Golf: Augusta National in sexism row

WASHINGTON - It may be professional golf's close season right now - but not at Augusta National. The club which vies with St Andrews to be the spiritual home of the sport is engulfed in a uniquely American controversy over its refusal to admit women members.

And if Augusta's crusty old chairman William 'Hootie' Johnson has his way, that's not going to change anytime soon.

This classic case of irresistible force versus immoveable object offers a perfect mix of ingredients: political correctness, the battle of the sexes and that other ancient struggle between a 'progressive' liberal north-east and a prickly conservative South, which hates nothing more than outsiders who tell it what to do.

Finally, there is the small matter of the Augusta Masters, arguably the most famous, and certainly the most beautiful golf tournament in the world, played in the second week of April each year.

But if the current impasse continues, the hallmark of the 2003 Masters may not be mint juleps, gorgeous dogwoods and azaleas and the winner's traditional green jacket - but a vulgar old picket line.

The trouble started earlier this year when Martha Burk, head of the six million-member National Council of Women's organisations, decided enough was enough: Augusta's refusal of female members was symbol of glass ceilings, unequal opportunities and "all the reasons women are running second in America."

She took her campaign to the airwaves, and began to lobby Augusta's 300 members for change.

Hootie was unmoved. One day perhaps, women might be allowed to join, "but not at the point of a bayonet."

And he has taken extraordinary measures to prevent them.

Thus far the saga demonstrates nothing so much as the power of the Augusta National.

Commercial sponsors are normally the financial lifeblood of American sport.

But to avoid being pressured by the Masters' sponsors (who include CocaCola), he has simply dropped them.

Nor is CBS, the network which has covered the Masters since 1956, going to dig in its heels - and risk losing rights to the event that is the jewel in its sports broadcasting crown.

Augusta even insists on the right to veto commentators, as the unfortunate Gary McCord found in 1994 when the club banned him for saying on-air that the course's lightning fast greens looked as if they had been "smoothed with bikini wax."

Ms Burk has had very limited success in her lobbying of Augusta's 300 existing members, among them dozens of America's top CEOs, as well as William Farish, the current US ambassador in London.

A few, including Sandy Weill of Citigroup, have come out in favour of admitting women. But most, in keeping with Augusta's iron rules, are staying mum.

Last week the northern liberals wheeled out the mighty gun of an editorial in the New York Times.

Yes, a private club had the legal right to choose its own, said the Times. But it urged Mr Weill to resign in protest at this "brazen discrimination," and called on Tiger Woods to shun the event next year.

Now that would be something - a boycott by the reigning and three-times masters champion, whose absence would utterly devalue the tournament.

But that will not happen either; the green jacket's lure is too strong.

An unhappy Woods (himself a mere honorary member) declared that "there was not much he could do about it." Polls, too, show that a majority of the public favours Augusta over the ladies.

The real winner however is the couch potato golf fan. To minimise the potential for financial pressure, Mr Johnson has ordered that the 2003 Masters be televised without commercials.

This invites a broadcasting feat as peculiar as the row itself: a potential ratings-topping program that will lose money.

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