Civics In A Year
What do you really know about American government, the Constitution, and your rights as a citizen?
Civics in a Year is a fast-paced podcast series that delivers essential civic knowledge in just 10 minutes per episode. Over the course of a year, we’ll explore 250 key questions—from the founding documents and branches of government to civil liberties, elections, and public participation.
Rooted in the Civic Literacy Curriculum from the Center for American Civics at Arizona State University, this series is a collaborative project supported by the School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership. Each episode is designed to spark curiosity, strengthen constitutional understanding, and encourage active citizenship.
Whether you're a student, educator, or lifelong learner, Civics in a Year will guide you through the building blocks of American democracy—one question at a time.
Civics In A Year
The Anti-Federalists: America's Overlooked Founding Voices
Dr. Carrese returns to explore the Anti-Federalists, an overlooked yet crucial group of America's founders whose opposition to the Constitution led directly to the Bill of Rights and continues to shape constitutional debates today.
• Anti-Federalists opposed the 1787 Constitution because they feared the federal government would become too powerful and remote from the people
• They criticized the presidency as concentrating too much power in one person elected for a lengthy four-year term
• The Senate, the independent judiciary, and the small House of Representatives were viewed as threats to democratic representation
• Key Anti-Federalist writers included Federal Farmer, Brutus, and Sentinel, alongside notable revolutionary figures like Patrick Henry and Samuel Adams
• Historian Herbert Storing's "The Complete Anti-Federalist" finally collected these critical writings in the 1970s, nearly 200 years after the founding
• The Anti-Federalists' emphasis on civic virtue, republican self-government, and local control continues to influence debates about federalism
• Without their persistent criticisms, America would not have the Bill of Rights protecting individual liberties
Listen to our previous episode on the Federalist Papers to understand both sides of this foundational constitutional debate.
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School of Civic and Economic Thought and Leadership
Welcome back everyone. I am excited about today's topic because I feel like this group of people doesn't get talked about as much as always. We have Dr Carice back with us and Dr Carice, today we're going to talk about the anti-Federalists, right? So who were the most important anti-Federalists and why were their ideas so important? And we kind of touched on it in a previous episode, but I want to go more in depth with it today.
Speaker 2:Yes, thank you, liz, this does. This topic deserves more attention than it usually receives. Partly it's because of the anti-word and the name of these founders of our Constitutional the anti-federalists. And the anti-federalists were the opponents to the ratification of the 1787 constitution and because they lost, so to speak. The 1787 constitution was ratified by the requisite number of states and eventually by all the original 13 states. Well, the Anti-Federalists were the losers, and why do we care about losers, right? So our challenge is to see that, while the name is not great branding and I'll talk about this Anti-Federalists their contribution to the founding of American constitutionalism is very important and they deserve to be considered founding fathers. And I'll cite a great 20th century scholar who made this argument. So this is paradoxical Critics of our Constitution deserve to be considered founding fathers. Well, one obvious piece of evidence for this is that without the anti-federalists and their written and persistent criticisms of the new proposed Constitution, we would not have the Bill of Rights. And, in effect, the Bill of Rights was fairly certain to be a reality by the end of the ratification process itself. Sort of gentleman agreements had occurred in several important state ratification debates, saying, look if you vote to ratify this Constitution, me a real advocate of it, a Federalist as they were called. I pledge to you that amendments will be put forward immediately under the amendment procedure in the Constitution to establish a Bill of Rights. So that's a big, complicated argument. But to step back for a minute.
Speaker 2:The Anti-Federalists are the opponents because they believe the new proposed Constitution was establishing would establish too strong a government. The new federal government was going to be too remote from democratic consent. Offices that were too powerful. These were offices, said the Anti-Federalists, like what you'd see in an aristocracy or a monarchy. And eventually this new federal government under the new 1787 Constitution would overwhelm the state governments. You wouldn't have a federal republic, a republic made up of independent state governments. You would have one consolidated American government.
Speaker 2:And why did they say this? Well, if you think about just take the single executive office of the presidency that has control over the entire war powers, commander-in-chief powers, and over a lot of foreign affairs and administration, execution of domestic affairs, well, that's a lot of power in one office and it's a single person. And that single person is elected for a long term four years and in the original Constitution that office was not elected by the people, it was selected by a college of electors, as it was referred to. Okay, so there's one criticism of the Antifederos. Second one is that the Senate, in the legislature proposed by the 1787 Constitution, the upper house, the Senate, well, that's taking power away from the people's house, from the house of representatives. The Senate has distinct powers about treaties and about confirming judges proposed by the executive and by confirming other offices proposed by the executive. So this, this Senate, together with the executive, that's way that's. That's way too powerful and way too remote from the people. Then an independent judiciary, we'll talk about that. The size of the house itself was too small, it wasn't representative enough.
