Show ! 2A 1 Standard-Examin- er Friday June 1 1990 j Opinion 1 Ogden dances past costly legal pitfalls to regulate nudity Every once in awhile municipal government leaders are confronted with an issue to which there seems to be no logical conclusive resolution r All a mayor or councilman can do is study all the listen to the public debate swallow hard make a decision and hope the criticism he or she endures isn’t overwhelming I The Ogden City Council faced such a dilemma when the issue of “adult businesses” was dumped in its lap Councilmen were spurred to action by the announced ment that the South Sait Paradise Dance and was Studio to set preparing up shop somewhere Modeling iin Ogden with shows featuring completely nude dancers danc-er- s: One local establishment already offers semi-nud- e Ladies of Lace on Wall Avenue Because Lace sells alcoholic beverages the city has the legal leverage to impose specific requirements on costuming But Paradise would serve no alcohol so it presented a very different situation Predictably the issue caused an uproar i The immediate reaction was to look for a way to keep the nude dancing establishment out of the city Fortunately the council kept its cool Rather than attempting to draft an ordinance that would be unenforceable — and possibly unconstitutional — the council carefully studied what other communities are doing to regulate dancers who wear nothing but smiles At the same time the council decided to update its regestablishments hoping to prevent ulations on semi-nud- e problems before they could start Councilmen found that nude dancing as a form of entertainment is a somewhat new phenomenon — but not without some aspects that can be regulated The city directed Assistant City Attorney Andrea Lock-woo- d to determine how Ogden could put a leash on adult establishments yet stay within constitutional bounds The US Supreme Court has determined that nudity in a controlled environment is not obscene Lockwood noted Therefore an outright ban would be impossible : : But she also said the city can restrict the location of adult businesses to keep them from clustering in what some cities term a “combat zone” Ogden's ordinance prohibits adult businesses from locating within 1000 feet of residential zones or other sexually oriented businesses or within one city block of churches schools parks libraries the city’s two malls and historic buildings or districts They also must be at least a k from a place that serves alcoholic beverages Although those restrictions effectively prevent an adult business from locating at most sites within the city limits some residents still weren’t happy with the council for “giving in” to future adult businesses that might want to locate here Residents who spoke out at public hearings on the issue wanted the council to draw an ordinance banning nude 'dancing altogether and take its chances in court defending the law’s constitutionality Such a move would have been d and expensive An ordinance banning nude dancing would have lasted only as long as it would take to file a lawsuit challenging it The track record of adult businesses indicates that wouldn’t be long The cost of defending a faulty law would be prohibitive particularly for a city that has other pressing financial considerations No estimates were made but depending on the complexity of the ordinance and the number of appeals possible the total could run into hundreds of thousands of dollars With Utah still smarting from its costly and futile defense of the state law banning “indecency” on cable TV the council wisely avoided trying to establish any new legal precedents To press ahead in hope that the Supreme Court might adopt a far more conservative stance in this area of constitutional interpretation as suggested by some critics of the council would have been another expensive exercise in wishful thinking The Ogden City Council did the best it could with the Jegal tools at its disposal The councilmen should be commended not condemned for its actions an-igl- es I ! Lake-base- I ! half-bloc- short-sighte- Canada also confronts secession hiil completely overblown Anti-crim- e WASHINGTON — In considering the biil now pending in the Senate it is tempting to paraphrase Ecclesiastes Politics of politics said the Preacher all is politics In this election year it is politically advantageous to be in favor of (1) the death penalty (2) reform of habeas corpus proceedings and (3) liberalization of the exclusionary rule By the same token it is useful to be against (1) assault weapons (2) money laundering and (3) organized crime bill is not a bad bill it is just The an overblown bill One is reminded of the little old lady in the presidential campaign of 1984 She looked at a