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Anti-Federalism was a late-18th-century political movement that opposed the creation of a stronger U.S. federal government and which later opposed the ratification of the 1787 Constitution. The previous constitution, called the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union , gave state governments more authority.
The Anti-Federalists also objected to the new powerful central government, the loss of prestige for the states, and saw the Constitution as a potential threat to personal liberties. [7] During the ratification process, the Anti-Federalists presented a significant opposition in all but three states.
Madison and Jefferson formed the Democratic-Republican Party from a combination of former Anti-Federalists and supporters of the Constitution who were dissatisfied with the Washington administration's policies. [141] Nationwide, Democratic-Republicans were strongest in the South, and many of party's leaders were wealthy Southern slaveowners.
Generally speaking they reflected the sentiments of the Anti-Federalists, which Akhil Reed Amar of the Yale Law School generalized as: a localist fear of a powerful central government, a belief in the necessity of direct citizen participation in democracy, and a distrust of wealthy merchants and industrialists. [7]
The Federalists of this time were rivaled by the Anti-Federalists, who opposed the ratification of the Constitution and objected to creating a stronger central government. [14] The critiques of the Constitution raised by the Anti-Federalists influenced the creation of the Bill of Rights. [15]
Central to Hamilton's argument was his belief that the federal government would be representative of the people and that a federal legislature could be trusted with a standing military. [9] Federalist No. 26 was one of the more populist of the Federalist Papers, contrasting with the elitism that is present in many others.
Madison, as written in Federalist No. 10, had decided why factions cannot be controlled by pure democracy: . A common passion or interest will, in almost every case, be felt by a majority of the whole; a communication and concert result from the form of government itself; and there is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party or an obnoxious individual.
Hamilton's arguments are a response to anti-federalist arguments against the new constitution and the strong general government that it implied. The anti-federalists feared that the national government would weaken their states and that national debts would burden the country, [2] and were particularly concerned with the executive branch ...