THE COMMUTER CONGRESS

摘要

In its midcentury heyday, the sen- ate Wives' Club, a charitable group, met at 10 o'clock each Tuesday morning in the Russell Caucus Room on Capitol Hill. Fifty or so wives-Democrats, Republicans, and, at least once, Jackie Kennedy-would sit together in Red Cross uniforms, rolling bandages and exchanging the intimate details of their lives. "We became close friends. We all lived here. We would see each other on weekends," remembers Ellen Proxmire, whose late husband, William Proxmire, spent three decades in the Senate. Eventually, in a nod to the growing number of females in Congress, the club changed its name to Senate Spouses, though Proxmire says most husbands never came.