Protesters Won’t Be Given the Gate

It’s Masters week, which means it’s time to ... protest?

If all the people who have announced plans to demonstrate for or against Augusta National Golf Club’s membership policy actually show up, chances are that the streets around this northeastern Georgia town are going to be even more crowded than usual during tournament week.

No one knows for sure how any demonstrations will affect the tournament or the players, but Davis Love III gave an indication of how he’s going to react.

“I’m going to keep my head down,” Love said.

“I’m honored to be playing in the Masters. I’m honored to be going to a place that’s done so much for golf, where men and women work and men and women play golf and men and women enjoy watching the Masters. I’m going to play golf and I’m not going to do anything else.

“I’ll talk to anybody to tell you how good I’m playing or how I feel and let that be that. It’s going to take a lot of determination and a lot of two words [reporters] hate the most -- ‘no comment’ -- to get through the week.”

Tiger Woods shows up trying to become the first player to win three consecutive Masters, but his drive for history has not gathered nearly as much attention as the dispute between Martha Burk, chair of the National Council of Women’s Organizations, and Hootie Johnson, chairman of Augusta National.

“All this controversy, it just sickens me,” said Billy Casper, 71, the 1970 champion. “The Masters really was the epitome of all that was good in golf and now ... well, let’s just say it’s going to be a very interesting week.”

The issue is simple, the solution unattainable, at least so far. There are no women members in the club. Burk wants that to change now and Johnson says if it does change, it’s up to the club to decide when.

A number of groups plan demonstrations during the week, with Burk’s scheduled for Saturday during the third round of the tournament. Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow/PUSH coalition and a splinter group from the Ku Klux Klan also are expected to show up and take their places among what is expected to be a crowd of 600 demonstrators.

A spokesman for Augusta National said the club will have no comments on events outside the front gates. However, the club’s media consultant, Jim McCarthy, will be stationed outside the gates and make himself available for information purposes.

Because of the controversy and, possibly, a still-sagging economy, corporate attendance -- or company entertaining at the tournament -- is expected to be off by as much as 40%.

The story line is familiar by now. It began last June when Burk sent a letter to Johnson, urging Augusta National Golf Club to admit a woman as a member before the next Masters tournament. Johnson responded a month later with a strongly worded denial of Burk’s demand.

With that, the controversy was off and running. When Burk hinted she would pressure Masters sponsors, Johnson said the tournament telecast would carry no advertising so the sponsors wouldn’t be put in the middle of the conflict.

Burk asked CBS to drop the telecast and for the PGA Tour to take a stand on Augusta National. While CBS brushed off Burk’s request, Commissioner Tim Finchem of the PGA Tour said the tour has no contract with Augusta National because it is not co-sponsoring the Masters and thus will not alter its relationship with the club or the tournament.

The New York Times, in an editorial, called for Woods to drop out of the Masters. He said he won’t. In November, LPGA Commissioner Ty Votaw urged Augusta National to admit a woman member, and two weeks later, Thomas Wyman, former chief executive of CBS, resigned his Augusta membership and called Johnson a “hardhead.”

Sheriff Ronnie Strength of Augusta-Richmond County has asked Augusta National to set aside five acres of club-owned property about a third of a mile from the front gates for the demonstrations.

Last month, Janice Mathis, a vice president of Jackson’s group, said its protest would probably be scaled back because of the war in Iraq.

“There is some feeling that we would have a more muted position,” she said.

In this dispute, the fact that anything could be muted is news indeed.