ABSTRACT
Professor Beard interpreted the making of the Constitution as a simple, clear-cut series of events. His analysis led him to formulate three basic propositions, one regarding the Philadelphia Convention and two regarding the contest over ratification. This chapter focuses attention upon these three key propositions of Beard's economic interpretation of the Constitution. It is impossible to justify Beard's interpretation of the Constitution as "an economic document" drawn by a "consolidated economic group whose property interests were immediately at stake". Beard asserted that public securities were the dynamic element within the dynamic element in the ratification. There were, indeed, some holders of public securities among the opponents of the Constitution and, contrary to Beard's assertion, they were as numerous as the security holders among the supporters of the Constitution. Beard's essential error was in attempting to formulate a single set of generalizations that would apply to all the states.
