The Party Cabinet by Eric Konigsberg, was originally published in the March 1997 issue of Vogue.
When Kim Cubine was in college, politics meant running her best friend’s campaign for homecoming queen.
But that was years ago.
Photo: Getty Images
She had a hard time getting out of the car because of her beaded black gown.
“You have to learn to sit down and stand up without bending your knees.”
There were nearly 5,000 inside, clogging the main hall.
Did her friend win?
Cubine rolled her eyes.
“Hell, yes.”
This weekend, the stakes are higher.
Cubine is responsible for the welfare of more than 100,000 who have descended upon the capital for the inauguration.
Over the past three weeks, she has pulled six all-nighters.
Suddenly, they’re not.
Hartigan, 30, is deputy to Clinton’s campaign-finance cochairman Terry McAuliffe.
“She knows heads of state, senators, movie stars,” Cubine says.
“But I’ve never seen her so excited as getting to meet Hootie.”
“Cue,” she says to Cubine.
“This is really cool.”
Just ten days earlier, the mood hadn’t been so unabashedly upbeat.
“We hadn’t had a Democrat in the White House for twelve years.
We were so excited we didn’t know how to handle it.
This one will be differentand understated.”
The week before the inauguration, Jordan’s office was the lone oasis of calm within the maelstrom.
The last great Washington bash of the millennium.
Added the Post: “Mrs. Clinton, pants.
kindly, just think about them.")
As it turned out, the First Lady’s golden Oscar de la Renta gown was a smash.
Same for the coral suit she wore to her husband’s swearing-in.
(She, too, it appears, learned some lessons from four years ago.)
Chelsea, at sixteen, seemed better able to appreciate all the festivities this time.
Over at the California Ball, Ann Jordan beamed with contentment in a long, black sheath.
There is no one more qualified to captain an event of this magnitude than Jordan.
Over the years she has been on the giving end of hundreds of dinners and benefits.
She has helped plan the Kennedy Center’s annual honors ceremony six times.
She is that rare woman in Washington who does not shrink from the term hostess, or even socialite.
I’ve done three weddings for my three daughters.”
Two years ago, her boss asked his old friend Jeff Jenkinsa Republicanto contribute to Clinton’s war chest.
“That meant me.
So when I was out in L.A., he took me to dinner.
I came home with a $ 1,000 check.”
“I told him I was worried,” she said.
“I was moving out to California with no job, no ring.
And the president said he was really proud of me.
He said, ‘I told you it’d work out.’
"
If only the inauguration were that easy.
Each ticketranging from $100 to $3,000 (with no freebies this time) would be crucial.
“We have to pay for the whole thing with sales this year,” Hartigan said.
Ann Jordan called upon business consultant Argelia Rodriguez.
“The people want to own a piece of history,” Rodriguez told me.
I don’t think it’s gaudy.
QVC is upscale; it presents values we are comfortable with.
Now, some of those other home-shopping networks I don’t know about.”
They all carried beepers (which were used even within the building).
“It’s just like at the White House,” Andy explained.
About fifteen members of the press office attended, escorted by the U.S. military.
What most of the inaugural planning amounts to is constituent work.
Underneath Cousin’s watch there are more than 30 “desks.”
I asked if I could observe the activity in the VIP wing.
We have a lot of Jewish people coming into town for this."
Just as I dropped in on Cubine, she received a request from an inaugural press secretary.
“NBC News wants to know if they can film the tickets for a visual,” he said.
Cubine shook her head.
“Tell them ‘security risk,'” she said.
In the end, every ticket to all fourteen balls was sold.
The Clintons, of course, stopped in at each one for a dance, then moved quickly on.
There were some notable absences.
For the women of the Inauguration Committee, it was a relief just to have made it this far.
Kim Cubine and Laura Hartigan got separated at the Tennessee Ball.
Kim went on to the Arkansas Ball, Laura to three others.
Little Feat were playing, and Laura found Kim sitting at a table with her date.