shrunken hamburger and demanded to know “Where’s the beef?” In this bill there is remarkably little beef to anti-cr- ime 73-pa- be seen In its first section the biil would extend the death penalty to several federal crimes in such as murder committed by a a federal prison The provision might be a deterrent — no one can say — but given the long list of “mitigating circumstances” that a sentencing jury must consider capital punishment rarely would be ordered The primary purpose of this section is to give members a chance to show how exceedingly tough they are The second section is intended to shorten the endless delays that now accompany imposition of a death sentence By filing repeated appeals and petitions for a writ of habeas corpus an inmate on Death Row can now avoid execution for 10 to 15 years Under the pending bill the time frame would be greatly shortened but prisoners would be guaranteed life-term- er fragment the USSR his Canadian hosts confront a reg vived specter of secession by predominantly Quebec Fresh threats by Quebecois to seek their future outside the Canadian federation marks the approach of a June 23 deadline for ratification of the 1987 Meech Lake accord on a constitutional amendment recognizing Quebec as a “distinct society” Quebec nationalists insist on this to protect their French heritage from further immersion in national affairs dominated by speakers But g some of the smaller provinces — Manitoba New Brunswick and Newfoundland — refuse to go along reflecting resentment of Quebec’s demand for special treatment Unfortunately Gorbachev may not see in Canada’s example any easy formula for addressing his own problems of national division Scripps Howard News Service French-speakin- non-Fren- English-speakin- ch the assistance of experienced counsel in suing their appeals law-abidi- pur- Title III of the bill is altogether sound and e rule desirable It deals with the by which relevant evidence may be excluded at trial if the evidence has been obtained without perfect obedience to the Fourth Amendment The section would order such evidence admitted “if the search or seizure was carried out in reasonable reliance on a warrant issued by a detached and neutral magistrate ultimately found to be invalid” judge-mad- This may sound highly technical but in an astonishing number of criminal cases the exclusionary rule results in a judicial travesty Patently guilty defendants go free The hard work of police officers goes for nothing If the omnibus bill contained only this thiid section it would justify overwhelming approval The fourth section has excited the most passion As a tool for fighting crime it is the least important Here Congress would prohibit the transfer or possession of nine specified “assault weapons” beginning with the Kalashnikovs and the Uzis and extending to a fearsome firearm known as “Street Sweeper and Striker 12” Ho hum Just before the Memorial Day recess the Senate tied itself in parliamentary knots over Title IV The Senate’s rule is to allocate proponents and opponents equal time Esquire reminds us sexism isn't dead CHICAGO — Thanks Esquire Just when Barbara Bush is reminding the nation — and the graduates of Wellesley College — about the virtues and rewards of bee wife and mother you’ve done ing a a masterful job of putting the American wife back in her hag little woman nag bag sweetieface battle-a- x full-tim- toilet-cleani- butt-of-jok- es place Your snide snotty sophomoric June issue on “The American Wife” should rank as one of the great feminist tracts of the century It’s a superb refresher course on the simpy male attitudes that have made millions of women decide to shake themselves free of second-sexis- m An intriguing coincidence overshadowed Mikhail Gorbachev’s visit to Canada en route to his Washington summit with President Bush While the Soviet leader ponders what to do about several separatist movements that could James J Kilpatrick for debate On this question the factions had equal time for bombast Proponents of the citizen really ban argued that no needs a Uzi semiautomatic weapon and this is true Opponents contended that the ban would not affect criminals or maniacs who can readily obtain the forbidden weapons and this is equally true Well said roponents the ban might help a little bit Yes said opponents but that little bit would put Congress on a slippery slope toward banning the kind of semiautomatic guns that sportsmen have been using for a hundred years On winds of hot air Title IV narrowly survived parliamentary assault The ban remains in the bill This observer could not possibly care less The remaining two titles arouse less cosmic emotion Title V would direct a study of ways to imprint an electronic coding device upon currency