My mother is in retail, my grandparents were in retail, and even a great uncle owned a small men's haberdashery in Berkeley that still bears his name. I've got retail in my blood.

And so I took particular interest in an opinion editorial from Monday's Wall Street Journal by American Enterprise Institute scholar Walter Berns, "Clothes for Working Women – or Working Girls?" Mr. Berns was responding to an earlier piece in the Journal which discussed the sexy office fashions displayed on the nighttime soaps and wondered if anyone dressed like that in real life. In his own piece, Berns makes a slightly tongue-in-cheek case for a federal dress code for women, suggesting that today's sexier styles may incite male lechery to a degree at which men cannot be expected to control themselves.

I would point out that what one finds on the runways of Milan and New York – and on prime time television – is generally not exactly what you find on the racks of department stores. Designers know that regular people don't wear "pointy-breasted bustier tops" as Berns suggests, and in fact, what you find in the shops is usually a moderated version of the runway's dramatic excess. And while it's true that fashion in the last few years has become more feminine, there still are not many office buildings filled with the kind of thigh-baring, skin-flashing outfits found on Los Angeles sound stages. Here in Washington, the fashion certainly runs more to the staid Talbots look than to flashy Versace-esque styles, even among younger women. The "Melrose"-ing of the workplace, then, is probably not as pervasive as Berns would have us believe.

His concerns still raise an important subject – the apparent disconnect between the semi-hysterical sanitization of the workplace and the blatant sexuality promoted by the fashion industry. According to Walter Olson's new book The Excuse Factory, the number of sexual harassment claims doubled between 1989 and 1993. There are, of course, cases of harassment that are reprehensible and disgusting, but there are others that border on the ridiculous. Nonetheless, the tension created by the specter of sexual harassment litigation in corporate American is powerful, breeding a false sterility in the workplace, hampering teamwork and crippling camaraderie.

Throw into this environment the reappearance of the micro-miniskirt and things get even more complicated. Without falling into the "she's asking for it" camp, is it possible to suggest that a woman is responsible for the message her appearance might convey? My mother, an executive with San Francisco’s Saks Fifth Avenue, tells me that first impressions are made within two seconds of meeting someone. Berns suggests that to wear some of today's sexier styles is to invite romantic overtures, or at least to knowingly inspire lechery. If my mother's right, then Berns must be onto something, for what is the first impression left by a 15 inch leather skirt?

The mixed signals are palpable. On the one hand is the campaign to strip colleagues of their sexuality through all manner of speech codes, employee manuals and sexuality workshops. On the other is the demand that women be allowed to advertise their sexuality without any repercussions or implications. One or the other has got to give.

The answer to this dilemma seems to be a matter of common sense and responsibility. The false firewalls set up by the harassment litigation industry remove responsibility from the choices one makes, even choices as basic as what to wear to work. Responsibility is the very thing we need to reintroduce – to the world in general and to the workplace specifically. It’s something to keep in mind while flipping through the pages of the fashion magazines. As someone once said, "Nothing in excess, everything in moderation."

—Katherine Post

Director of the Center for Enterprise and Opportunity