  This work presents high $S/N$ spectroscopic observations of a representative
sample of nearby elliptical galaxies. These observations provide a strong test
of models for the formation of elliptical galaxies and their star formation
histories. Combining these data with the Gonzalez (1993) data set, a volume
limited sample of 45 galaxies has been defined. Results are in agreement with
previous studies: the existence of the metallicity hyper-plane and the Z-plane
of Trager et al. (2000) is confirmed, and the distribution is clearly due to
physical variations in stellar population parameters and not measurement
uncertainty. Trends between stellar population parameters and galaxy structural
parameters suggest that angular momentum may determine the chemical abundance
of a galaxy at a given mass.