Speaker 2:And then, as I mentioned, the lack of a bill of rights, the lack of limits, guardrails against this new government's power, federal government power to protect individual rights. And to summarize all of it, the anti-federalists thought there was not enough attention to self-government and Republican civic virtue of participating citizens governing themselves close to their representative bodies, bodies. So, if you think about it, obviously the Bill of Rights is important. We can talk more about that. But think about what they were concerned about the federal government become too strong and too big. Well, we've heard a little bit about that in debates all during my lifetime I was born in the 1960s right the constant debate about which powers belong with the states and which powers are going with the federal government. And is the federal government in Washington DC just a sort of deep state that is interested in itself? Well, you know, not every particular criticism of the Anti-Federalists might be one that you agree with, and you might say the whole package of them was incorrect, that the Constitution should have been ratified. But, on the other hand, here we are 240 years later and some of these principles, issues, concerns that the Anti-Federalists raised are still with us and still very important.
Speaker 2:So let me just mention quickly the names of some of them. A great 20th century scholar named Herbert Storing, who was a professor for most of his career at the University of Chicago, said that there were really three of the anti-Federalist writers in different states who were as thoughtful and serious as the best of the Federalist writers, the Federalists being the proponents of ratification of the Constitution. And the three that he picked out were Federal Farmer, who probably was writing from Virginia, but we're not sure. Brutus, who was writing from New York, and Sentinel, who was writing from Pennsylvania, and, as we talked about in an earlier episode with the Federalists the Federalist papers. Federalists chooses Hamilton, chooses Publius as the pseudonym of the pen name. Right, well, these anti-Federalist writers were writing first. They were writing immediately after the Constitutional Convention closed in September of 1787. They chose pen names, often their Roman Republican names, roman Republican Liberty, but not always like federal farmer. And then there are others Agrippa is one author, cato. And then there are people who don't write under pen names but were very well known at the time of the founding and opponents to ratification of the Constitution in their state ratification conventions. So Patrick Henry is an anti-federalist, he opposes ratification conventions. So Patrick Henry is an anti-Federalist, he opposes ratification in Virginia. Samuel Adams. Samuel Adams opposes ratification in the Massachusetts Convention in 1777. George Mason of Virginia.
Speaker 2:Mercy Otis Warren, who turns out to be a great woman of letters and historian, writes an important history of the whole revolutionary and founding period. Mercy Otis Warren is an anti-federalist. So this is a great question.
Speaker 2:Because while they didn't have the anti-federalists, they didn't have a good PR operation, they didn't have a good public relations campaign, they didn't coordinate. I mean, it makes sense, right? They were interested in local liberty, local self-government, republican self-government out in the States. They didn't make a national coordinated campaign, the way Hamilton did. Hamilton picking the name Federalist, hamilton pulling up James Madison from Virginia and John Jay to write not just a few essays but 85 essays in a book under the name the Federalist. So the Anti-Federalists don't have a PR campaign, but they get, and then because of that they get stuck with the Anti-Name. The Federalists choose the name for themselves. We are a fan of this new Constitution, we have the true conception of Federalism and the opponents are stuck with Anti Anti-Federalists. But for all that, they are, as I've tried to suggest. These ideas, these writers, these Americans are very important for understanding our constitution and for founding our constitutionalism.
Speaker 1:Dr Kreish, I do have more questions, but I do. You know we had talked about because the Federalists put theirs like in a book right, and you told me a story about kind of the collection of the anti-Federalists to study 40 years ago as an undergraduate with a student of Herbert Storing's named Murray Dry.
Speaker 2:Storing died young, very suddenly, at age 49, of a heart attack, and Murray Dry finished this work and the work was called the Complete Anti-Federalist. You can find it, it's still in print from University of Chicago Press and the introductory volume of it, written by Storing, is what the Anti-Federalists were for and this is his big contribution that these were serious writers Among them, the best of them. They were as serious and thoughtful as Hamilton, madison, jay and other leading Federalist writers and they deserved to have their work collected. We deserved to read about it and argue about it. And I guess I'll mention the larger point that Storing makes this incredible claim that if you don't understand the Anti-Federalist point of view, you can't really claim to understand the Federalist point of view and you can't really claim to understand the Federalist point of view and you can't really claim to understand the American founding. And as an undergraduate I thought this was incredible, right to hear this argument that the anti-Federalists, the losers, were in a way as important as the Federalists. Now he does say and this is another extraordinary thing about Storing he says says in his own view as a scholar, the Federalists had the better argument. All things considered, all the factors considered, the Federalists make the better arguments. The Constitution should have been ratified. But think about that. Here's a scholar who devotes years of effort to collecting the best of the Anti-Federalist writings and then putting them not just in the big seven-volume version but in a one-volume version. So there's a kind of companion to the Federalist as a one-volume version. Right, that scholar Storing thought the Federalists had the better argument, but he's laboring to make sure the rest of us in America know the anti-Federalist arguments. So I'm going to read a quotation from his introductory volume If the foundation of the American polity was laid by the Federalists, says Storing, the anti-Federalist reservations echo through American history and it is in the dialogue, not merely in the Federalist victory, that the country's principles are to be discovered.
