A Club Woman on the Dress Question by Mrs. M. Elizabeth Burns-Howell

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Jul 30, 1912

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 39, No. 29.

A Club Woman on the Dress Question

By Mrs. M. Elizabeth Burns-Howell

Says "Dress Violates Decency, Morality, and Economy"

By Mrs. M. Elizabeth Burns-Howell

T the biennial of women's clubs recently held in San Francisco, where were congregated leading women of intelligence and high character from all over the nation, as well as the rank of the fashionables and women of wealth, also many distinguished visitors from abroad, many topics of vital interest to the welfare and progress of humanity were discussed.

None, however, was more pertinent to the crying needs of these times than the address on "Slavery to Fashion," by Mrs. John C. Hessler, of Decatur, Illinois. This speaker did not mince matters, but spoke out bravely, with unfearing frankness and candor. That her remarks were roundly applauded by her audience, shows well for the average woman — that after all, deep down in her heart, she despises much of the folly which she seems forced to follow at the dictate of fashion.

The San Francisco Examiner quotes Mrs. Hessler in full, from which report we have culled the following excerpts, particularly because the sentiments are identical, in the main, with those in our last week's article on "Dress Atrocities," which to some may have seemed rather too strongly expressed. Compare notes, however, and you will find the same spirit of sanity and truth at war with the foolish frivolity and sinful waste of the whole system of fashion as it rules the feminine world to-day.

Mrs. Hessler said:

The Greatest Loss

"The greatest loss in dress is the loss of womanly dignity and stability of character which accompanies the dissipation of time, labor, and thought which is the result of false standards.

"I believe, too, that all womankind, which, as Miss Addams points out in her new book, suffers as a whole from the degradation of individuals, is suffering definite moral degradation from prevalent fashions.

"We used to speak of respectable women who went decently clad. Remembering this, old-fashioned people might challenge the respectability of a large proportion of our sex to-day, as we observe the indecently transparent bodices worn by so many of us, and the gowns which are so swathed about the figure, with no petticoats to blur the outline, as to reveal the person with absolute frankness.

Shuddered at Sheath Gown

"This has come about so gradually that many of us do not realize how our standards of personal modesty have been blunted. I recall the horror of most women at the décolleté daytime bodice with its slight veiling of transparent lace, when it appeared, some fifteen years ago. We shuddered, too, at the first petticoatless sheath gown, when we saw it on the stage, but —

"Vice is a monster of so frightful mien, As to be hated needs but to be seen; Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face, We first endure, then pity, then embrace."

"We need to call a halt upon the wearing of boudoir garments on the street. We have grown too familiar with the public through the intimacies of dress we wear in public. We women have not realized that we have been watching, or, with innocence of evil intent, taking part in the breaking down of barriers between virtue and licentiousness.

This is the very serious reason why I am speaking so frankly on the moral side of dress.

"The problem of the increasing immorality of young girls — schoolgirls as well as working girls — is causing growing concern to those who know of it. Shameful proof of the reality of this situation is startling educators.

"I discussed this matter not long since with a man who is a great scientist — a physician, a cosmopolitan — and asked what he believed to be the cause. He replied: 'And what are their mothers thinking of? Their mothers are wearing the same sort of clothes.' And he went on to say: 'I am ashamed of our countrywomen when I go abroad. They dress as no decent woman dresses in Europe. They go to Paris and see, in public places, beautiful women driving in elegant carriages, wearing lovely and conspicuous gowns. Doubtless they think they are seeing the great ladies of the city, for they hasten to the shops and buy similar garments. They do not realize that these beauties are the demi-monde, and that the clothes they bought were made for the demi-monde — and for Americans. No French gentleman would allow his wife to wear them.'

"We can only hope that the madly accelerated speed at which fashion moves to-day is rushing toward destruction of its empire. As women think for themselves along other lines, they are learning to think independently concerning questions of dress.

Better Standards Are Needed

"We all agree, I think, that we need better dress standards — or at any rate, that other women do. When we think of absurdities in present-day costumes, we call to mind the stout women who outline their figure mercilessly in the sheath skirt; we remember the mushroom hat, so pitiless to the middle-aged women that wear it, since it hides their best features — their eyes and look of intelligence — and unsparingly reveals their faded necks and wrinkled chins; we recall the modish shadow veils which cloud with a semblance of age the face of the wearer.

"We can go nowhere where women congregate, without seeing many of our sex who mince along, bound in tight skirts, tottering on high heels, peering from under an overbalancing burden of hat. Prominent in the list of injurious styles is the tight skirt, which exposes the wearer to accidents; the figured veil, which impairs her sight; the high heels, which rob her of half her activity and injure her nervous system.

"We can make a list of inconsiderate styles, and place in it the rude and publicly inconvenient picture hat, the too familiar and promiscuously caressing aigret, the murderous projecting hat pin, and — I am sure every husband will wish this added — the gown which fastens in the back.

