WHAT   IS  A  POLITICAL
HISTORY  OE   CLOTHING?
 

Michael Zakim
 

T!
 

^he history of clothing unfolds at
the center of politics. It is insepa¬
rable from social power, labor
relations, political conflicts, and ideological justifications. In fact, two
distinct moments in this history, divided in time by a hundred years, help to
illuminate one of the great issues of American politics, namely, the rela¬
tionship between capitalism and democracy.

Homespun clothing became a means of revolutionary agitation in
America in the 1760s, a response to British trade reforms. A patriot donned
these unrefined products of household labor to renounce imperial hubris
and augment its antithesis, domestic manufactures. As Benjamin Rush,
president of the United Company of Philadelphia for Promoting American
Manufactures, argued, "A people who are entirely dependent upon
foreigners for food or clothes must always be subject to them."'

Thus, when "thirty-three respectable ladies . . . met about sunrise, with
their wheels, to spend the day ... in the laudable design of a spinning
match," they became actors in the great revolutionary drama. Reports from
Providence, Salisbury, Byfield, Newbury, Rowley, Ipswich, Beverly, and
Boston told of Daughters of Liberty gathering to spin in coordinated
displays of "industry" designed to "save their sinking country." The
Massachusetts Gazette admonished "young ladies in town and those that live
round" to "wear none but your own country linen. Of economy boast, let
your pride be the most to show cloaths of your own make and spinning."
Harvard College's graduating class wore homespun at their commence¬
ment ceremonies in 1768. So did the students at Yale and the College of
Rhode Island. The South Carolina Gazette noted the appearance in
Charleston   of   a   gentleman   "completely   clad   in   the   Prodtict   and