Congressional Government: a Study in American Politics. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin, 1885. First edition, inscribed by Wilson to Dr. W. D. Hoyt on the first blank. Publisher's blue cloth, spine gilt-lettered and with the Houghton Mifflin monogram, gray paper endpapers. 7 x 4 1/2 inches (17.75 x 11.5 cm); viii, 333, [1], 4 pp. ads. Head and toe of spine a trifle rubbed, light binding wear and soiling overall, the front free endpaper detached, front hinge just starting, a small bump to the foremargin with a resultant minute marginal tear in signatures 16 and 17.

A scarce presentation copy of Woodrow Wilson's first book. This work was written at age twenty-eight as his doctoral dissertation, while he was still a graduate student. It is inscribed to Dr. William D. Hoyt, Jr., the cousin of Woodrow Wilson’s first wife Ellen Axson Wilson. The book was extremely well received, and its success was a major factor in his appointment to a professorship at Princeton. It remains a classic critique of Congress, vide ANB: "Emulating Bagehot's realistic approach to British politics, Wilson portrayed how the US Constitution actually worked in contrast to its framers' theories as expressed in The Federalist. In his view, congressional committees dominated the government behind closed doors at the expense of both public discourse and presidential leadership."