WASHINGTON, 11 February 2005 — Virginians, who wear their pants so low their underwear shows, may want to consider investing in a pair of suspenders. Despite the current fashion trend among some younger Americans, one freshman lawmaker says he heard so many people complaining about the “in-your-face fad”, he decided to do something about it.

T. Howell Jr., of Norfolk, is a freshman in Virginia’s House of Delegates, and a full time barber. Howell says that since he introduced it last month, he has been deluged with calls and e-mails, mostly positive.

Howell told local newspapers that he kept hearing from customers in his barbershop that something needed to be done about young people who wear their pants around their knees, exposing their underwear. So, he decided to act.

The state’s House of Delegates passed his bill Tuesday, which authorizes a $50 fine for anyone who displays his or her underpants in a “lewd or indecent manner”.

Delegate Lionnell Spruill, a Democrat who opposed the bill, asked his colleagues to remember their own youthful fashion follies and how they dressed or wore their hair when they were in their teens.

On Tuesday, before elections, Spruill pulled out the race card, saying the measure is an unconstitutional attack on young blacks that would force parents to take off work to accompany their children to court just for making a fashion statement.

“This is a foolish bill, Mr. Speaker, because it will hurt so many,” Spruill said before the measure was approved 60-34. It now goes to the state Senate.

Spruill and Howell, also a Democrat, are both black.

The American Civil Liberties Union has stepped in to the fracas, saying: “The bill will not withstand constitutional scrutiny.”

But Howell says if the droopy-drawers bill is to be his legacy, then so be it.

“I’m not expecting the police to go out and make massive arrests. But I think if there’s a law saying you can’t walk down the street with 8 or 10 inches of your undergarments showing, at least some of them might stop doing it,” Howell told media after the vote. “That’s why they’re called undergarments. They’re supposed to be worn under something else.”

Could there be a generation gap at work here? Howell is, after all, 67.

No, he said. He has also heard from plenty of young people who applaud his stand.

And it is not about race, either, he said. Howell is black, as are the youths who first popularized the low-riding style. The droopy-drawers look has now become invasive across the country.

Linda Smiley, a white General Assembly office worker, said the bill goes beyond race. She praised Howell for his efforts.

“I told my son, ‘If you walk around with your underwear showing, I won’t wait for a state law,’” Smiley said. “I’ll fine you $50 myself.”