Helen Hulick, Famous Slacker

In the fall of 1938, the Los Angeles home of 29-year-old schoolteacher Helen Hulick was burglarized.  A bad thing, to be sure, but this seemingly unimportant event was to catalyze a series of events which would turn Hulick into a nationwide newspaper sensation, provide a unique footnote in judicial history, and--last but certainly not least--earn our young teacher a place in the hallowed halls of Strange Company.

On November 9, Hulick appeared in Los Angeles Municipal Court to testify against the two men accused of the burglary.  (As a side note, tell modern-day Angelinos that there was a time when burglary suspects were not only routinely apprehended, but, if convicted, sent to serve long prison terms, you will receive stares of wide-eyed wonder.  But I digress.)  However, before Hulick could take the stand, the judge in her case, Arthur S. Guerin, announced that he had a problem with the young lady’s attire.

Hulick was wearing slacks.  Blue flannel slacks.  Judge Guerin was not about to allow any woman to wear “pants” in his courtroom.  A bailbondswoman offered to loan Hulick a skirt.

Our educator of young minds was having none of it.  “I like slacks,” she retorted.  “They’re comfortable.  It’s my constitutional right to wear them.”

Judge Guerin was not happy.  “I don’t set styles,” he told Hulick sternly.  “But costumes acceptable at the beach are not acceptable in formal courtroom procedure.  Slacks are not the proper attire in court.”  He added plaintively, “It’s tough sometimes to be a judge.”

Regarding that last statement, the judge would soon learn that he didn’t know the half of it.

Hulick’s lawyer--naturally anxious to pacify the judge--motioned to postpone the hearing.  Guerin rescheduled the hearing for November 14th, with the earnest hope that Hulick had learned her lesson about “maintaining the dignity in my courtroom.”

On the morning of the 14th, Hulick strolled into Guerin’s court wearing…slacks.  Orange and green, this time.  By her side was her attorney, William Katz, carrying a thick stack of law books containing various citations proving that Hulick had the right to wear whatever she damned well pleased.

Guerin was beginning to wish he had never laid eyes on Miss Hulick.  He fumed, “The last time you were in this court dressed as you are now and reclining on your neck on the back of your chair, you drew more attention from spectators, prisoners and court attaches than the legal business at hand. You were requested to return in garb acceptable to courtroom procedure.

“Today you come back dressed in pants and openly defying the court and its duties to conduct judicial proceedings in an orderly manner. It’s time a decision was reached on this matter and on the power the court has to maintain what it considers orderly conduct.

“The court hereby orders and directs you to return tomorrow in accepted dress. If you insist on wearing slacks again you will be prevented from testifying because that would hinder the administration of justice. But be prepared to be punished according to law for contempt of court.”

Outside the courtroom, Hulick told reporters (the affair was already becoming a local sensation,) “I’ve worn slacks since I was 15. I don’t own a dress except a formal. If he wants me to appear in a formal gown that’s okay with me.

“I’ll come back in slacks and if he puts me in jail I hope it will help to free women forever of anti-slackism.”  She added that she refused to wear silk stockings “because the silk comes from Japan and every pair means a dead Chinese.”

"New York Daily News," November 19, 1938, via Newspapers.com

The following day, Hulick entered the court wearing a plaid coat, a red-and-white blouse, and…gray slacks.  At first, Guerin ignored the outrage, concentrating on what by now was the nearly forgotten business of the hearing--namely, the two men who had robbed Hulick’s home.  He ordered that the defendants be bound over for trial.

Then, Guerin got to the really important part.  In seven typewritten pages, the judge came down on the erring schoolteacher like a ton of judicial bricks.  He fumed that Hulick had, after all his warnings, appeared in “a tight-fitting sweater and tight-fitting pants, commonly known as slacks,” thus disrupting “the orderly procedure of the court.”  He snorted that according to Hulick’s logic, nudists might come into his court, simply because they felt more comfortable sans clothing.”  Guerin sentenced her to five days in jail.

Hulick--followed by a pack of reporters from newspapers across the nation--was taken to the county jail, booked, fingerprinted, and presented with a denim dress.  An hour later, Katz saw to it that she was released on a writ of habeas corpus.

On November 17, two judges from the Appellate Division held a hearing on the controversy.  Katz argued that Hulick had every right to wear slacks in Guerin’s court.  Judges, after all, were not the fashion police.  Prosecuting attorneys responded by saying that the real issue was not Hulick’s attire, but her attitude.  She not only repeatedly defied direct orders from the bench, she did so with a “leering and contemptuous expression on her face.”

The following day, the Appellate judges issued their decision.  They wrote, “While the court record indicates by way of recital that petitioner in a court room during proceedings indulged in a type of exhibitionism which may have tended to impede orderly procedure, and which she might have been required to discontinue on pain of disciplinary action, the commitment appears to be based solely on petitioner’s failure to obey the judge’s order to change her attire, which attire, so far as the record before us discloses, did not of itself interfere with orderly court procedure, but involved merely a question of taste, a matter not within the court’s control.”  They ordered that her sentence be absolved.

In short, the judges ruled that while Miss Hulick may have been an irritating exhibitionist, Judge Guerin should have just kept his mouth shut about it.  Guerin, wisely knowing when he was beaten, graciously announced, “I accept the decision as final and will be guided by it in the future.”

The coda to our little story took place on January 17, 1939, when Hulick finally testified against the two accused burglars.  Our heroine appeared in court wearing what one admiring reporter described as “a close-fitting, rust silk dress, sheer hose, high-heeled shoes and a pert up-tilting hat with flowing veil.”  Hulick explained to the press that she had come to believe that “Maybe there’s something to this dressing-up business after all.  Because I’ve been stepping out every night since I decided to dress like the rest of the girls.”

After hearing this, Judge Guerin could surely be forgiven if he had decided to end his day with a few stiff drinks.

"St. Louis Globe Democrat," January 19, 1939

[Note: In her later years, Hulick--who specialized in teaching deaf children--gained a more conventional fame by developing what is known as the “auditory/verbal” technique for working with the hearing-impaired.  By the time of her death in 1989, she was a renowned and respected educator.  However, she remains best known as The Girl Who Wore Slacks.]