Curio Cabinet

If you spent the holidays binge-watching Bridgerton, the salacious period piece produced by Shonda Rhimes, you're not alone. Based on a series of historical romance novels by Julia Quinn, including The Duke & I and The Viscount Who Loved Me, Bridgerton is set in England during the Regency era (1795-1837 C.E.)—so-named because the Prince Regent served as a proxy leader for his unwell father, George III. The Netflix adaptation indulges in this historical drama, as well as contemporary settings (enhanced by CGI), costumes, and vocabulary. The main characters are often headed to the modiste, a term from milliner or dressmaker derived from the French word for fashion, mode. (If something is à la mode it is "in fashion," not topped with ice cream.) There is also much talk of "leading strings," an expression tossed around in Regency romances that suggests the person in question is either quite young or under the control of someone else.

 
During the early modern period in Europe, leading strings were pieces of fabric attached to a child's garments. Their shape evolved with fashion trends, going from hanging sleeves to shorter and narrower strips, like ribbons. Used as a training tool, leading strings were intended to help children learn to walk. A caregiver would hold the strings and guide the child, much like a puppeteer manipulates a marionette or a coachmen steers a horse. Their use was controversial, with some doctors cautioning they could affect the child's health and disposition. Other medical professionals encouraged their use, with a dose of patience. In a 19th-century household medical reference book, H. Müller argues leading strings help "preserve the child from the accident of a dangerous fall." He believes "children very easily lose confidence in themselves when their first attempts to stand or to walk have painful consequences." Once a child could remain upright for an extended period, the leading strings served as a form of restraint, preventing children from running off or injuring themselves—a precursor to those safety harness "backpacks" seen at amusement parks. By the 18th century, leading strings on a young girl's garments also indicated she was unmarried, and still under the legal control of her parents. Talk about a fashion statement.

 
Image credit & copyright: Galerie des modes et costumes français, 32nd notebook, 2nd figure, c. 1778-1787

Let's face it: presidential election cycles can be a hot mess. Even before 2020's Four Seasons Total Landscaping press conference, certain lame duck elected officials were infamous for their late-term ineffectiveness. Luckily in 1933, a constitutional amendment was passed to remedy that… the 20th, to be precise.
 
Before the 20th Amendment passed, the duration of presidential and congressional terms were ambiguous. Article 1 of the Constitution mandated Congress meet at least once a year, usually in December to perform their federal duties: all went as planned during odd years, but in even (election) years, lame duck sessions ensured little was accomplished. While such inaction during the year might make us think of them as the precursor to a "do nothing Congress," the reality was that in the 18th and 19th century, politicians often had to set their affairs in order at home over several months before undergoing travel to the nation's capital. It also didn't help that Congress and the new president had to wait between Election Day in November and March 4th the next year to start their new jobs. That date was chosen by the 1789 Congress of the Confederation (the original unicameral legislative and executive body) as the beginning of new elected terms. The four-month long delays heavily tested the country's mettle during events like the secession of the Southern states in February 1861, which proved national emergencies wait for no man or new body politic to come into power.
 
The one-month Congress became a bigger and bigger problem as it failed to meet the needs of a growing nation transformed by trains, planes, and automobiles. Among the champions of progressive politics in the Senate was Republican George W. Norris of Nebraska, who advocated for labor rights, direct election of senators, and isolationism in foreign policy. In 1923, Norris proposed a resolution to shorten the lame duck session of the legislative and executive bodies. The resolution didn't pick up much steam during the roaring 20s, however the onset of the Great Depression demanded New Deal reforms in the social safety net, and the way Washington did business. The 72nd Congress proposed the 20th Amendment on March 2, 1932, with Section 1 addressing much needed changes to the four-month lame duck period:

Section 1. The terms of the President and Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January, and the terms of Senators and Representatives at noon on the 3d day of January, of the years in which such terms would have ended if this article had not been ratified; and the terms of their successors shall then begin.

After being ratified by three-fourths of the states, the 20th Amendment was passed on January 23, 1933, incidentally during a lame duck period. Franklin D. Roosevelt would become the last president to take office on March 4th in 1933, and also the first to be inaugurated on January 20th in 1937 under the 20th Amendment changes. In 1935 Clerk of the House South Trimble noted “This is the first time in 146 years that an old Congress dies and a new one is born on the 3d day of January…today we inaugurate the first session of the Seventy-fourth Congress.”
 

