Law Commons^™

The Protective Power Of The Presidency, Henry Paul Monaghan

Faculty Scholarship

Walter Bagehot's still-admired study of the English Constitution distinguished between its "dignified" and "efficient" parts. Bagehot argued that the English Constitution's "dignified" theory of parliamentary supremacy masked the (then) dominant reality of cabinet government. Attacking what he described as the "literary" theory of the American Constitution, Woodrow Wilson posited a similar distinction. Writing in 1885, Wilson asserted that the "literary" theory of American government embodied in Federalist's "ideal checks and balances of the federal system" obscured its efficient principle: "government by the chairmen of the Standing Committees of Congress." An ardent admirer of ministerial government, Wilson especially lamented the condition …