The Eighties in America - Salem Press (2009)

a toy gun. He handcuffed the forty-one-year-old
Goldmark, his forty-three-year-old wife, Annie, and
their two sons, Derek (twelve) and Colin (ten). He
then repeatedly stabbed all four of them. Annie and
Colin died immediately. Charles died shortly after
arriving at the hospital, and Derek died approxi-
mately thirty-seven days after the attack.
Charles Goldmark was a graduate of Yale Law
School and a prominent Democratic civil rights at-
torney in Seattle. He had served as a delegate for
Senator Gary Hart of Colorado at the 1984 Demo-
cratic National Convention. Charles was the son of
John and Sally Goldmark, who were accused of being
communists in the 1960’s. The accusations ended
John Goldmark’s career as a member of the Wash-
ington legislature, and in 1963 he sued for libel
against his accusers, who had based their state-
ments on the fact that Sally Goldmark had been a
member of the Communist Party in the 1930’s. John
Goldmark won his libel suit and received a forty-
thousand-dollar judgment.
Rice was apprehended two days after the attack,
when authorities traced the use of Charles Gold-
mark’s credit cards. During the interrogation pro-
cess, Rice confessed that he had been planning the
murder for six months. Investigators determined
that Rice was a right-wing extremist and a member of
the local Seattle chapter of the anticommunist Duck
Club. He learned of the Goldmark family through
the Duck Club organization. Leaders of the Seattle
Duck Club chapter, Homer Brand and Gene Goose-
man, identified the Goldmark family as members of
a communist conspiracy and provided shelter for
Rice after he committed the murder.
At his arraignment, Rice pleaded not guilty by
reason of insanity to four counts of aggravated first-
degree murder. Rice occasionally displayed symp-
toms of psychosis. However, his attorney, Bill Lan-
ning, failed to introduce any evidence at trial of his
client’s psychotic symptoms. Rice was found guilty of
the murders and sentenced to death.

Impact The Goldmark murders helped legislators
enact more stringent punishments for hate crimes.
Despite the victims in fact being neither Jewish nor
communist, the crime also shed light upon the rise
in anti-Semitism, as well as of hate groups and racist
ideologies in general, that characterized the 1980’s.

Subsequent Events Rice appealed his conviction
on the grounds of having been represented by an in-

effective counsel. In addition to Lanning’s failure to

introduce evidence supporting his client’s defense,

the attorney had allowed the police unlimited access

to Rice. In 1997, the appellate court determined

that Lanning’s defense had indeed been ineffective,

and it overturned Rice’s conviction, granting the ap-

pellant a new trial. In May of 1998, Rice pled guilty in

exchange for a lesser sentence of life imprisonment

without the possibility of parole.

Further Reading

Amond, P. “Racist Origins of Border Militias: The

History of White Supremacist Vigilantism and

Tom Posey’s Civilian Military Assistance.” n.p.:

Public Good Project, 2005. Available at http://

http://www.publicgood.org/reports/vigilante_history

.pdf

Robbins, J. A. T. “This Thing of Darkness: A Sociol-

ogy of the Enemy.”Journal of Scientific Study of Reli-

gion36, no. 2 (1997): 340.

Turner, W. “Sanity of Confessed Slayer at Issue in Se-

attle Trial.”The New York Times, May 28, 1986.

Nicholas D. ten Bensel

See also Atlanta child murders; Crime; Jewish

Americans; Terrorism; Tylenol murders.

Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986

Identification Law to reorganize the United

States’ military command structure

Date Signed into law on October 1, 1986

The act was the first major overhaul of the top U.S. militar y

command in about forty years. It was an attempt to central-

ize authority in the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff

rather than continue the separation of the uniformed ser-

vices’ command.

Senator Barry Goldwater and Representative Wil-

liam Flynt Nichols cosponsored the piece of legisla-

tion officially known as the Goldwater-Nichols De-

partment of Defense Reorganization Act of 1986,

which was passed as Public Law 433 of the Ninety-

ninth U.S. Congress. The intent of the law was to

force more coordination between the various

branches of the U.S. armed forces in order to en-

courage a more efficient military. To accomplish

this coordination, the law strengthened the posi-

tion of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

The Eighties in America Goldwater-Nichols Act of 1986
425