The Anti-federalists doc PDF

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anti federalists vs the federalist and the bill of rights...

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The Anti-Federalist opposed the ratification of the U.S. Constitution. However, they were never able to efficiently organize throughout all thirteen states, so they had to fight the ratification at every state convention. The AntiFederalists were more interested in power in the states, not power in the central government. Members that were a part of the Anti-Federalists usually included small farmers, landowners, shopkeepers, and laborers. Fighting for the ratification, the Anti-Federalists published a series of articles and delivered numerous speeches. With these speeches and articles, they discussed issues such as the excessive power of the national government at the expense of the state government, and the disguised monarchic powers of the president. The Articles of Confederation lasted from 1776 to 1789 and had more weaknesses than strengths it seems. It pretty much placed most of the power in the hands of the states. The Articles of Confederation in a sense failed the U.S. economy, since the government lacked the amount of power needed to enforce tax laws.

Challenges of the Articles of Confederation (article) | Khan Academy Anti-Federalists | The First Amendment Encyclopedia (mtsu.edu) Differences between Federalists and Antifederalists | Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History

The Anti-Federalist were afraid that the ratification of the 1787 U.S. Constitution would give the national government too much power. They were more in favor of a stronger state government. This group included landowners, shop owners and farmers. For the ratification to happen 9 or more state conventions needed to agree. To lobby against the ratification the Anti-Federalists put together The Anti-Federalist Papers that included writings and speeches and brought issues to the forefront. Some of their issues included:  Excessive power at the national government level. 

Uncertainty about federal court.



No Bill of Rights to protect individual liberties.

While the ratification happened there was a compromise of sorts that we know now as the Bill of Rights. Ultimately this was implemented to protect individual liberties. Prior to this was the Articles of Confederation that were signed in 1781. It was thought there were many more weaknesses than strengths. It allowed states to basically run as they would like. Because of this they were not required to give the National Government tax money. This forced the National Government into bankruptcy. This led to less confidence from other countries to work with the United States. Anti-Federalists | The First Amendment Encyclopedia (mtsu.edu) Weakness Of The Articles Of Confederation (historyrocket.com)

I will be choosing Anti-federalist for my discussion post and explain how both roles played out. The Federalist were the ones who supported the Consitiution while the Anti-Federalist opposed the ratification of the Constitution. The Anti-Federalist wanted small localized governments with limited authority and feared the bill of rights being taken away and that the Consitution would not be able to protect the rights of all people and each state. The AntiFederalist were lead by Patrick Henry, James Winthrop, Melancton Smith, and George Mason. The Federalist were led by John Adams, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, Rufus King, John Marshall, Timothy Pickering, and Charles Cotesworth Pinckney. The federalist believed one large government was necessary to make a better union and it would preserve liberty for all Americans. The Anti-Federalist included smaller business owners and laborers who were afraid of the government have way too much power and individual states not having enough. The Anti-Federalist published the The Anti-Federalist papers on September 25th, 1787 to oppose the ratification of the consistution. These papers brought to life many concerns like as stated before too much power for the national government, lack of bill of rights, ability of Congress taking away power, and more. The consitution needed to be ratified and this created a huge issue and the Anti-Federalist calling for a stronger union which thus created the Constitution on June 21st. 1788.

Some weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation were that the congress had no power in coin money so each stat had to develop their own currency. Congress was not able to tax so they had to borrow money on credit. Lastly, there was no national court system to protect the rights of United States citizens.

https://www.ewing.k12.nj.us/cms/lib6/NJ01001291/Centricity/Domain/122/articles%20of%20conf%20stength %20and%20weaknesses.pdf https://billofrightsinstitute.org/would-you-have-been-a-federalist-or-an-anti-federalist https://www.mtsu.edu/first-amendment/article/1175/anti-federalists

