The Sexes: Hormones in the White House

"I wouldn't see anything wrong with a woman President," Democrat Patsy Mink said after her 1964 election to Congress. Dr. Edgar Berman, Hubert Humphrey's personal physician and confidant, sees plenty wrong with a female Chief Executive. When he said so to the Congresswoman from Hawaii at a meeting of the Democratic Party's Committee on National Priorities, he set Washington abuzz and feminists afire.

Dr. Berman argued that women are limited in their leadership potential by physiological and psychological factors, especially during the menstrual cycle and menopause. "Suppose," he speculated, "that we had a menopausal woman President who had to make...

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