If the phrase "white collar boxing" conjures up images of stockbrokers whupping on each other, it should.
The sport, which has been around for roughly two decades, is pursued by mostly older amateur boxers who are often professionals in something other than the sweet science — such as "lawyers and bankers," according to the text of two virtually identical bills currently working their way through the state Assembly.
The measure, which has been knocking around the Capitol since 2006, would legalize white collar bouts and place them under the supervision of a private company whose owner now says he would rather have the bill stay down for the count.
Even if you've never laced up and worked out on the heavy bag, the legislative history of white collar boxing is fascinating as an object lesson in where bills come from, and how they quite often go awry. It's a particularly lively installment of a subset of Capitol journalism I like to call "Tales of Actual Legislation," reminders that while the Legislature can be democracy's great laboratory, what emerges can sometimes look more like Frankenstein's Monster.
Our story begins in a venerable Brooklyn gym called Gleason's, where beginning in the 1990s owner Bruce Silverglade experienced a boom in business from well-heeled swells who enjoyed pounding each other in exhibition matches.
"Never had an injury, never had a problem," Silverglade told me last week.
The only problem was with the state, which regulates boxing and wrestling — and no other sport — through the State Athletic Commission. In November 2005, the state shut down a white collar bout on Long Island, and reminded Silverglade and others that their matches were technically illegal.
Enter state Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno, who would occasionally stop by Gleason's to work out on downstate trips.
At this point, I interrupted Silverglade to ask if Bruno was a skilled fighter.
"Everybody who comes in says they used to box, they could compete against guys in the Army or the Navy," he said. (Bruno boxed successfully during service in Korea.) "For an older politician who sits around in Albany, he was pretty good."
Bruno suggested that Silverglade seek legislative redress, and in 2006 helped shepherd through a bill that would have handed regulation of the sport over to United States White Collar Boxing Inc., a company wholly owned by Silverglade. It was sponsored in the Senate by Marty Golden of Brooklyn — another denizen of Gleason's — and passed 57 to 3. Not a unanimous decision, but close.
After the Senate passage, author and journalist Thomas Hauser wrote about the bill for the now-defunct New York Sun in a piece that demolished the notion that the state should hand off its responsibilities to a for-profit venture — especially when USWCB Inc. would in effect function as both promoter and regulator of the bouts.
Silverglade, who remains a friend of Hauser's, spent most of the article agreeing with the writer's criticisms.
The bill croaked in the Assembly, and continued to fail despite Silverglade's lobbying efforts, which included a meeting with Gov. David Paterson.
In 2010, a compromise was reached with USA Boxing, which sanctions amateur boxing, that created a new "master boxer" category for fighters 35 and older — an age range that fits your average lawyer-banker-pugilist.
So the correct number of times the bill should have been introduced this year is zero. Instead, there's one sponsored by Assemblyman Rafael Espinal of Brooklyn and Sen. Golden, and another by Assemblyman Francisco Moya of Queens, who picked it up along with a stack of old bills previously carried by his predecessor Daryl Towns. (Silverglade says Moya's brother trains at Gleason's.)
Think of it: two identical bills sponsored by lawmakers from boroughs whose residents have never been known for their habit of sheepishly backing away from conflict. If only there were some gentlemanly way for Espinal and Moya to work this out, perhaps on the floor of the Assembly if we can convince the sergeant-at-arms to push some of the desks back and clear a space.
Meanwhile, the guy who would benefit the most from the bills' provisions doesn't want either version to pass.
"Me, I don't want it — because I don't want the responsibility," Silverglade said.
Now that he can organize amateur bouts with his older white collar palookas, he doesn't need to make an end run around the Athletic Commission. Also, "I don't have to worry about anybody from Albany, Rochester, Watertown calling me up and wanting me to be part of their event."
In recent years, Silverglade has let USWCB Inc. lapse into corporate purgatory. The whole endeavor feels vaguely spectral, and makes you wonder how many bills are currently under eternal consideration in one or both legislative chambers — veterans of past battles now simply swaying on their feet, desperate for the bell that would allow them to exit.
cseiler@timesunion.com • 518-454-5619