Laurence M. Vance: Does the First Amendment protect the feedom of asociation?

  The Augusta National Golf Club — where the Masters golf tournament has been played since 1933 — is in the news again, and not because Tiger Woods failed to earn a fifth green jacket.

  The exclusive club has come under fire again because of its male-only membership policy. And although the club has traditionally extended membership to the CEOs of its corporate sponsors, one of its major sponsors — International Business Machines (IBM) — has a new female CEO, Virginia Rometty, who has not been asked to join. The past four CEOs of IBM have all been Augusta members.

  "It’s just an embarrassment that it’s still all-male," said Debora Spar, president of Barnard College in New York — an all-women’s college. Seeming oblivious to the irony, she added, "Any argument that can be made anymore for male-only recreational sites is just kind of past its day."