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That concern was cited by Cypress Point in Pebble Beach, Calif., when the club last September withdrew its dramatic oceanside course from a P.G.A.-sanctioned pro-amateur tournament that it had been host to since 1947. Cypress Point insists that it has no ban on blacks, although it has no black members and none on the waiting list, where the delay is seven years. Vice President Dan Quayle, who belongs to Maryland's male-only Burning Tree Country Club, played at Cypress Point in December; he said later he had been assured it "does not discriminate." Members may genuinely believe it does not.
Snobbery and exclusion have long been inseparable from golf. Playing even one round requires the use of expensive equipment, access to landscaped acres of greensward and, for most people, expensive lessons in technique. A caddy is a sort of walk-along valet. At private Baltusrol, new members put up $25,000 as an initiation fee, plus a $5,250 bond and $3,900 yearly dues. In times gone by, those economic facts alone might have barred most blacks. But, just in case, the sport had overtly racist rules and practices. Blacks did not play in the elite Masters tournament in Augusta, Ga., for 41 years. The phrase "Caucasian race only" was part of the P.G.A.'s eligibility rules until 1961.
Despite this legacy, minorities now share in the game's broad popularity. On Southern California's public links, typically up to one-third of the players are black or Hispanic. At the Riviera Country Club in Los Angeles, where the initiation fee is $60,000, general manager Bill Masse says one-fifth of the 1,500 members are black, Hispanic, Asian or of Middle Eastern descent. Admission procedures are as Old Guard as at any all-white club: an applicant must be sponsored by six members who have known him or her for three years. Says Masse: "We admitted our first black member in the 1940s. We're known as nondiscriminatory."
The lack of entree at elite courses may contribute to golf's lack of astonishing black role models, a la Michael Jordan -- except, perhaps, for Jordan himself, an eager amateur who joined the Wynstone Club in suburban Chicago because it offers color-blind corporate memberships. Only four of the P.G.A.'s 240 touring pros are black -- and just 25 of the 20,000 country-club pros. The sport's one faint hope for minority recruitment is the Atlanta-based Calvin Peete National Minority Golf Foundation. Set up in 1989 to award scholarships to promising blacks discovered on public courses, it has yet to sponsor anyone. Donations total $100,000, barely enough for administrative expenses. Only $20,000 has come from pro golf and pro golfers -- and not a penny from private country clubs.
CHART: NOT AVAILABLE
CREDIT: NO CREDIT
CAPTION: CLUBS THAT MET THE NEW POLICY ...
...AND SOME THAT DIDN'T