One thing I kept thinking about while reading this is transactional leadership doesn’t seem like leadership to me. To me it seems much more as interactions between certain people at a certain time. There may be a difference in power but i don’t necessarily see it as a leader follower relationship in the examples Burns gave, except elected officials. However with elected officials some people may give them their vote not because they follow them but because they see them as the best option in a bunch of not great options. They do not fully support them.
I think with transformational leadership is where you start to see a leader follower relationship develop. It takes time for this relationship to develop not just a one time thing. It takes multiple interactions.
I can see where you’re coming from because it seems that the leader you are thinking of is someone that motivates change and helps inspire others rather than the leader that just has more power and decision making abilities than the people they lead. I do, however, think the argument can be made that both those types of people are leaders, just different types. It seems that transactional leadership requires less of a leadership follower relationship because one person has power and the other is incentivized to do as they say.