Etiquette Humor and a U.S. President

Official etiquette forbids divulgence of Presidential conversations, but a friend of a friend of a prominent inmate of the White House says that a little bird told him that Mark Twain's name came up in some connection… — Public domain image of Colonel George Harvey

There are those who would have given no small sum to have been within hearing distance while President Wilson and Colonel George Harvey were conversing in the White House. Mutual friends used to say that it was as good as a play to watch the flashes that sprang from a crossing of those two keenest of minds over a luncheon table.

Official etiquette forbids divulgence of Presidential conversations, but a friend of a friend of a prominent inmate of the White House says that a little bird told him that Mark Twain's name came up in some connection, and Colonel Harvey remarked casually that there still live persons who had never heard of the great humorist. The President found this almost incredible.

“Oh, yes,” the Colonel continued. “Only yesterday, here in Washington, I met such a one. He was an office-seeker. He declared positively he had never heard Tom Sawyer. No, he had never heard of him either.” 

“Nor Huck Finn?” 

“No, never.” 

“Nor Pudd’nhead Wilson?” 

“Oh, Lord yes,” he ejaculated, “I voted for him."

And the President's roar of delight did not diminish in the least when the Colonel continued softly. “And,” he added, wistfully, “that's all the good it done me.” — Chico Record, 1914

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Etiquette for Hosting Fasting Guest

Prime Minister Modi was in the middle of a nine-day religious fast, a practice that reportedly limits his intake to water and lime. How was a dinner to be hosted in his honor? — According to HinduWebsite.com, “Fasting in Hinduism is a declaration of faith and resolve and way to build character, strength and purity as part of one’s preparation for liberation. It is also helpful to restrain the mind and the senses and practice detachment, austerity and self-control. The Hindu Law Books such as the  Manusmriti prescribe for both men and women elaborate rules and procedures to practice fasting on specific occasions. They also consider fasting a meritorious deed or good karma.”

 Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi, in New Delhi on August 08, 2019 

Photo source, Wikimedia Commons

An Indian leader’s fast was etiquette question for a dinner at the White House

Reporting from Washington —


White House visits from foreign leaders regularly bring up delicate questions of etiquette and protocol. Just in the past year, a small team of experts at the White House has had to figure out whom to seat next to the newly single French president, for example. And they’ve fielded questions over how to greet a leader’s wife when that leader is a polygamist.

Next week, the team faces one of its more unusual challenges: how to host a dinner for a man who isn’t eating.

The prime minister of India, Narendra Modi, is due at the White House on Monday for his first visit with President Obama. The White House is planning a dinner for the leaders and other top officials to honor his arrival. Modi is in the middle of a nine-day religious fast, a practice that reportedly limits his intake to water and lime.

That could make for an awkward evening Monday as the president and others start eating. But officials say they’ve got it covered, though they have not been specific about how.

“We obviously try to be respectful of the needs of all of the high-profile visitors that come to the White House and to be respectful of their observances,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Friday.

Earnest suggested the dinner would be more focused on the conversation than the food and would not require the president to dine alone.

“It’s my understanding that we’re talking about a working dinner with a substantial number of people around the table,” Earnest said. “If Prime Minister Modi or other members who are participating in that working dinner choose not to eat based on their own religious or cultural observance, then we’ll certainly work to accommodate their needs as best we can.”— K. Hennessy for the Los Angeles Times, 2014

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Etiquette and French Courtesies

It is customary for world leaders to congratulate other world and domestic leaders, regardless of differences in policy or initial support, when an election has been won. It helps to foster healthy relationships between the two countries or states. Émile François Loubet was the 45th Prime Minister of France and later President of France

WASHINGTON, March 30.—Ambassador Cambon today delivered an autographed letter signed by President Loubet of France and directed to President MeKinley, informing the latter of M. Loubet's election to the Presidency of the French Republic. This is a graceful, personal compliment, from one President to another and permitted renewed assurances of goodwill between the two governments.- Los Angeles Herald,1899

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia©️Etiquette Encyclopedia 

Presidential Etiquette Privilege

Rank has its privilege, and for past Presidents, it offered even more –– “The President may walk where he pleases in the streets of Washington, meeting with no further notice than the tipping of the hat, unless of his own motion be stops to speak with someone.” 

