Rep. Henry Daggett, of Bear Creek in rural Waupaca County, thought young women should be stopped from displaying a provocative, 18-inch waist. Although contemporary feminists also argued that tight corsets were unhealthy, Daggett acted not to safeguard women's health but rather to purify public morals.

He told the press that "for years he has studied the figures of the ladies of Bear Creek" and that "the waists of most ladies are about half the size they should be."

Daggett's anti-lacing resolution was first referred to the Assembly Committee on Public Improvements, which passed it quickly to the Committee of Public Health and Sanitation, which handed it off like a hot potato to the Committee of Agriculture.

Some opponents protested that lawmakers had more important issues to address than regulating women's fashion. Others felt that how tight one chose to wear one's underwear was no business of the government.

Daggett was ridiculed for prudishness in the Janesville, Oshkosh and Chicago papers. At a Madison party, a large painting was hung showing him as a medieval knight, sword in hand, ready to battle a monstrous corset.

When he shipped his trunk home at the end of the session, it arrived pasted over with pictures of scantily clad, tightly corseted women, raising eyebrows at the Bear Creek train depot.

This was too much for Daggett, who let his resolution die in committee and did not run for re-election.

-- Wisconsin Historical Society
www.wisconsinhistory.org

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