All-White Clubs Give Ambitious South Carolina City an Image Problem

“The future has arrived,” declares a rich baritone voice, recognizable from Coca-Cola ads. A shot of a bronzed executive swinging a golf club is spliced between scenes of contented workers and happy schoolchildren. Music swells as the 10-minute video promotion for Columbia urges business people to come enjoy “the good life all year ‘round.”

It did not quite turn out that way for Charles W. Savage II when International Business Machines Corp. sent him back to his native state as its top corporate representative.

Savage, who is black, quickly discovered that the exclusive clubs where business tends to be conducted in Columbia did not want him as a member. The private golf course around the corner from his home was socially out of bounds. His son complained of mistreatment on school buses; his daughter was not invited to parties for neighbors’ children. Disillusioned, he eventually asked IBM for a transfer.

Case Made Headlines

Although it has been two years since his family packed and left, the Savage case made front-page headlines here for a month this spring. Savage had no desire to publicize his travails, known only to a handful of business associates. But at a time when Columbia is promoting itself as “the Sun Belt’s emerging city” in a $2.2-million advertising campaign, his story has become a stark illustration of the battle lines between the Old South and the new.

Reacting to his case, the Greater Columbia Chamber of Commerce has begun boycotting private clubs that do not admit blacks. The state’s Republican governor, Carroll A. Campbell Jr., has said he favors disallowing expense claims incurred by officials at clubs that discriminate. And The Columbia Record has published details about other prominent community members, including the Jewish commanding general of an Army training camp, who have had difficulty penetrating the charmed world of wood-paneled clubrooms, lush lawns and private tennis courts.

“You find segregated clubs and segregated communities everywhere, not just in South Carolina,” said Theo Mitchell, a black state senator who has proposed revoking the liquor licenses of clubs that discriminate. “I hope that what we have started here will catch on like wildfire throughout the United States.”

Jack Bass, a local historian and newspaper columnist, described Columbia’s private clubs as part of an inner bastion of a gradually crumbling system of racial segregation. The outer defenses were abandoned in the 1960s with integration of schools, public transport and restaurants. Today, with cities competing for investment, demands are growing for an end to subtler, more intimate forms of racism.

‘White Support’

“There’s a lot of white support for opening up these positions,” Bass said. “What’s interesting is that the business community here is confronting the issue openly and taking the lead.”

According to an opinion poll organized by the Greater Columbia Chamber of Commerce, 67% of business people in the city favor opening private-club membership to minority groups. Black leaders note that these are precisely the people who, as club members, have maintained the barriers of racial exclusivity.

The Summit Club occupies the 20th floor of the Bankers’ Trust tower, providing its 1,200 members, all white, with a commanding view of Columbia’s changing skyline. As they sip their martinis, members gaze out at the neoclassical state Capitol, topped by the Stars and Stripes and the Confederate flag. A few blocks away, on the other side of the club, is the First Baptist Church, meeting place of the early secessionists.

Columbia’s small-town atmosphere and the constant reminders of history help explain why allegations of discrimination at private clubs have become such a sensitive issue here. The Summit and Palmetto clubs are just around the corner from the offices of most of the people who count in Columbia--and the most convenient places to invite business clients for lunch. Neither club has a black member.

State Bar President

“I was president of all the lawyers in South Carolina and still could not get membership of the Palmetto Club,” said I.S. (Leevy) Johnson, the first black president of the state bar association and one of several prominent Columbia citizens who are launching a new, non-discriminatory club known as the Capital.

But club officials see segregation as a non-issue. There is nothing in the bylaws of any Columbia club that prevents admitting minorities.

“The purpose of a private club is to promote a congenial atmosphere among its members. . . . As far as I know, we have never had a black person apply here,” said Cameron Todd, president of the Summit Club and senior vice president of Merrill Lynch & Co.

Frank S. Smith Jr., president of the Palmetto Club, Columbia’s oldest, draws a distinction between “discrimination” and “exclusivity.” “No private club should practice discrimination on the grounds of race,” he insisted. But he added that private clubs do have the right to “select new members who are compatible with the existing members.”

