Anti-Federalist Papers

Anti-Federalist Papers is the collective name given to the works written by the Founding Fathers who were opposed to, or concerned with, the merits of the United States Constitution of 1787. Starting on 25 September 1787 (eight days after the final draft of the US Constitution) and running through the early 1790s, these Anti-Federalists published a series of essays arguing against the ratification of the new Constitution.[1] They argued against the implementation of a stronger federal government without protections on certain rights. The Anti-Federalist papers failed to halt the ratification of the Constitution but they succeeded in influencing the first assembly of the United States Congress to draft the Bill of Rights.[2] These works were authored primarily by anonymous contributors using pseudonyms such as "Brutus" and the "Federal Farmer." Unlike the Federalists, the Anti-Federalists created their works as part of an unorganized group.[3]

  1. ^ Klarman, Michael J. (2016). The Framers' Coup: The Making of the United States Constitution. Oxford University Press. p. 3. ISBN 9780199942046.
  2. ^ Cooper, Charles J. (1993). "Independent of Heaven Itself: Differing Federalist and Anti-Federalist Perspectives on the Centralizing Tendency of the Federal Judiciary". Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy. 16 (1): 119 – via Academic Search Premier.
  3. ^ Cornell, Saul (1999). The Other Founders: Anti-Federalism and the Dissenting Tradition in America, 1788-1828. University of North Carolina Press. pp. 22–24. ISBN 0807847860.