While the 20th Amendment also outlines other important procedural actions in the executive and legislative branches, like the chain of succession to the presidency, it's mostly known these days for setting the date for the Inauguration Day ceremony and celebrations at the Capitol Building and National Mall. And in these days of high speed internet and other forms of instant gratification, some are upset about the lame duck delay between Election Day and January 20th! Not to worry though, the president elect and his transition team are, by all accounts, kept incredibly busy during the transition period between presidents. We might even say it's a time for the newly-elected ducklings to get to work and start quacking!

 
Image credit & copyright: Alex Wong, Getty Images

 
Written by: Esther P.

It's Flashback Friday! Enjoy this favorite from the Curio Cabinet archives.
 

These men are tight-lipped, but their signs say it all. There was no better rallying cry than the affirmative "I am a man" for the African-American sanitation workers of the 1968 Memphis Sanitation Strike. Tensions between low-income waste collectors and Memphis mayor Henry Loeb were already high when a malfunctioning truck killed two workers in February. 1,300 workers staged a strike to call attention to poor working conditions and low wages. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. showed his solidarity by marching with protesters on March 28, when this photo was taken. In a chillingly foretelling speech given a week later, on the eve of his assassination, King inspired persistence and hope: "Like anybody, I would like to live a long life—longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now… I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land." The strike ended on April 16 when negotiators agreed to recognize unions and increase wages. But "I am a man" would stay relevant as a symbol of the Civil Rights Movement. In the continuing fight for equality, the phrase is still salient—along with its updated, hashtagged relatives.

 
Image credit: Richard Copley
 

It's Flashback Friday! Enjoy this favorite from the Curio Cabinet archives.
 

Gesundheit, MLK. One of the darkest days in American history was the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. on April 4, 1968. But the world almost lost him ten years earlier. On September 20, 1958, a mentally disturbed woman named Izola Ware Curry stabbed King while he signed copies of his book Stride Toward Freedom at Blumstein’s Department Store in Harlem, New York. Curry stabbed King with a seven-inch steel letter opener, striking him in the upper left chest area. He was rushed to a local hospital where doctors performed several hours of surgery to repair the wound. One of his surgeons later remarked that “had Dr. King sneezed or coughed the weapon would have penetrated the aorta.” This quote formed the foundation of King’s “I have been to the mountaintop” speech which he delivered on the last evening of his life. He was speaking at the Mason Temple Church in Memphis. In the climax of that speech, Dr. King told the story of his attack ten years earlier, recounting the well-wishings he had received during his recovery:

I had received one from the president and the vice president; I've forgotten what those telegrams said. I'd received a visit and a letter from the governor of New York, but I've forgotten what that letter said. But there was another letter that came from a little girl… I looked at that letter and I'll never forget it. It said simply,

"Dear Dr. King: I am a ninth-grade student at the White Plains High School." She said, "While it should not matter, I would like to mention that I'm a white girl. I read in the paper of your misfortune and of your suffering. And I read that if you had sneezed, you would have died. And I'm simply writing you to say that I'm so happy that you didn't sneeze."

I want to say tonight that I… am happy that I didn't sneeze. Because if I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been around here in 1960, when students all over the South started sitting-in at lunch counters. And I knew that as they were sitting in, they were really standing up for the best in the American dream and taking the whole nation back to those great wells of democracy, which were dug deep by the founding fathers in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been around here in 1961, when we decided to take a ride for freedom and ended segregation in interstate travel.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been around here in 1962, when Negroes in Albany, Georgia, decided to straighten their backs up. And whenever men and women straighten their backs up, they are going somewhere, because a man can't ride your back unless it is bent.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been here in 1963, when the black people of Birmingham, Alabama, aroused the conscience of this nation and brought into being the Civil Rights Bill.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have had a chance later that year, in August, to try to tell America about a dream that I had had.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been down in Selma, Alabama, to see the great movement there.

If I had sneezed, I wouldn't have been in Memphis to see a community rally around those brothers and sisters who are suffering. I'm so happy that I didn't sneeze… I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the Promised Land.

I don’t think we have gotten to the Promised Land yet, but we would be a lot further away if MLK had sneezed on September 20, 1958!