20 last, which in part is as follows: " The Douglas Park Jockey Club acknowledges receipt of a letter from the chairman of your honorable body, advising it that certain legislation would be enacted by your commission concerning racing associations, among other things announcing that purses required by your commission to be given would be increased over those of last year. This association desires to say that while it intends at the approaching meeting to give an amount which will average for each day of the meeting not less than -per race, no purse to be less than 1916.sh00, it vigorously protests against the continued unfair action of your body in the matter of dates assigned to it. It might be, in the course of events, that one track or another should occasionally be given less or more, as the case might be, in the matter of preferable dates, but the course aimed at Douglas Park, wo say without hesitation, has been uniformly detrimental and unfair in the extreme. Wo -have no hesitation in saying that a fair construction of the act creating the commission, intended that its rules and regulations should be general and should bear equally and fairly on all tracks alike, placing all of them on a fair and equal footing. If this association is expected to give as liberally as the more favored associations, better dates must be awarded to enable it to earn the requisite money. "It so happens that two racing associations, representing more than fifty per cent of all the money invested in race plants in Kentucky, have never had a representative on this commission. This is in itself unfair as to the other represented tracks, In the matter, at least, of racing dates; in this connection, we call your attention to the fact that the Douglas Park Jockey Club was first in the field to offer stokes of the value of 0,000 added money, and it is our desire to continue this liberal policy toward horsemen and breeders, but to do so, we must have fair consideration in the matter of racing dates. "This year we requested the same dates for both Louisville tracks as were awarded last year, to wit: 12 days for the track having the opening meeting and 13 days for the track having the closing meeting, and offered to give Churchill Downs the first choice of dates; instead, Churchill Downs was given the first meeting of 13 days, with a Saturday for both opening and closing, and this club was awarded the second meeting of 13 days with. Mondays for both opening and closing. "In this suit, -which is stated to be a friendly one, it is set forth that we have, at great cost and expense, constructed a racing plant which, in a large part, is not useful for any other purpose; that it has been the unbroken custom from time immortal for racing associations throughout tlie country, to voluntarily offer to owners and breeders of thoroughbred horses purses, prizes and premiums in sulllcient amounts to Induce them to enter and contend for. and that the General Assembly of Kentucky, in recognition and continuation of tills custom, provided in the act regulating racing that the corporation or owners of horses engaged in such races, or others who are not participants in said racing, may contribute purses, prizes, premiums, or stakes to be contended for. "We have in the past offered and will continue to offer suitable purses, prizes and premiums, but we deny the authority of the Racing Commission t , J e J : to require ns to give any specified amount, and we wish to show thnt two members of the commission, I viz: Messrs. Grainger and Ilaldeman, voted against I said rule, while three members voted for it. I "We also charge that in the license issued by J the commission to racing associations, it is provided that, And they agree by accepting the license that t- the association will conform to all the rules adopted i: by the commission, and that if a license is granted to the Douglas Park Jockey Club for 1917, It will be required to agree in accepting such license to give v these purses, and we ask that the commission be enjoined from enforcing said rule and that the same be declared null and void. We also claim that the , rule is not of uniform application in that it applies J to Louisville and Latonia only, exempting the Lex-. t ington track. Signed. "JOHN IIACIIMEISTER, I "General Manager." j
