MINORITIES CLUBHOUSE RULES: NO JEWS ALLOWED?

When Dallas thinks of racism, it usually thinks in terms of black and white. Until some Nazi-skinhead groups vandalized a few local synagogues, most people didn’t think of anti-Semitism as one of the city’s problems. But it’s long been common knowledge that three old-guard country clubs-the Dallas Country Club, North-wood Club, and the Brook Hollow Golf Club-have no Jewish members. Just why this is so. in a city with so many prominent Jews, is less than clear.

At Dallas Country Club, calls for change are coming from within. Frustrated members, including developer Trammell Crow, blame a tiny minority of members for barring prospective Jewish members. Crow and others-including several former club officers-once pressed hard on behalf of a neighbor with all the right assets: he was a lifelong Christian, a native of the Park Cities, and had a family history of membership in the club. But the man’s father was Jewish, and he was rejected. Club rules do not require denials to be explained, but several of the man’s sponsors view the snub as a matter of prejudice, plain and simple.

Club reformers point out that business and civic affairs are often held at club facilities, leaving Jews with a bitter dilemma: should they visit a club that would reject them if they applied? For such reasons catalogue mogul Roger Horchow once objected to the regular scheduling of Hockaday School board meetings at Brook Hollow; the site was changed. Today, many Dallas Jews decline invitations to parties and receptions held at DCC.

Defenders of the status quo insist that Jews have their own Columbian Country Club, with its own tacit requirement of some Jewish ancestry. And besides, they say. it’s not illegal for private clubs to choose their own members. But even that may change through court or legislative action in the wake of a Supreme Court ruling on a New York business-club-bias law last year.

In a city that desegregated its public facilities with relative ease, the question is less legal than moral: why Jews, who sport some of the city’s highest profiles, oldest roots, and thickest drawls? Some at DCC attribute the habit to “cultural” remnants from the past. They insist that the majority of club members would be pleased to accept Jewish applicants whom they knew and liked.

A.K. Hilberth, genera! manager of the DCC. says there is no written or unspoken policy forbidding Jews. He says the club keeps no record of membership by faith, race, or color. Hilberth. who has been at the club for three months, adds that members “usually express” any objections they have about prospective members.

Some club members fear that anti-Semitism, even if practiced by a few. could put a blight on the city’s future. “What if we were to approach Larry Tisch [the head of CBS and Loews Corporation],” asks a DCC member of long standing, “and pitch Dallas as a good place to relocate? We’d have to tell him. ’except you can’t be in some of our clubs because a couple of our buddies don’t like to play golf with Jews.’ It sure makes you laugh at all this self-induced B.S. about being an ’international city.” We’re about as international’ as Mabank, Or maybe Waco.”