The President In Public

It is a point of etiquette, universally observed at the national capital, never to obtrude attentions upon the President when he appears in public. On the street or in any place of amusement in Washington, the President has the undisputed privilege of appearing as any private citizen, he is never stared at unless it is by strangers, and his appearance in a theater is not greeted with any sort of demonstration. The President may walk where he pleases in the streets of Washington, meeting with no further notice than the tipping of the hat, unless of his own motion be stops to speak with someone. 

Office seekers and petitioners never venture to approach him on the street. His surest riddance of the importunities of the throng is to go out among them. Sir Julian Pauncefote, speaking of the American customs that had impressed him, remarked that, while a foreigner's first impression might be that the seeming indifference of the public toward the President when he appeared on the street or at the theater was the result of an exaggerated idea of democracy, it must become apparent on closer observation that it was the highest possible tribute of respect and consideration. —San Francisco Argonaut, 1899

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia 

White House Etiquette and Tone

Hamilton Jordan, President Carter’s “right hand man.” – “The White House yesterday issued a 33-page white paper contradicting a published account of a Jan. 27 barroom occurrence in which presidential aide Hamilton Jordan was slapped by a young woman. The account in Sunday's Washington Post Magazine asserted that Jordan was struck after spitting his drink down the woman's blouse. "I did not say or do anything that night to any woman that was improper, and I categorically deny that I spat my drink on anyone. I did have an unpleasant encounter with a woman at the bar, but it was not precipitated by me of anything that I had done," Jordan said in a statement released by the White House...” – Portion of a Washington Post article, February 21,1978

A Timely Historical Etiquette Post:

“Didn’t You Know, My Dears?” 

WASHINGTON - “You won't find it listed in the U.S. Constitution or in the transition team’s notebook, but one of the highest duties of a new President apparently is to uphold, enhance and adorn the social life of Washington. I am quite sure Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter and all the President’s men scarcely gave that a thought before moving into the White House. Now they are having to give it more time and attention than they would like. Believe me, it is a no-win proposition. I say that because of the latest federal flap over the tavern tribulations of Hamilton Jordan, the President's prominent non-chief of staff and man about town. But Jordan is only a recurring cross the Carters have to bear. 

There have been others and there will be more. For reasons rooted in local tradition, members of the First Family and the White House staff are supposed to be models of decorum and Emily Post etiquette. They are expected to be versed in the social graces and protocol; to remember what to do with a fork and what not to do with a finger bowl; to know when it is all right to go tieless and shoeless; that it is never alright to get pickled in public. This city is as stuffy as any other in America. It has its own ‘standards’ of acceptable conduct, born of a peculiar mixture of politicians, bureaucrats, diplomats, lobbyists and the press, all of whom coexist in a useful but fragile social relationship that is subject to shattering every four years. It does not react warmly to those who buck the system or offend its practitioners. 

Politically speaking, the Carter crowd already has discovered that Washington does not adjust easily to those who come in as ‘outsiders’ and want to stay that way. As even Jordan admits, the Carter administration wasted a lot of valuable momentum its first year because it thought it was unnecessary to first learn how the rest of political Washington works. Socially speaking, the same is true. In its own way, Washington is as provincial as Plains, Ga., although I doubt any of its social lions or lionesses would admit it. Lusting in one’s heart or in private is fine, even for a ranking White House official, but heavens, not in a public place like Sarsfield’s singles’ bar or at a posh Barbara Walters dinner party. The trouble is that Washington expects, even wants, those who live and work in the White House to be like the preacher’s family in a small town: above reproach. The White House is the sun of the local solar system. Everything here revolves around it, socially as well as governmentally. It sets the climate in which Washington lives. But expecting local folk to be always happy with the social tone set by the White House, is as futile as expecting people to be happy about the weather. 

