She was privy to her husband's thoughts and anxieties as the 1975 constitutional crisis developed, but in his autobiography "Matters for Judgement" (1978) Sir John Kerr strongly denied she had either dissuaded him from warning the Prime Minister Gough Whitlam that he was going to dismiss him, or that she herself had a political axe to grind. However, Paul Kelly claims that she was shown the draft dismissal letter on the morning of 11 November, and that the sentence "It is for the people now to decide the issue, which the two leaders have failed to decide" was added at her suggestion.