What changed hands?
U.S. Constitution, official first printing. Exact price comes from the Constitution lot card, not the rounded USD 43.2 million prose figure.
A printing, not the abstract document
The object sold was an official first printing of the Constitution’s final text. Describing the transaction simply as buying the Constitution can blur the distinction between an individual historical printing and the constitutional document itself.
Why the extra digits matter
The source’s lot card gives $43,173,000, while its prose rounds the amount to $43.2 million. We preserve the more precise figure in the evidence panel. Rounding is useful for a headline, but the underlying record should stay visible.
Read the number carefully
An auction result captures a particular object, a particular sale and the buyers competing on that occasion. It does not establish the value of every similar object, or what this one would sell for today.
Our selection keeps historical results separate from asking prices and estimates. Where the cited report does not break out fees, we say so rather than inventing a hammer price.
Sale documentation: The Macklowe Collection Highlights $1.3 Billion Week ↗
What does “source reviewed” mean?
We checked the published report against the amount and object listed here. That does not independently authenticate the object or confirm settlement of the transaction.
