SOURCE: "Politics by Other Means," in Saturday Review/World, Vol. 1, No. 15, April 6, 1974, pp. 25-7.

Kirkpatrick is a former professor of political science and American ambassador to the United Nations. In the following review of The Imperial Presidency, Kirkpatrick finds that Schlesinger's analysis of the expansion of the power of the president of the United States lacks balance and is clouded by his political loyalties.

We move quickly in America from political conflict to constitutional controversy. The authority and ambiguity of the Constitution encourage recourse to its provisions to strengthen an argument or to prove a point. Since no given division of powers can be proved to be exactly what the Founding Fathers had in mind, dissatisfaction with incumbents is readily translated into dissatisfaction with the balance of power among the branches of government. Not only does constitutional debate seem more serious, more elevated, than simple criticism of personalities...