[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 59 (Friday, April 11, 2003)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5339-S5340]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             HOOTIE JOHNSON

 Mr. HOLLINGS. Madam President, I have known Hootie Johnson for 
the past 50 years and yes, there is no one more well thought of, more 
popular, more respected in South Carolina.
  A star football hero in college, he came on as a natural leader in 
the banking business. He is one with this so-called vision, leading the 
way to integration, opportunity and, yes, as head of Augusta National 
having women play the course. I have read extreme nonsense from every 
angle critical of Hootie and withheld public comment because I knew 
coming from the State it would lack a certain amount of credibility. 
Now, Sally Jenkins in this morning's Washington Post has responded for 
me in her column ``Hootie and the Blowhard''. I ask that it be printed 
in the Record.
  The article follows:
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

               [From the Washington Post, Apr. 11, 2003]

                         Burk Is Way Off Course

                           (By Sally Jenkins)

       Augusta, GA.--Dorein Vanderzahm poked her umbrella into the 
     red clay Georgia field and announced, definitively, ``Fire 
     ants.'' If you stooped down and examined the dirt, there they 
     were, swarming over the crabgrass acre where Martha Burk will 
     hold her protest against Augusta National, ready to blister 
     ankles. ``I think they may come as an additional surprise to 
     her,'' Vanderzahm said. Burk is liable to be surprised by 
     many things here, given her reliance on old southern 
     caricatures, the redneck sheriff with the star-shaped badge, 
     the mush-mouthed Bubba, and the southern magnolia who swings 
     her umbrella soft as a hanging fern. That's why Burk's 
     campaign against Augusta National's all-male membership has 
     been greeted with fire-ant hostility by many here, and why 
     even the women of Augusta find it ultimately weak, and wrong: 
     because it's based on stereotype and mischaracterization.
       If you're a white male of a certain age and luckless enough 
     to speak with a twang, then apparently you must be a tobacco-
     spitting good old boy, no matter what your actual record. For 
     months now, Burk has done her best to make Hootie Johnson, 
     the honey-voiced president of Augusta National, out to be a 
     sexist hick or worse. What's more, some of the media has 
     shamelessly perpetuated the image, most notably the New York 
     Times, which has relentlessly excoriated him while until 
     recently giving Johnson's notable career as a civil rights 
     activist and women's advocate short shrift.
       The truth about Johnson, a banker from South Carolina, is 
     that he's a longtime progressive who has fought long and hard 
     to integrate South Carolina's schools, banks, businesses and 
     politics, and launched the careers of scores of women and 
     minorities. He has also fought to remove the Confederate flag 
     from the statehouse. He is nobody's chauvinist, or bigot, or 
     good old boy. And yet when a Ku Klux Klan crank applied for a 
     permit to protest at Augusta, Burk actually said, and got 
     away with it, ``Augusta National should not be shocked by the 
     KKK's endorsement. They have behaved in a manner that 
     attracts this type of support.''
       This smearing of southern white men has eroded any 
     inclination to listen to Burk around here, and it's a kind of 
     discourse that would be considered universally despicable if 
     it was turned on women or minorities. People have been taking 
     roundhouse swings at privileged white men for a long time; 
     that's nothing new. But Burk is not just fire-breathing; she 
     is inaccurate. Burk seems not to have done any homework on 
     who Hootie is, what he has done or what The Masters

[[Page S5340]]

     is--she actually suggested they move the tournament to a 
     different course. She is so wrong about so many things it's 
     tough to take her seriously on anything about which she might 
     be right.
       The fact is that Johnson defies category, and for that 
     matter so does Dorein Vanderzahm. Vanderzahm doesn't agree 
     with Burk--``not a bit,'' she said.
       Vanderzahm was born and raised in Augusta--she knows about 
     the fire ants because she used to cut through the field--and 
     it would be convenient for Burk if Vanderzahm was a 
     downtrodden southern housewife or a mindless belle, but she's 
     not. She's a physician, who disagrees with Burk on principle, 
     and because she finds the whole campaign silly. ``I think she 
     has an overblown sense of importance,'' Vanderzahm says.
       Burk also has portrayed local law enforcement as heavies, a 
     bunch of Bull Connors doing the bidding of rich men, because 
     they won't allow her to protest in front of the main entrance 
     to the club. They cite safety and traffic reasons--reasons 
     perfectly legitimate to anyone who has ever tried to 
     negotiate the choked intersection. Deputy sheriff Johnny 
     Whittle sat in his black-and-white squad car, parked under an 
     old tree in the field of crabgrass where Burk will protest. 
     He will be in charge of keeping the peace at Burk's protest. 
     A heavy badge was pinned on his uniform pocket, and his shirt 
     collar was buttoned tight, above which loomed a face that was 
     more John Wayne than John Wayne's. ``Oh, we're used to it,'' 
     he said. ``We've been stereotyped our whole lives. Everybody 
     says watch out for the Georgia police, but we try to get out 
     of locking people up.''
       Whittle expects nine groups of protestors to show up 
     Saturday, including the Burk flotilla, the Rainbow/PUSH 
     Coalition, the New Black Panther Party, a hilarious anti-
     Burkist faction called People Against Stupid Protests, and 
     the lone self-described KKK member, whom Whittle simply 
     refers to as ``that person, for lack of a better word.'' 
     Whittle adds, ``None of us agree with him, but we have to 
     protect him.'' Not that Whittle agrees with Burk, either.
       ``They don't let me in that club,'' Whittle said. ``Are 
     they discriminating against me, too? To be honest, I don't 
     want to go in there and set down where they smoke those 
     stinking cigars. It just seems like there's a lot of better 
     things to be done in the cause for women.''
       Burk filed suit complaining that by being relegated to the 
     field, she will miss her audience. She lost the suit. 
     Actually, the field is centrally located across the street 
     from the course; anyone going to the tournament, or for that 
     matter making a run to Eckerd, can't miss it. Thursday, even 
     before she arrived and on a day when play was cancelled, 
     people rolled down car windows as they passed the field, and 
     shouted, ``Say no to Martha!'' Kiosks sold ``I Support 
     Hootie'' buttons, as well as golf balls that said, ``Drive 
     Burk Out'' and T-shirts that said ``The Burk Stops Here.'' 
     What Burk should worry about is not whether the audience will 
     miss her, but whether she has lost her audience 
     altogether.

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