Kamala Harris's white suit is not fashion, it's history
Fashion is a powerful communication tool. In keeping with his tribute to all the women who "paved the way," Harris wore a white tailored suit for his triumphant evening speech in Wilmington.
Kamala Harris, the first woman to become Vice President in the United States, last Saturday (11/07/2020) paid a vibrant tribute to the generations of women who "paved the way" for her election, assuring that she will not be "the last ".
The vice president-elect paid tribute to her mother, Shyamala Gopalan Harris, who came to the United States from India at the age of 19. A civil rights activist, this breast cancer researcher died in 2009.
"She couldn't have imagined this moment, but she deeply believed in an America where a moment like this would be possible," she told a crowd of supporters gathered in Wilmington, Delaware, to celebrate Joe Biden's victory. "I think of her, of the generations of women, black, Asian, white, Latina, Native American, who paved the way," he said.
Similarly, Harris praised those who "have sacrificed so much for equality, freedom, and justice for all, including black women, who are too often looked down upon but often shown to be the backbone of (the ) American democracy.
Celebration in a white tailored suit
Thus, in line with her tribute to all the women who "paved the way," Harris wore a white tailored suit for her triumphant evening speech in Wilmington.
The color white has long been associated with the women's suffrage movement, and its long struggle for the right to vote for women, adopted as a symbol of moral purity alongside green for hope and purple for dignity.
During her speech, the former prosecutor and later senator recalled the long struggle of women for the right to vote: "A hundred years ago with the 19th Amendment, 55 with the suffrage law, and now, in 2020, with a new generation of women who put their ballots in the polls and continued the fight for the fundamental right to vote and to be heard. "
Long list of women who led the way
But beyond the suffragettes, Harris's deliberate choice of outfit was also a gesture of solidarity with the long list of women who have defied expectations in American politics.
Harris honored people like Shirley Chisholm, who also wore white when she became the first African-American woman elected to Congress in 1968, or Geraldine Ferraro, the first woman in United States history to run for the Vice Presidency, who also dressed fully. in white to accept the role of Walter Mondale's running mate in his 1984 presidential campaign.
And recently, she followed in the footsteps of Hillary Clinton, who wore a white pantsuit to accept the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016, and Democratic women in Congress, in February 2019, who had dressed in white during her speech about Donald Trump's State of the Union.
Harris's tie-neck blouse also carried historic weight. It evoked the powerful clothes of Margaret Thatcher, who wore hers in the same way that her male colleagues wore ties, an appropriate metaphor for how the UK's prime minister co-opted and recast the rules of British politics of the 1980s.
Harris made it clear that today is part of this long history, but that it will not be the last: "I will not be the last," she said, "because every girl who looks at tonight sees that this is a land where everything is possible."