What More Is Required?

"Built on the foundation of an undistorted body, woman's dress is to-day structurally good and artistic. It follows sincerely the lines of the body it clothes. Sleeves conform to the natural shape of the arm. Bodices are easy and comfortable. Collars are comfortably high or can be omitted. Skirts are usually wide enough for freedom of motion. Shoes of sensible shape are on the market.

"Since we can clothe ourselves so comfortably in every particular, what more is required? The question of woman's dress is not only one of physical comfort, but also of that gracious harmony and beauty which gives pleasure to the beholder, and expresses in visible form an inner beauty and orderliness of spirit.

Obedience to Fashion

"In this day of the marvelous intellectual and social growth of women, it is a matter for wonder that so many still unreasoningly obey fashion.

"Fashion grew in the proud desire of the royal princess — or the money princess — to produce by her dress a sharp distinction between herself and inferior mortals. These inferior mortals persistently imitated her as quickly as they could, to destroy this distinction.

"But the growth of intelligence and of a more sympathetic humanity is slowly remedying this. That it has lasted so long is because the fashion mania has been fostered. Women, through their love of change, have been exploited commercially by means of the great foreign dressmakers who make the styles. And these foreign dressmakers have been subsidized by manufacturers who wish to increase the market for textile and ornaments.

New Styles with Seasons

"For many years we have been trained to expect new styles with the season's change. 'Each spring and fall we stand tiptoe, gazing expectantly over seas for the advent of new fashions. While foreign dressmakers are setting the stage for the new production, the air is full of hushed voices. The magazines hazard wild guesses.

"Finally the curtain is drawn. A beautiful and regal figure steps across the stage clad in a gown with — yes, it is — with drapery bunched about her slender hips. A voice, mysterious, sweet, and compelling, says, 'This is the fashion,' and again, 'This is the fashion,' and we who listen, rich and poor, fat and thin, swayed by the hypnotic suggestion, all run to have our gowns made with pannier drapery.

"Few in America know that the inspiration of styles for the last year and a half or two years was the wonderful costumes of the imperial Russian ballet, which has been appearing in the great cities of Europe. For them, Bakst, one of the greatest decorative artists of any time, staged 'Cleopatra,' 'Scheherezade,' and 'Narcisse.' . . .

"They [Bakst styles] were designed to express physical movement and the voluptuous emotions or immoral and decadent scenic productions, and performed their office with transcendent artistic audacity and success. Translated through the dressmakers, they have lost much of their beauty — which, after all, was largely in the ensemble — tho they have lost little of their suggestiveness.

Economic Waste

"Fashion results in tremendous economic waste, first, through the use of perishable material; second, through the discarding of clothing which has not begun to wear out. Women buy new cloaks, for example, annually. The old cloak is as warm as the new, it is as beautiful as it ever was, but it is laid aside because no longer the fashion.

"The willow plume, ardently desired yesterday by every woman, for which they scrimped and saved — or sold their souls — is no longer prized, tho their soft fringes are as graceful as they ever were.

"The articles discarded because out of fashion were produced by labor. The new garments which take their places are also the product of labor. Discarding them results in needless labor.

Labor Worse than Wasted

"It is folly to say that these extravagances give work to some one. Every moment spent in labor which is unproductive of the real needs of the world is worse than wasted. It should be turned to constructive uses. The women who work in trades which minister to the waste of fashion should be freed to tend the neglected children who tug at their skirts. The white slaves of society are not all of them slaves to the vices of men. An appalling number of them are slaves to the frivolity of women.

"The aigret symbolizes to me all that is ruthless in fashionable dress and its manufacture — feathers torn from the quivering, murdered mother, leaving the nestlings to wail and die."

To close, Mrs. Hessler points to education of the young as one remedy. Girls and boys in the grammar and high schools should be taught the quality of textiles, color harmony, proportion as adapted to form and use, a sense of values as to cost of material, etc., and girls should learn dressmaking along sensible lines, also millinery, just as they learn music or mathematics.

She would also have the government take up the matter of wholesome dress as they have

taken up that of pure food, and advocates such laws as would make it a felony to manufacture or sell a shoddy quality of material, and further that governmental supervision of styles with reference to limiting extremes and establishing a sensible standard would greatly aid the needed reform.

All this may come in time, just as has the national pure food law, which was unheard of till recent years. It was doubtless advocated long before its passage, but as a working fact is a comparatively recent innovation. So does every goodly plant grow — "first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear."

But the main factor in a composite result is the attitude of each individual. Hence you and I, sisters, need not wait for governmental control of our clothing. Let us set about it to see for ourselves that it conforms to the laws of sanity and comfort, of practical usefulness and harmonious effect in color and line. So shall we be arrayed as the lilies, in sweet and perfect purity, our costumes conforming to what our souls should be, all that is truly beautiful and of a righteous character.