The Sexes: Love and Politics

Pat Nixon urged her husband to burn the Watergate tapes. Muriel Humphrey, who heard secondhand that Hubert had decided to run for President in 1968, sent him a sarcastic telegram: "Let me know if I can be of help." And a woman overnight guest at the L.B.J. ranch was awakened in bed by a familiar drawl, "Move over−this is yore President."

Such gossip is the stuff of Washington politics−and of Myra MacPherson's new book, The Power Lovers: An Intimate Look at Politicians and Their Marriages (Putnam; $10). But MacPherson, 40, a feature writer...