It will undoubtedly become a classic in the literature on Congress. Mr. Rothman combines use of the finest historical research methods with a sense of what are important questions in studying political institutions. I hope that other historians will be encouraged by this effort to begin to fill the great chasms in our knowledge of the historical development of Congress.
-- Charles O. Jones, Department of Government, University of Arizona

This remarkable book tells us a great deal about the Senate... Dr. Rothman’s thesis is that the anarchical Senate of the postwar period, the Senate of Charles Sumner and Roscoe Conkling...had become an adequately efficient body by 1901. More than that it was an independent power.
-- D. W. Brogan Spectator

A most readable account of the profession of politics itself... For those who would understand the present Senate as well as those of the past Politics and Power offers a ready and valuable reference.
-- Washington Star

An incisive study of the history of the United States Senate in the post-Civil-War era, when it occupied a pivotal place in the operations of the federal government... [The author’s] striking reinterpretation clarifies an important phase of the history of American institutions.
-- Atlantic Monthly