During the Eisenhower years, when I first came here, nobody accused administration officials of risqué behavior. But, my, how they grumbled about the stodginess of the White House social scene. Dullsville was replaced by Camelot when the Kennedys came in. Washington was entranced, intrigued and enlivened by the social style of the young President and his Jacqueline. The Johnsons set a more down-home and boisterous pace, but it was still judged to be within the Washington tradition. The Nixons tried hard but it came off as too much pretension, while the Fords’ social example was rated as sort of a Grand Rapids version of the LBJ era. The social tone being set by the Carters is more permissive, more do-your-own-thing, than Washington society would like. And that goes equally for Amy reading a book at a State Dinner or boozy bar-hopping by Jordan, Jody Powell and top presidential assistants. 

Mr. Carter came to town determined to govern more openly than any president before him. His Cabinet members and high appointees were to have no conflicts of interest, no hidden motives, no cozy deals out of public view. His style of governing was going to be like living in Macy’s window. But Washington, and perhaps a good part of the country, would prefer it if the Carter people would behave in public as though they were living in Macy’s window. Perhaps Mr. Carter is of a mind to insist on that, if only to protect himself from the political embarrassment of social misbehavior. It is not terribly uplifting for the country when the President’s White House legal counsel has to be sent out, on government time, to take a sworn statement from a bartender that the President’s highest assistant did ‘no spitting, no touching’ during an altercation with a young woman at the bar.” – Editorial in The Desert Sun, 1978

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Washington Centenary Etiquette

William Henry Harrison was the 9th President of the United States. The last president born as a British subject, Harrison died of pneumonia merely 31 days into his term, thereby serving the shortest tenure in United States presidential history. He was the first president to die in office. Harrison's death briefly sparked a constitutional crisis, leaving unsettled Constitutional questions as to the presidential line of succession. 

If we could be carried back into the 18th century we should behold a country totally unfamiliar to us, and the material transformation which the progress of a hundred years has wrought, but measures a corresponding change in the national attitude. Though only the Chief Magistrate of a Government which was viewed with scant respect abroad, and composed of a few factious states that offered many intricate puzzles in statecraft, and sharply checked any extension of the executives power, nevertheless the Republican Court was hedged in by much more formality than is now permitted, to rule the White House.

Were we to apply the principle of evolution to social forms, we could see how well they have been demonstrated in the changes wrought in the etiquette of the Federal Capital. Washington's attendance, upon Congress in a cream-colored coach, drawn by six white horses, with outriders and postilions, escorted by the Secretary of State and the Secretary of the Treasury, savored of Kingly state. His receptions were chillingly formal, but in strict accordance with his sense of Presidential propriety, which forbade the ceremonial of hand-shaking as too familiar. England's yoke had been thrown off, but her influence was still apparent in the aristocratic tinge of society and the imitation of her form.

As the notion of the Republic has been developed, these remaining traces of Royal ceremonies have disappeared, until now. President Harrison steps from the ranks of private citizenship into the executive chair of a nation great in extent and influence without any essential change in the etiquette of his intercourse with his fellow-citizens, and now Americans see nothing derogatory to the indignity of the high position when our President serves his guests to refreshments or assists them in the cloakroom. 

These changes have deep seated causes. The cheers which will re-echo for President Harrison on his progress to New York will have a widely different keynote from those that greeted Washington. The pulse of the nation, then struggling to its feet, beat high with hope and with fear for their new Government. Under the Confederation, the United States were hopelessly drifting toward anarchy, and the terrors of the French revolution filled American elites with forebodings for their own future. 