Anti-Federalist believed in a system where the central government shared power with smaller state run governments. It was believed that smaller local governments better understood what its people needed over one large central government. Each state would have the power to run itself according to what their people needed and feared that one large government would hold too much power and ignore what some states needed. Which also lead to the question of losing influence and independence since the original Constitution didn't guarantee citizen rights so anti-federalist were under the asusmption that it would be likehaving a King all over again. The Constituion and Articles of Confederation had the sameideaas far as being rules set by our government but the Articles was considered an early draft and had some key things added which created the constitution. Things such as the Articles only giving one vote to each state while the constitution gave every member in parliment a vote. The constitution also allowed for anyone to claim its rights while the articles withheld that power to certain and specific members.

https://dcps.duvalschools.org/cms/lib/FL01903657/Centricity/Domain/18/Federalists%20_%20AntiFederalists_0.pdf https://askanydifference.com/difference-between-articles-of-confederation-and-constitution/

For many years these United States have been so in title alone; with each state pursuing their own agendas to the detriment of the union. In our fear of what we had overthrown, we created a pitiful monstrosity of government, too weak to be even called a government let alone guide us to a brighter future. These articles of Confederation lack the strength to enforce their decrees primarily due to denying the government the power to levy taxes. Many have argued that the new federal government proposed by the Constitution would simply be a return to the tyranny we fought so hard to overthrow. I, however, must put those suspicions to rest. Far from ushering in a new wave of oppressive rulers, a powerful, central government will provide us with the means to prevent such despots from arising amongst us. A strong governing body with the power to tax its citizens, as presented by the Constitution, would be able to better manage the potential of this country and its people. These Articles of Confederation render the government too weak to perform any of its duties, however, the Constitution sets forth a plan for even the smallest of states to retain their hard-earned liberty while promoting prosperity for our posterity. Best wishes, Samuel K.

Schultz K. M. (2018). Hist5. Cengage Learning Incorporated. agree with your description of the Anti-Federalists. They had more interest in preserving the power in each state than having a unified government. Led by the “normal” citizens and working class, it was understood that the Constitution only aided the rich and would hurt the middle class and poor. I agree that the Articles of Confederation failed the economy and the Constitution strengthened it with taxation and a currency that would be accepted nationwide.

ow are you?! Great post by the way, you made some really good points and I actually like what you said in the beginning of it. "However, they were never able to efficiently organize throughout all thirteen states, so they had

to fight the ratification at every state convention." I liked this statement for 2 reasons. One because it is true, Anti-Federalist came so close but always fell short by a few votes to make this happen. Which is a crazy thought because imagine if they were able to sucessfully oppose radification? You and I could be living way different lives since we live in 2 different states. I also like that satement because I feel it was a testiment to how badly smalltown farmers and laborers wanted change and to get ride of having to be controlled by one large central government who held all the power. I think anti-federalist had a better graspof the life they wanted as well! Actually, I just think they liked the idea of something new, breaking away from the old and having the opportunity to create a new life and essentially a new world. I would imagine that traveling asmuch as they did and having to fight and compete somuch just to be heard would have been a huge pain and such an exhaustionspecially since they went through all that and still came up short. I would be prettymad myself lol. Maybe you being competitive isn't a bad thing, you'd fit right in with being an anti-federalist lol. Thinking about it life could have had some cool aspects had they succeded. Like having our own state govern itself could have a lot of potential. We could have possibly adopted a trade and barder system with other states for money and of course that also means each state would have the ability toset lawsinto place that they felt were needed. There are also alot of negatives I could picture too, like what would our military look like and be like? Would some states adopt a more hostile tone and look to invade or attack other states? There are just a lot of unkowns here but the idea is coo lto think about regardless.

I will be going with an anti-federalist position for this discussion, though the anti-federalist lost they made great pursuits towards equality, some of which most of us are still fighting for eben with the “Bill of Rights”. The anti-federalist wanted a weak central government as opposed to an all powerful one like that of Great Britain, which was ruled by tyranny. The anti-federalist wanted to remove that sentiment from the government that was being created in North America. Just like it is today, the anti-federalist (democrats) always fell short of making things happen and getting a small piece of the compromise when it is all said and done....