Compare and contrast the competing arguments of the Federalists and Anti-federalists in the battle for ratification of the Constitution.

Federalists like Alexander Hamilton argued that a strong national government was necessary to protect the liberty of the people.

After the state delegations at the Philadelphia Convention had voted unanimously to endorse the Constitution, it was sent to the Confederal Congress which, after some debate, forwarded it to the states to be considered for ratification. Sensing the significance of America’s grand experiment in selfgovernance, James Madison declared that the battle to ratify the new Constitution “would decide forever the fate of republican government.” It was indeed a pivotal moment for the American republic, one that would ultimately set the United States on its course for at least the next two centuries.

Participants in the Debate

The debates over ratification of the Constitution represent the most important and intellectually sophisticated public debates in American history. On the one side, the supporters of the Constitution, or “Federalists,” argued that the nation desperately needed a stronger national government to bring order, stability, and unity to its efforts to find its way in an increasingly complicated world. Opponents of the Constitution, or “Anti-federalists,” countered that the governments of the states were strong enough to realize the objectives of each state. Any government that diminished the power of the states, as the new Constitution surely promised to do, would also diminish the ability of each state to meet the needs of its citizens. More dramatically, the Anti-federalists argued that the new national government was too far removed from the people and would be all too quick to compromise their rights and liberties in the name of establishing order and unity.

The Federalists and Anti-federalists became the first two political parties in the United states. While the Anti-federalist party disappeared long ago, traces of Anti-federalist thought persist in American politics today.

A handful of men on each side of the debate became the central figures in an extensive public discussion about the proposed Constitution, publishing a series of widely-published and carefully read articles explaining their positions. James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay, writing under the pseudonym Publius, wrote dozens of articles supporting the Constitution, which are now collectively referred to as the Federalist Papers. Articles written in response by George Mason, Elbridge Gerry, and Patrick Henry are known as the Anti-federalist Papers. While these writings are the best known and most widely read today, there were hundreds, even thousands of others who joined in the debates through public argument or speech-making and by writing articles, letters, and pamphlets.