Must Be Sponsored

The mechanics of joining a club like the Palmetto or Summit are somewhat mysterious. Officially, neither club accepts applications. Prospective members must be sponsored by three members. Their names are then forwarded to a membership committee, whose membership is a closely guarded club secret. One opposing vote is sufficient to exclude someone.

In practice, the process is usually more subtle, according to people working to change the system. Many prominent blacks feel uncomfortable about applying to all-white clubs. Savage told The Columbia Record that his applications for club memberships were not openly rejected, they were simply not answered. Like other blacks who have been barred, he is reluctant to talk about the experience and has refused subsequent requests for interviews.

Besides the Savage case, The Record has cited the case of Alex English, a black basketball star honored by the city but denied membership in the Wildewood Country Club near his home. The Army confirmed reports that Maj. Gen. Robert B. Solomon, who is Jewish, had not been extended honorary membership in the Forest Lake Country Club, as is customary for commanders of Ft. Jackson.

“The ironic fact is that, if these clubs opened their doors tomorrow, there would not be a whole lot of black people wanting to join,” Johnson said. “If we want to sit down next to white folks, we can do that at a McDonald’s or a Hardee’s. The only reason black folks are insulted is that they do not want to feel they are barred from some place just because of their race.”

Investments Exhorted

Jack S. Hupp, president of the Seibels, Bruce Insurance Group, slips a cassette into the tape deck of his car as he drives home from work. The Cadillac throbs to the sound of a soul singer exhorting big companies to invest in a place that is “riding high on a star, growing fast, going far.”

“Here’s little Columbia, S.C. Just as we launch our We’re Growing Proud campaign, they raise this club issue, which exists in every town in America,” said Hupp, who moved here from San Francisco a year ago and now devotes much of his free time to boosting Columbia’s image.

Many Columbia businessmen are irritated, even bewildered, by the sudden storm of controversy over club membership policies. But they concede that the city’s efforts to promote itself as a “fun place to live where all individuals are accepted” could suffer unless the problem is resolved.

“The timing couldn’t have been better,” said T.R. (Tim) McConnell, South Carolina’s first black chartered accountant, who directs the Chamber of Commerce’s community relations program. “Part of a successful image campaign is showing the country that we are successfully dealing with our problems. It’s as simple as that.”

‘Facts to Brag About’

The We’re Growing Proud campaign is part of a major effort to transform Columbia, which was burned down by Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman’s victorious Union army during the Civil War, from a sleepy Southern town into a city of the future. Business leaders have adopted a development program entitled Visions 2001, cab drivers and hotel bellhops have been issued index cards with “facts to brag about” and full-page advertisements appear in glossy magazines.

“The last time we tried anything like this was in 1911. The slogan then was It’s All Here, which has got some of us wondering exactly what was in Columbia in 1911. Not a lot,” said Rebecca Hill, communications director for the Chamber of Commerce.

Concern about the Savage case has been fueled by rumors, published in the local press, that IBM has decided against building a manufacturing plant here until discriminatory practices are abolished. Company officials insist that they have not decided whether to develop a 1,500-acre site purchased years ago as a possible investment along a future “high-tech corridor.”

According to Claude M. Scarborough, Chamber of Commerce president, there is no evidence that companies are rethinking investment decisions because of the club controversy. But he added, “As long as there is any possibility of this posing a problem, we want to make sure that it doesn’t.” He predicted that the downtown business clubs like the Summit and the Palmetto will accept their first black members in the next few months. There are half a dozen such clubs in the suburbs.

Color of Money

“Any time you get down to pocketbook issues, it’s interesting how the color of the skin suddenly stops making a difference,” remarked Johnson, the black lawyer. “At that level, the only color that makes a difference is green.”

But while economic self-interest was clearly a major factor in persuading Columbia business leaders to speak out on the club issue, historian Bass said he believes there are other issues at stake.

“There is a strong sense of history in this state, a fear of disruption that goes back to a memory of Ft. Sumter (site of the first battle in the Civil War) and the consequences. A lot of people want to get the race issue behind them,” he said.