She was supposed to be elated. I would disagree that "is supposed" is a passive construction in this sentence, if for no other reason than intuitively I would say there is no hidden agent; nothing "supposed" her. I agree that "supposed to" is one of many quasi-modals, as linguists have often called them, in English. Note that many people will use "supposed to" in fragment form, indicating that the two words are bound together probably as a single morpheme. For instance, I've often heard people respond to a question about why somebody has to do something with "I'm supposed to." I don't see that this fragment would be acceptable if "to" were an infinitive linked w/ "be" rather than "supposed". Larry Beason,Director English Composition Program Dept. of English Eastern Washington University Cheney WA 99004 [log in to unmask] WAC Page: http://ewu66649.ewu.edu/WAC.html