The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1902-06-14
SOCIAL AsoENDANcY.

SOCIAL AsCENDANCY.
Topeka women who when they enter
tain adopt the method familiar to every
feminine social stragetist of giving two
successive affairs at which they dis
tinguish between the people they want
and the people they have to ask by in
viting all the world to one and only the
friends they wish particularly to honor
to the other have a notable precedent
for the system. Mrs. Theodore Roosevelt
has been face to face with the same
thing and Washington society is excl
ted on account of it. While to the IN
initiated the subtle difference between,
an invitation to a thimble party on We'd
nesday afternoon and one to a card
party on Thursday afternoon may not
be apparent women who are versed in
these matters understand the delicate
distinction which makes one invitation
more of an honor than the other ard to
those who know the social standing of
the guest is frequently indicated by the
list in which his or her name appears.
The hostess who uses this method of
solving a difficult social problem usual
~ gets herself cordially hated by ,ome
one who feels sighted by the dlscrimI-
nation and therefore treads upon dan
S6LO4S SIOunQ DIS the AlKSl ldQN OI lAG
land has had occasion to discover.
Mrs. Roosevelt has recently given two
garden parties, in themselves decided
innovations in the rather stately social
life of the White House, to the first of
which her invitations were general -and
included most of the women Of the con-
gressional families. leaving out that ex-
elusive coterie made up of the diDlo-
matte corps and the official and unofi-
cial families which compose the really
smart set at the national capital. These
were entertained later at a smaller gar
den party all by themselves. The latter
/ company included only three wives of
congressman and those from the east
and very few of the women Of the sena-
torial families. Among the excluded
were women who have lived in Wash
ington for years and who have been
somewhat prominent in the social lie
of the city and especially in White
House functions and it can readily be
believed that they are literally up in
arms.
But with a family of the standing Of
the Roosevelts in the White House it
might be expected that the presidents
residence and the presidents wife should
assume new Importance in Washing
ton society. By virtue of his position
the president is the leader of society
but there never has been a president
who made much of his opportunities in
this respect. Most of the presidents and
their wives have arrived at that dis
tinction at an age when society appeals
but little to man or woman. The later
presidents and their wives have not
been by birth, breeding. education,
tastes or habit fitted to shine very bril-
nantly in the social armament and the
White House has been by no means the
center of social power and gaiety in
Washington nor has it ever pronounced
the final word in a social controversy.
Most Of the wives of recent presidents
have been, like their husbands. of hum
bic birth and until their elevation to the
first Office in the republic. of obscure
social position, and they have been con-
tented with an acceptance Of the pure
~ perfunctory social life Of the White
House and the ready made etiquette OF
their official position. But the Roose-
velts are different. BY birth, breeding
and social standing the family is the
superior of any that has occupied the
White House since the early days Of the
Republic, and the change can not fail
to affect official society in Washington
where IL HAS frequently A1dRbCACu Liza
the families Of the president and his
cabinet have been, their official position
aside, the most obscure and common
people in the ultra fashionable set.
1t was William Dean Howells wht
{ said that an epoch in the national If,
, came to an end with the assassination
! of William Mckinley. with that life.
r wrote the dean of American letters
ended an order Of things which has pre-
/ vailed with Us for more than half
century It ended in a return to al
! older order which it superseded ant
s which has now become the newest order
{ Down to certain period of the ma
: tional life the ideal Of the gentleman
o ruled with US and then the ideal of tn
$ common man began to hold sway
t President Roosevelt may be- Mr.. How
s els says, "a democrat defacto, but h
e is an aristocrat de jure.' The Roose
i velts are the first family in the Whit
e house for a century which could by it
O own right and without the prestige tina
z attaches to the presidential office, oceup
/. the position OF leaders in Washingto
i society.
q In Washington position means some
thing. but persons are everything. an
d unless ones Office is very exalted it
Y not enough. Many wife of q wester
, congressman has gone to the capital e.