After the Black Sox Scandal of 1919 had severely tarnished Major League Baseball's reputation, the National and American Leagues decided to replace its three man governing committee with a single Baseball Commissioner "of unquestionable reputation and standing in fields other than baseball" whose "mere presence would assure that public interests would first be served, and that therefore, as a natural sequence, all exisiting evils would disappear."

The Commissioner was charged to investigate any activities detrimental to the best interests of baseball and take whatever remedial, preventive or punitive action he deemed necessary. Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis was elected the first Commissioner and is most famous for his Black Sox ruling. There have been nine Commissioners to date.