More on Hagan and the club
For those interested in Kay Hagan's Country Club membership, Politico reports:
The husband of North Carolina Democratic Senate hopeful Kay Hagan is a lifelong member of an exclusive country club that didn’t admit its first black member until 1995, Hagan’s campaign disclosed Tuesday.Charles “Chip” Hagan III, a businessman and former Democratic county leader, “supported opening up membership” at the 1,000-member Greensboro Country Club -- but remained a member for years despite his opposition to the club’s de facto segregation policy, Hagan spokeswoman Colleen Flanagan told Politico.
Kay Hagan, who is counting on strong support among North Carolina’s black Democrats to unseat Republican incumbent Elizabeth Dole, has never been a member of the club herself, Flanagan added.
“Chip supported broadening the membership to include African Americans and others,” she said. “Though it took longer than it should have, Greensboro County Club fully desegregated in 1995 and remains so today.”
Hagan, a state senator and niece of former Florida Sen. Lawton Chiles, leads Dole by one to three points in a race that is one of the most bitterly fought in the country.
The vast majority of black leaders in the North Carolina back Hagan, who pushed through a $1.5 million state grant for an international civil rights museum in the state senate and recently voted for a bill banning cross burning and the display of nooses.
Click here for their full post.
Update: Hagan's spokeswoman sent along the following, which has been reported in other stories:
"This is textbook Washington desperation. For Elizabeth Dole to be launching these kinds of attacks to cover up her own record of using and defending racially tinged tactics last election cycle as the chair of the National Republican Senatorial Committee is despicable. And just months ago, Dole chose not to condemn the racist ad run against Democrats in this year’s gubernatorial primary, saying "I'm just not going to get into refereeing a third party political ad that has nothing to do with my race." Those attacks have no place in this campaign, which should be about moving the country forward, not backward. Chip supported broadening the membership to include African Americans and others. Though it took longer than it should have, Greensboro County Club fully desegregated in 1995 and remains so today."
Update: After the jump, a story from the time about the integration of GSO Country Club.
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AREA COUNTRY CLUB MAY ADMIT FIRST BLACK - GREENSBORO COUNTRY CLUB
Greensboro News & Record - Thursday, April 6, 1995
Author/Byline: JACK SCISM Staff Writer
Edition: ALL
Section: GENERAL NEWS
Page: A1
Greensboro Country Club may join other clubs in admitting African-Americans.
Greensboro's country clubs quietly are shedding their all-white images.
Three of the city's five clubs now have black members and a fourth - Greensboro Country Club , the oldest and most exclusive of the clubs - may be about to admit its first African-American.
Robert J. Brown, once an aide to President Nixon and now the owner of a nationally known public relations and marketing research firm in High Point, is being sponsored for membership in Greensboro Country Club by several of the city's most prominent businessmen. Greensboro has gotten favorable national notice over the years because its clubs, including the 85-year-old Greensboro Country Club , have had Jewish members from the day they were opened.
But only in recent years have they quietly begun to admit black families as members.
Both Sedgefield and Starmount Forest have had black members for at least two years.
Forest Oaks became the first club to accept African-Americans in 1990 - a move allowing it to keep the Greater Greensboro Open golf tournament. The Professional Golfers Association, which sanctions the GGO, requires host clubs to show evidence they do not discriminate racially.
If Greensboro Country Club accepts Brown as expected, only the Cardinal Country Club in northwest Greensboro will not have black members. Officials there said the club has a nondiscriminatory admission policy but never has had an application from an African-American.
The other clubs have only a few black members - Forest Oaks has four, Starmount two, Sedgefield one - but the number may increase now that each has admitted its first black member.
The exact status of Brown's membership application at Greensboro Country Club could not be immediately determined Wednesday because of that club's strict policy of not commenting on any membership matters publicly.
Two of his sponsors, textile executive William J. Armfield and car dealer F. David Brown, referred questions to club president Tom Duncan, who cited the club policy in declining to comment.
Brown, reached at his office in High Point, also declined to comment.
Other members, however, privately reported that Brown's name was included in a recent membership bulletin listing prospective new members.
According to one member, the appearance of an applicant's name in the bulletin usually means the applicant has been approved by the membership committee and needs only final approval by the board of directors.
"I'd say it's cut and dried," said the member.
The membership ranks of the club include many of Greensboro's wealthiest and most influential business leaders.
The club is located on Sunset Drive in the heart of Irving Park, the city's most affluent residential area.
Since leaving the White House where he was a special assistant to Nixon from 1969 to 1973, Brown's B&C Associates firm has brought him into contact with executives of many large corporations seeking advice on dealing with minority relations issues.
He is a director of two major North Carolina businesses, First Union Corp. and Duke Power Co., and also of Sonoco Products, a Hartsville, S.C., packaging products company.
An active Republican, Brown was elected to the University of North Carolina Board of Governors earlier this year by a
Republican-controlled State House of Representatives.
He also has served on the Piedmont Triad Airport Authority.
Brown, now 60, founded B&C Associates in 1960. He joined the Nixon White House staff after working in Nixon's 1968 campaign.
Elsewhere in the Piedmont Triad, High Point (the former Emerywood) Country Club does not yet have any black members but Forsyth Country Club in Winston-Salem does.
Comments (4)
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"For Elizabeth Dole to be launching these kinds of attacks..."
Mark, do you have any idea to what they are referring?
Posted on October 22, 2008 2:58 PM
I really find it hard to believe that it wasn't until 1995 that GCC had its first black member. That was 15 years after the dust-up at Shoal Creek CC in Birmingham! Surely one of our locals would have made sure GCC was integrated before 1995. Is there more to this story than is coming out? How many blacks were turned down before 1995, or did no one even propose a black member.
Posted on October 22, 2008 3:22 PM
Roch: There are two answer to that one.
First, the campaign playbook says if you're being hit from a third party, link it back to your opponent anyway. A story has less impact if voters think it's coming from the person you're running against rather than an independent source.
Second, in this case, I can safely say that someone connected to the Dole campaign (I can't say connected how, but just connected) has been shopping this story for a couple weeks now. I guess something similar hit about Erskin Bowles in the 2002 race and that did Dole some good back them.
Were I to guess, once a publication's whose logo looks good askew and in black-and-white bites on this story, Dole will use it in a campaign ad with a "so-and-so reports Hagan belonged to a club with a bunch of ..."
Posted on October 22, 2008 3:26 PM
Preston: Some of your questions might be answered by the story I just attached to the post from 1995.
My understanding is that the club's story was that no African American approached the club seeking membership until 1995. I've also been told by reporters who were around at the time that if it was true no one approached, it was because it was clear their efforts would be for naught.
As to whether we're going to write anything on it, I don't have a story in the works and the feeling of our editors is that it's kind of a non-story. It may make our weekly political column on Monday. That, of course, is always subject to change.
Posted on October 22, 2008 3:53 PM