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In January 1899, a resolution was introduced in the Assembly to prohibit tight lacing of women’s corsets.

Rep. Henry Daggett of Bear Creek, in rural Waupaca Co., thought young women should be stopped from displaying an 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.

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

Some foes 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 knight, sword in hand, ready to battle a 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 quietly in committee and did not run for re-election.

Find out more about Wisconsin history online at the Wisconsin Historical Society’s Web site: www.wisconsinhistory.org.