NATION IN BRIEF : NEW YORK : Judge Says Parade May Bar Gay Group

A judge ruled that organizers of New York’s St. Patrick’s Day parade discriminated against an Irish gay group by refusing them marching status but had a constitutional right to do so. Rosemarie Maldonado, an administrative law judge for the New York Human Rights Commission, said in an advisory ruling that the Ancient Order of Hibernians discriminated last year by putting the gay group on a phony waiting list, knowing the group would never be advanced up the list. But she said the constitutional guarantees to freedom of religion, speech and assembly gave the Hibernians the right to exclude homosexual marchers. After the ruling, members of the Irish Lesbian and Gay Organization called for a boycott of this year’s parade on Tuesday.