Despite a political career that spans nearly two decades. Ronald Reagan's decision-making process remains elusive, almost most mysterious. As Senior Correspondent John Stacks says of the subject of this week's cover, "Reagan appears simple and straightforward, but he is actually complicated. All of us want to know about how he works and thinks, what kinds of advice he accepts and rejects, how he adapts to challenges and change." Stacks first interviewed Reagan in 1967, not long after the former movie star had won the first of his two terms as Governor of California. Fifteen years later, Stacks finds that outwardly "Reagan hasn't changed at all. He's a monument to constancy."

White House Correspondent Douglas Brew, who has covered Reagan since he began campaigning for the presidency three years ago, spent a month researching this week's cover story. He too has found the President complex and occasionally impenetrable. Says he: "On one level, major issues, he is very predictable, but in his asides and small details, he is often quite surprising."

Both correspondents were also surprised by the openness they found while talking to two dozen of the President's closest associates, from the First Lady to members of the Cabinet. Some eagerly ventured their own theories about Reagan's makeup. Others were keen to discuss, in Stacks' words, "a political touch that causes even those who disagree to second-guess their own wisdom." One source so warmed to the topic that a scheduled 45-min. interview lasted more than five hours.

The President too was generous with his time. Stacks and Brew interviewed him on a day when he was completing his MX speech, and was hoarse besides. "But Reagan was characteristically gracious and pleasant," says Stacks. "Even as his staff paced the room signaling their desire for an end to the interview, he invited more and more questions."

To give its readers a broad perspective on modern Presidents, TIME turned to former Time Inc. Editor-in-Chief Hedley Donovan, who served a year in the White House as a senior adviser to Jimmy Carter. Donovan offers a comprehensive commentary on the presidency. Having spent much of his career reflecting on nine Presidents from F.D.R. to the present, he also proposes the qualities that future aspirants should possess, not to get the job, but to do it well.

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