The Federal Government seemed to offer a remedy, but might not the President become an absolute Monarch, and the Senate arrogate to itself aristocratic privileges and relentlessly crush the liberty of the States. Thus it was that a deep undercurrent of anxious emotion surged through the hearts of the citizens who greeted Washington, while the cheers which will resound for Harrison as he follows in his predecessor's footsteps will arise from hearts full of proud satisfaction in their President, and trusting with perfect confidence in the form of Government that has so well stood the test of the century, and under which the country has achieved such unparalleled progress. — Pacific Rural Press, 1889

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia 

Presidential Theater Etiquette

President-elect attacks "Hamilton" saying Vice- President elect, Mike Pence, was 'harassed' by 'very rude' cast who stopped the show to confront VP sitting in the audience - 'We are the diverse America who are alarmed and anxious that your new administration will not protect us, our planet, our children'. Pence has been slammed for seeing the play, while the crowd booed him and his family. The booing was indeed harassment, but was the cast's plea, as well? Perhaps a more polite way to address Mr. Pence with their concerns, would have been to invite him and his family backstage to meet the cast after the show.

It is a point of etiquette, universally observed at the national capital, never to obtrude attentions upon the President when he appears in public. On the street or in any place of amusement in Washington, the President has the undisputed privilege of appearing as any private citizen, he is never stared at unless it is by strangers, and his appearance at a theater is not greeted with any sort of demonstration. 

The President may walk where he pleases in the streets of Washington, meeting with no further notice than the tipping of the hat, unless of his own motion he stops to speak with someone. Office seekers and petitioners never venture to approach him in the street. His surest riddance of the importunities of the throng is to go out among them. 

Sir Julian Pauncefote, speaking of the American customs that had impressed him, remarked that, while a foreigner's first impression might be that the seeming indifference of the public toward the President when be appeared on the street or at the theater was the result of an exaggerated idea of democracy, it must become apparent on closer observation that it was the highest possible tribute of respect and consideration. — San Francisco Argonaut, 1899

Etiquette Enthusiast Maura J Graber is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Olympics Etiquette Breach

The 1932 Summer Olympics, (the Games of the X Olympiad) were held in Los Angeles. No other cities had made a bid to host. Many nations and athletes that would normally participate, were unable to pay for the trip, as they were held during a worldwide Great Depression. Those who did pay for the trip, felt personally snubbed by the President of the United States, due to his visible absence.

Did a U.S. President Medal in Rudeness?

The Los Angeles Illustrated Daily News quoted foreign athletes attending the Olympic games as saying that failure of President Hoover to open the games “seemed like a breach of international etiquette.” — Los Angeles, July 28, 1932

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Royal Etiquette Confusion

"In an era of gentlemen adventurers, Theodore Roosevelt stood apart." — Travel and Leisure Magazine

Shortly after leaving the White House, the former U.S. President left for sites beyond the U.S. borders. World Monarchs did not know how to treat someone who no longer carried the title of "President," but that of "Colonel" and wherever he went, confusion followed.

The Colonel's Triumphal Progress in Confusing the Royal Courts 

Sore disturbance is caused by the advent of the Colonel among the crowned heads. The Court Chamberlains, the Lords of the Powder Closet and the lesser dignitaries who regulate the ceremonial observance that doth hedge a King are deeply agitated, making search for precedents and finding none. 

If Roosevelt were President of the United States the matter would be comparatively simple, but here is a man without official rank, who, nevertheless, must be received with almost royal honors. As the favorite son of the most powerful nation on the globe, Citizen Roosevelt bears a representative character that defies all precedent. 

Contemporary European Monarchs, who are men of the world, recognize the conditions and act on their judgment, ignoring traditions. But the situation causes acute distress to the custodians and interpreters of the severe and rigid etiquette that governs Courts. Any breakdown of these rules takes on the aspect of sacrilege among the minor dignitaries, who, in fact, owe their official existence to their function of making a hedge for royalty. 

At Copenhagen, for instance, the Chamberlains and superior Butlers of the Court were perplexed because the Colonel was compelled, by non-delivery of his baggage, to sit at the Royal Board in his old clothes. But the King of Denmark had more sense and at once accepted the situation. 

Emperor Wilhelm has announced that he will personally meet the Colonel at the railway station in Berlin and conduct him in one of the Royal automobiles to the castle. This is a distinction hitherto reserved for crowned heads. 