The idea is to make it more difficult for the lords of organized crime to transfer great bundles of $100 bills Title VI would reorganize the bureaucracy of the Department of Justice to create a new Organized Crime and Dangerous Drugs Division with its very own assistant attorney general There you have the package If the bill becomes law it will benefit honest cops on the one hand and overburdened federal judges on another The ban on assault weapons could result in additional makeweight charges in some cases On the whole the bill would mainly serve the manly pretensions of politicians who want to be perceived as Tough on Crime! So do we all so do we all Universal Press Syndicate for good Your timing couldn’t have been better Esquire Too many young women are growing up assuming that the feminist revolution is all over that men have finally been acculturated to think of women as equals that marriages are now truly egalitarian partnerships Nothing will snap them back to sexist reality as fast as your elaborate houseTake that photo of a Doris Day-is- h wife kneeling in front of a toilet bovd with rubber gloves sponge Pine Sol and Comet (“My mom used Comet") scrubbing away with a smile talking about the virtues of using a coffee filter to wash windows (“No lint") Just when a lot of women are wondering whether it’s worth all the energy and d scheduling to juggle family and is a sobering reminder of the that picture job alternative We needed that Esquire What belly laughs you must have had compiling your list of “The 100 Best Wives of All put-dow- n split-secon- Time" What an inspiration for June brides to read Joan Deck that your choices include Blondie Bumstead Wilma Flintstone and the Bride of Frankenstein along with Ivana Trump Tammy Faye Bakker and Juliet (none of whom are known for cleaning toilets with Comet) How curious that you list among your best wives of all time Eve who lost her husband the Garden of Eden and Wallis Simpson who cost her husband the British throne Several of your choices — Lee Hart Jacqueline Kennedy Happy Rockefeller Eleanor Roosevelt Tammy Faye Bakker for example are wives whose husbands notoriously strayed from the marital bed (Or is their apparent freedom to do so the point you are making?) As for naming Alice Kramden as “The Absolute Best Wife of Our Time” dear Esquire you have deliberately traded away your literary pretensions for the guffaws and snickers of a National Lampoon and your fashion-plat- e posturings for the image of a lout So much for taking you seriously again pot-belli- ed n For all your cutesv-po- o Esquire you do seem a little confused about your subject matter You’ve put together an elaborate section called “Your Wife: An Owner’s Manput-dow- ual” that includes sketches of “Her Plumbing" complete with gynecological details as romantic as candidiasis cystitis and trichomoniasis nuts-and-bol- ts You rummage through her purse and her medicine cabinet You poke into the construction details of her bra You time her in the bathroom You track her daily schedule and total up her spending (less than her husband’s for home furnishings artwork collect ibles and books and only a few bucks more than her husband on clothes) But sometimes you seem to be talking more about a Boy Scout — or a faithful e wife dumb hound dog — than a Your description of a “perfect wife” for example intentionally parodies the Boy Scout Manual (She’s trustworthy loyal helpful friendly courteous kind obedient cheerful thrifty brave clean and reverent) But you burble on and on Your perfect wife “knows that when you’re right you’re right Also knows that when you’re wrong you’re right when she’s wrong youYe right and when she’s right it’s most polite not to press the matter” Furthermore she “doesn’t mind washing a few dishes or even a great many willing to drop everything and have sex with you even when you have just come in all fresh and she’s always sweaty from the garden looking to save that extra piece of string she might need to darn her plain cloth coat which she got at Loehmann’s after a fierce she’s blind to the shortcomings struggle you intend to retain can be depended upon never to humiliate you with all the teeny peccadilloes that if they became common knowledge would compel you to jump in front of a milk truck" So thank you Esquire for your elaborate r $295 smirk For all its snickerit’s a necessary reminder that women ing haven’t made as much progress toward equality as most of us assumed But if your issue reflects as your subtitle brags “Man at his best” it shouldn’t be hard to crawl out from underfoot really insist on divvying up toilet bowl cleaning and get on with being ourselves — not the object of your owner’s manual Chicago Tribune real-lif- glossy-pape- |