¹ This point is made forcefully in North, Douglass C., Structure and Change in Economic History (New York, 1981), Ch. 3.Google Scholar

² Beard, Charles A., An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution of the United States (New York, 1913, 1935).Google Scholar

³ This and the preceding statement represent a synthesis of the treatment of Beard's thesis in most current economic history textbooks. For examples, see Brownlee, W. Elliot, Dynamics of Ascent (New York, 1979), pp. 112–13;Google ScholarNorth, Douglass C., “Government and the American Economy” in Davis, Lance et al. , American Economic Growth (New York, 1972), pp. 26–27;Google ScholarWalton, Gary and Robertson, Ross, History of the American Economy (New York, 1983), pp. 123–25;Google ScholarHughes, Jonathan, American Economic History (Glenview, Illinois, 1983), p. 141.Google Scholar

⁴ Beard, An Economic Interpretation, pp. 16–18.Google Scholar

⁵ Although we believe this paragraph accurately reflects Charles Beard's thesis, other scholars may not agree. Beard's An Economic Interpretation is confusing because he uses terms imprecisely, continuously interchanging “economic interest” with “class interest,” “class” with “group,” and “economic interpretation” with “economic determinism.” As a result, Beard's thesis sufficiently broad and ambiguous to offer support for a variety of interpretations. Many scholars consider his fundamental contribution to be a “class analysis” of the motives of the Founding Fathers. We do not accept this as an accurate portrayal of Beard's thesis. But even if others do not accept our interpretation of Beard, we suggest that an important issue to analyze is whether the self—interests of delegates affected their voting behavior. Therefore, this paragraph more appropriately may be said to reflect a “Beardian” view rather than “Beard's” view.Google Scholar

⁶ See Blinkoff, Maurice, “The Influence of Charles A. Beard upon American Historiography,” University of Buffalo Studies, 12(1936), 1–84.Google Scholar

⁷ Brown, Robert E., Charles Beard and the Constitution: A Critical Analysis of An Economic Interpretation of the Constitution (Princeton, New Jersey, 1956);CrossRefGoogle ScholarMcDonald, Forrest, We the People: The Economic Origins of the Constitution (Chicago, 1958).Google Scholar

⁸ McDonald, We the People, p. 110.Google Scholar

⁹ Benson, Lee, Turner and Beard: American Historical Writing Reconsidered (Glencoe, Illinois, 1969), pp. 95–174.Google Scholar

¹⁰ Main, Jackson Turner, “Charles A. Beard and the Constitution: A Critical Review of Forrest McDonald's We the People,” William and Mary Quarterly, 17 (1960), 86–110;CrossRefGoogle ScholarSchuyler, Robert, “Forrest McDonald's Critique of the Beard Thesis,” Journal of Southern History, 27 (1961), 73–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹¹ Main, “Charles A. Beard,” pp. 92–102.Google Scholar

¹² Ferguson, E. James, The Power of the Purse: A History of American Public Finance, 1776–1790 (Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 1961);Google Scholar and Ferguson, , “The Nationalists of 1781–1783,” Journal of American History, 56 (1969), 241–64. It should be noted that Ferguson believes this correspondence to be coincidental.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹³ Main, Jackson Turner, The Antifederalists: Critics of the Constitution, 1781–1788 (Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 1961).Google Scholar

¹⁴ See Brownlee, Dynamics of Ascent; North, “Government”; Poulson, Economic History; Walton and Robertson, History of the Economy; Hughes, American Economic History.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Beard, An Economic Interpretation, p. xii and p. 73. The confusion over Beard's thesis in the history literature is discussed in detail in Benson, Turner and Beard.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Disentangling the influence of political factors from economic factors on voting behavior becomes difficult if economic interests are strongly correlated with political philosophy. This potential problem of multicollinearity may create difficulties of interpretation. This issue is discussed in more detail later in the paper.Google Scholar

¹⁷ McDonald, We the People;Google ScholarMain, “Charles A. Beard”; Main, Jackson Turner, Political Parties Before the Constitution (Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 1973);Google ScholarBrown, Richard D., “The Founding Fathers of 1776 and 1787: A Collective View,” William and Mary Quarterly, 33 (1976), 465–80;CrossRefGoogle ScholarLynd, Staughton, Anti-federalism in Dutchess County, New York (Chicago, 1962);Google ScholarPool, William C., “An Economic Interpretation of the Ratification of the Federal Constitution in North Carolina,” North Carolina Historical Review, 27 (1950), 119–41 (Pt. 1), 289–313 (Pt. 2), 437–61 (Pt. 3).Google Scholar

¹⁸ Brown, Richard D., “The Founding Fathers”; and Main, “Charles A. Beard”.Google Scholar

¹⁹ Main, Political Parties; Pool, “An Economic Interpretation”; and Lynd, Anti–federalism in Dutchess County.Google Scholar

²⁰ For more details on this aspect of the study, see McGuire, Robert A. and Ohsfeldt, Robert L., “A New Economic Interpretation of the Formation of the Constitution of the United States,” mimeo. For more details on our analysis of voting patterns over the individual issues at Philadelphia, see Robert A. McGuire and Robert L. Ohsfeldt, “Economic Interest Groups and Voting Patterns in the Constitutional Convention of 1787,” mimeo.Google Scholar

²¹ For a detailed discussion of logit analysis, see Hanushek, Eric and Jackson, John E., Statistical Methods for Social Scientists (New York, 1977), Ch. 7.Google Scholar

²² It follows that strategic voting behavior was less likely at the state ratifying conventions and, therefore, does not affect our statistical analysis.Google Scholar

²³ For additional details on the ratification aspect of the study, see McGuire, Robert A. and Ohsfeldt, Robert L., “A New Economic Interpretation of the Ratification of the Constitution of the United States,” mimeo.Google Scholar

²⁴ Our proxy variables for political factors may not represent political philosophy very well. Some relevant variables may have been omitted. If the omitted variables are not correlated with the included variables, no severe problems are created. If they are strongly correlated, there is a problem of interpretation because isolating the influences of the relevant variables becomes computationally impossible.Google Scholar

²⁵ For details on these proxy variables, see McGuire and Ohsfeldt, “A New Economic Interpretation of Formation” and ”A New Economic Interpretation of Ratification.”Google Scholar

²⁶ A conceptual problem inherent in the study is that the characteristics of the entire citizenry may be more relevant to an understanding of the Constitution than the characteristics of delegates alone. It has been argued the delegates represented the will of their constituents and not their personal interests. If this is true, researchers would need to analyze the characteristics of the citizenry (Bensen, Turner and Beard). There are at least two problems with this analytical approach. As a practical matter, the compilation of detailed profiles for the entire voting citizenry or even representative groups would be prohibitively costly. Also, the belief that the vote of a delegate was determined primarily by the will of his constituents and that his personal interests did not influence his voting behavior significantly is restrictive. In any case, an understanding of the relationship between the delegates' voting behavior and the delegates' characteristics is necessary for a complete understanding of the making of the Constitution.Google Scholar

²⁷ Beard argues that slaveowners might have opposed the Constitution because they feared adverse legislation concerning slavery and the slave trade, as well as the potential for “navigation acts” imposed on them by a national legislature controlled by the more populous northern states. Beard, however, thought this factor would be outweighed by slaveowners' other interests (for example, financial interests) and their desires for a stronger national government to quell possible slave revolts (Beard, An Economic Interpretation, pp. 29–30). Beard may have overestimated the importance of the expectation of slave revolts given that slaveowners, holding other economic interests constant, opposed the Constitution.Google Scholar