It need not be doubted that King Edward will not be outdone in courtesy by the Kaiser. It is a triumphal progress that the Colonel makes, breaking all precedents and shattering the consecrated code of Court etiquette. — San Francisco Call, 1910

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia 

U.S. State Dinner Etiquette

Grover Cleveland, a bachelor when he first became President, had to depend upon someone other than a wife to preside over the White House during his first administration. His choice was his sister, Rose. Miss Rose Elizabeth Cleveland, was deemed a young woman of “fine culture, high attainments and superior character.”

At a State Dinner, the etiquette of the White House is exactly the reverse of the custom at a private dinner. The guests assemble in the East Room and await the President and his wife, who appear at the stroke of the clock. Woe betide the late guest! He has committed a national or international breach of etiquette.

At the table the President is served first, his wife next, then the guests, in order of precedence. An invitation to the White House is a command, and takes precedence of all others, even of a dinner at one's own house. An infringement of this rule would be regarded as a shocking breach of the amenities. The President's sister may be at the helm of the Whits House, as Mrs. McElroy was during President Arthur's administration, and Miss Rose Cleveland (being a part of Mr. Cleveland's first administration); but her position is never like that of the President's wife.

She has much more latitude, and although she follows in a general way the etiquette laid down for the President's wife, she has by no means the recognised official standing of the "first lady of the land." The younger and more inexperienced a woman is when she enters the White House, the more likely she is to succeed; since she is likely to do as she is told, without presuming to act upon her own judgment. This is one secret of Mrs. Cleveland's success. — The Sausalito News, 1897

 🍽️Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber of The RSVP Institute of Etiquette, is the Site Editor of the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia  

Etiquette for Former President

Theodore Roosevelt in Egypt, 1910 — Of all US Presidents, Theodore Roosevelt is the only one whose greatness and popularity increased when he left the office. When he toured Europe in 1910, as "Colonel Roosevelt," he was hailed as the most famous man in the world. Crowned heads vied to put him up in their castles and palaces. Etiquette note: When a President leaves office, the title of President is not supposed to be used, unless it is used in the title "Former President." But we continue to see and hear former US Presidents referred to as "President" on television and radio programs. The job is a temporary one and the title belongs only to the current office holder. 

Monarchs Perplexed About Etiquette Regarding “the Colonel”

WHAT to do with Roosevelt, or rather about Roosevelt? Lord Cromer is reported to have audibly thanked his God that the Colonel made no sally upon India, where the relations between the British Raj and the natives are even more strained than in Egypt. 

The cautious British statesman conceives of the Colonel as one who goes about dropping matches in any convenient powder magazine that lies in his itinerary. The Colonel has such an overpowering personality, that they never know what he will do next. But they always know it after it is done.

Therefore King Edward is reported to be no little perplexed and, in a word, frightened about the advent of the Colonel. A nice, old gentleman who has been carefully fenced about all his life with rigid barriers of exacting Court etiquette and saturated with an atmosphere of polite deference may look forward with some dread to meeting one who speaks his mind so bluntly. 

The Colonel is not skilled in the observances of a court where the worst crime in the calendar is the faux pas. So the King is reported to be anxiously considering whether the rules of Court etiquette might not be used as a convenient shelter in which to hide.

The Kaiser is different. He is not bothered by etiquette and precedent. He makes precedents, and is ready to meet Roosevelt, man to man. There is no flutter in the Imperial dovecotes at Potsdam. The Kaiser has a homely taste for plain living and high thinking. He bid his guest to potluck on sauerkraut and sausage, it may be and bids Polly put the kettle on, for a big talkfest is on the way. 

Princes and potentates are all human in their, several ways, and some prefer the heady brew, while others like to look upon the tea when it is pink. — San Francisco Call, 1910

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia 

Question of Presidential Etiquette

Infanta Eulalia, Duchess of Galliera was the youngest daughter and child of Queen Isabella II of Spain and Francis, Duke of Cadiz, sister of King Alfonso XII and aunt of his son King Alfonso XIII. Very unconventional as a Spanish royal, on her visit to the US in 1893, she raised eyebrows by smoking. And rather than have mass in a luxurious Roman Catholic church cathedral, she attended mass in a poor parish. It was also reported that Eulalia even snubbed a social event to "eat sausages" at the Chicago World's Fair, just like a common attendee. According to www.EdwardianPromenade.com, "She later courted more controversy when she tried to divorce her husband, and when she became the official go-between for wealthy, social-climbing Americans and European noble families (the grateful Americans of course showered Eulalia with automobiles or the loaning of yachts)."

