Obviously, I can move the constants line elsewhere and/or use the $
directive within the table but I thought that this was an inconsistency
in the parsing of org files?  Maybe not?

Org up to date and verified with emacs -Q.

Thanks,
eric

-- 
: Eric S Fraga (0xFFFCF67D), Emacs 24.3.50.2, Org release_8.2.5h-687-g9d39aa