Dean Rosovsky will meet with the senior faculty of the Government Department next week to discuss the department's nomination for tenure of Doris H. Kearns, associate professor of Government, members of the faculty said yesterday.

Don K. Price, professor of Government and dean of the faculty of public administration, said yesterday that the meeting is "not a normal one," but that he does not know whether Rosovsky will ask the department to reconsider its recommendation of October 1974.

Rosovsky will "consult" the department because of recent disclosures that Kearns does not plan to publish the manuscript she submitted to the senior faculty before it nominated her for tenure. Harvey C. Mansfield '53, chairman of the department on leave this year, said yesterday.

No Comment

Rosovsky declined to comment last night on the matter.

Kearns attempted in late April to terminate her contract with Basic Books publishing house in New York for publication of the 480-page manuscript, about former President Lyndon B. Johnson. Kearns served as an aide to Johnson in 1968.

Basic Books refused to terminate the contract, although Kearns subsequently, signed a contract with Simon & Schuster to co-author a new book about Johnson with Richard N. Goodwin, a former aide to the president.

Basic Books last Friday sued Kearns for breach of contract, and Kearns said she is now preparing a counter-suit.

Mansfield said yesterday that a possible ground for reconsideration of the nomination is "the question of whether the manuscript that we saw is going to be made available to the scholarly public" or whether a book, altered "by the process of co-authorship," will be published.

He said that if Kearns publishes a different book with Goodwin, the Government Department will have been cheated of a scholarly credit that it expected when it voted to grant Kearns tenure.

Kearns was not available for comment Wednesday or Thursday, but said last week that co-authorship would make the book a better one.

Chance for Tenure

Goodwin said yesterday, from Washington, "From my conversations with her. I don't think she thinks it [changing the nature of the book] hurt her chances for tenure."

He said that he and Kearns have completed about 300 pages of the new work.

President Bok and Rosovsky, followed by the Corporation and the board of Overseers, must approve a nomination for tenure before it becomes an appointment.