Base Classes and java.lang.IllegalAccessException

[Leschke Scott-QA2775]

We're using Axis 1.0 and are having a problem with serialization using BeanSerializer. 
We have a number of classes that are public and have public default constructors but 
they extend abstract classes that have package level visibility. For example:

abstract class A
{
   protected A()
   {}
}

public class B
   extends A
{
   public B()
   {
      super();
   }
}

When BeanSerializer attempts to serialize B, it throws 
java.lang.IllegalAccessException because A is not public. Changing the visibility of A 
to public corrects the problem. Is this an artifact of Java reflection? An Axis bug?

Thanks,

Scott