It's a Question of Etiquette

and a Matter of Form

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Infanta Situation 
"Bothering the Diplomats" 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Shalt President Cleveland Return Eulalia's Visit? 

Now the Momentous Problem

Special to The Morning Call

Washington, May 14, 1893 — lt was learned to-day that the representatives of Spain and the United States have thus far failed to reach a satisfactory understanding regarding the programme of courtesies to be extended between the President and the Infanta Eulalia in the course of her stay in Washington.

According to custom, the Princess, at a convenient period after her arrival, would call upon the President and Mrs. Cleveland at the White House. Whether or not the President should in return call at the Princess's quarters in the hotel is the question, upon the settlement of which depends the future course of the Infanta.

The Spanish representatives, it is understood, insist that a return visit to the Princess is one that is due by courtesy and should be paid. They argue that the Princess is the personal representative of the Queen Regent, and will come to the United States upon the express invitation of Congress. Under these conditions, and these only, they feel that a return visit should be paid. 

If the Infanta were traveling through the country as a tourist merely, they say, she would pay her respects to the President, and no return visit from him would be expected. The Spanish officials are quoted as saying that the courtesy which should obtain among individuals of the same rank, and not etiquette, demands that the visit of the Infanta be reciprocated by the President.

The subject has been very thorougly discussed in Washington and Madrid, and a telegram from the latter capital printed. On Saturday morning, expressing the apprehension that the Infanta's health would not permit her to coutinue on her journey to the United States, is construed here as preparing the way for her return to Spain from Cuba if it should be found necessary to change tho original plan. The situation is embarrassing, and many plans have been made of expedients to relieve it. 

One of these, it is understood, was that the Infanta and her suite be entertained at the White House during her stay, thus obviating altogether the difficulty over the return visit. There is no precedent for the guidance of the officials here, as no one assuming to be the personal representative of a sovereign has ever visited this country.

Havana, May 14 .—The Infanta Eulalia and her husband attended a military review yesterday afternoon and in the evening went. to a ball at the Casino Espagnol: It is reported that she will embark to-morrow for New York. — San Francisco Call, 1893

Etiquette Enthusiast Maura J Graber is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

White House Etiquette, 1897

Mrs. Grover Cleveland experimented with the White House protocol.

Precedence and Protocol 

of Being the U.S. President's Wife

in the 1890s

When the President and his wife drive out, the President sits on the right hand and his wife on the left, says the Illustrated American. If there are others in the carriage, whether ladies or gentlemen, they must sit with their backs to the horses. 

When Mrs. Cleveland was first married she tried the experiment of placing her mother opposite the President and herself in the Presidential landau, but the people laughed at it so immoderately and professed to think Mrs. Folsom (as she was then) to be the maid, that it was speedily dropped. When the President's wife drives alone, she sits in the right-hand corner — the place of honor. 

The lady of the White House cannot set foot within those splendid houses in Washington whose flagstaffs mark the foreign embassy or legation. She could not go without the President, and as an embassy or legation is technically a part of the country it represents, the President could not go — so that she never sees the inside of a diplomatic house as long as she presides at the executive mansion. 

The President dines only at Cabinet houses and his wife cannot dine anywhere without him. President Arthur dined with Judges of the Supreme Court and with Senators, but as he had no wife, the whole system was very much simplified for him. 

The President's wife may, if she chooses, go to luncheons where there are no gentlemen, or to teas, both being regarded as strictly informal, but the danger of giving offense by accepting one invitation and declining another is so great, that it is seldom or never risked. — The San Francisco Call, 1897

🍽️Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor of the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia