The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1895-09-20
Al MATTER OF YARDS.
So Held a California Judge Regarding the
Question of Permissible "Bifurcates.''
from the San Francisco c


from the San Francisco Chronicle]
The inevitable question as to how
far the new woman may go in adopt
ing the attire of man has been precipi-
tated in San Francisco by Police Judge
Charles A. Low. In his court yester-
day he decided that there is a point be-
yond which, if a woman strides in
trousers, she is guilty of an attraction
of the law.
The matter came up in the police
court. A piquant young woman, insist
ing that she had done no wrong, gave
dramatic interest to the issue. The
courts position was anomalous.
The point was not that bifurcated
garments, per Sc, are immodest, and
the wearing of them by women viola
ton of law, but that they are improper
and not to be worn when a scant
amount of materials used in the max
ing of them. In other words, the judge
approached the subject with a yard
stick and tape line. He did not know
4
takes to keep a woman on the legal
side Of propriety, but he insisted, new
ertheless, that there is a dividing line
Two yards made into bifurcate for
example, might be the proper thing,
while one yard, perhaps, would render
the rider liable to arrest. 1t was a
delicate question, but in the case be
fore him Judge Low decided that he
had the right to say that the young
woman had not used sufficient materi-
al in the making of her attire.
Paragraph of section 10 of the
General Orders Of the Board of Super
visors Providing Regulations for the
Government of the City and County of
San Francisco" reads as follows:
mo person shall appear in a public
place in a dress not belonging to his or
her sex"
That was the provision which Judge
Low had to construe against the young
Sacramento society girl who, more de-
faint than demure, listened unwillingly
to his learned exposition upon the law
and ethics of woman's attire.
The young woman's contention was
that in these days of constantly chang
ing vogue, when ever such high author
tiles as the late dictator of fashion, Mr..
Worth of Paris, was often uncertain,
after he had designed new dress,
whether to call it garment for men or
for women, it was a questionable as
sumption upon the part of a police
Judge to decide what was mans and
what was woman's dress. Garments
| themselves are of neuter gender
There was no gainsaying that. Now
then, how could the court say that
either sex had an exclusive privilege to
wear certain kinds of dress?
| Judge Low was not open to argu-
ment. Other people might speculate
| upon the subject, but he was not casu-
list enough to see propriety in tightly
| fitting bifurcates on a woman. In the
| bagginess of boomers women could es-
| cape the law, but when she made them
| scant-when in the perfectness of the
| fit she shattered all the witching mys.
| terry about the form divine-then it was
| time for the law to step in and drive
women back into flowing skirts anG
| founces and general fluffiness.
| The defendant, who was an attrac
| tive, tall blonde, had given her name a.
| MAY Smith, and she insisted that thai
| was her true name. a few days ago
| she came to this city from Sacramento
| With two young women friends sht
saw San Francisco. and saw it il
boomers. They wanted to explore Bo
hemia. at might. They wanted TO set
tits lights and shadows, and feel tha.
| they were living intensely, but it wa.
out of the question for the three pretty
girls to do the town at night unattend