Speaker 2:I mean, that's an amazing argument. And if we had more of that spirit in American life, that if I hold a particular principle about the meaning of the Constitution, about some public policy question, but I really looked for and wanted to listen to the best arguments opposing it, I would understand my own argument better and I might actually make the further step of saying you know what there's a possible compromise I could make here. My apparent opponent has a good point or two right. And so now to get back to the anti-federalists. That's where the Bill of Rights comes from.
Speaker 2:If it weren't for the serious criticisms made by various anti-federalist writers Federal Farmer, brutus, sentinel, others federalists wouldn't have said you know what?
Speaker 2:They've got a good point and we're not going to win ratification. They've got such a good point we're going to lose the ratification vote in some of these states. We need to pledge to immediately amend this constitution using the Article V amendment procedure in it for a Bill of Rights. That's a great model for all of American political life and it's a paradox, but it's a crucial character of American politics and American political life. We find that we agree on certain principles. The Federalists and the Anti-Federalists agreed about individual natural rights. They agreed about the Declaration, they agreed about republicanism and self-government in general ways, and then they disagreed about how to actually live up to those ideas, how to implement them, and the argument produced a great thing the Bill of Rights as well as the argument producing the Federalists right. If it wasn't for the Anti-Federalist authors getting out of the gate first, hamilton and Madison and Jay wouldn't have been pushed to write such extraordinary essays as they did in the Federalist.
Speaker 1:And that Anti-Federalist collection wasn't put together until the 1970s.
Speaker 2:The 1970s, storing was thinking about the bicentennial of the Declaration of Independence. We're now thinking about the semi-quincentennial, the 250th anniversary. But Storing undertook this great scholarship because of a commemoration moment of the American founding.
Speaker 1:That's just thank you for indulging me, because when you told me that, it just, I think, blew me away that 200 years later, the anti-federalists finally get their volume and finally get somebody that kind of is out there saying this is important. I agree that the other side won, but this stuff is still very, very important. You mentioned the Bill of Rights as the most significant result of the anti-federalist critique of the proposed Constitution. How does that concern about lack of protection for individual rights fit under other anti-federalist concerns about the proposed federal government?
Speaker 2:Yes, this is one of Starring's great points, that there's a package of ideas the antifederalists have, even if they don't themselves coordinate and brand their messaging, so to speak, in the same coordinated way that Hamilton does with the antifederalists, but they fit together concern that this new proposed federal government, the new way of governing the union of the states produced too strong a government in the center and it would eventually take powers away from the state governments. And the root issue there is republicanism, republican self-government. So some of the anti-federalists would say you know, maybe this constitution could be ratified, but it has to be kind of amended first. Right, we could eventually accept something like this, but we need a larger House of Representatives and we need definitely the Bill of Rights to show what the limits are of this government. And maybe we should make some revisions to say, like there shouldn't be such a powerful independent judiciary that they have a power of constitutional interpretation, the power we call judicial review, now that these independent federal judges could strike down laws of the states or strike down laws of the Congress and the president in the federal government. So the whole theme of this is, yes, individual rights and individual liberty, but there's a positive, participatory element. It's not just what a government in the center shouldn't do, it's what states and local governments should do. So here I'll finish on this point.
Speaker 2:One of the major themes of the various anti-Federalist authors is that the whole approach of the Constitution didn't emphasize citizenship and civic virtue, the civic virtue of a self-governing Republican people to American government. Otherwise, why did we fight the revolution? Why did we resist an imperial government far away in London and resist a monarchy and an aristocratic class of nobles in the House of Lords? Why did we go through all this fight and effort and bloodshed and sacrifice to get a kind of local version of monarchy and aristocracy right? We should be thinking about Republican self-government in the States as very important. And yes, maybe we need to strengthen the Articles of Confederation a little bit. Maybe we need a little bit of stronger government, the center for the union, but not this strong, because the whole point of liberty and self-government and republicanism is being lost.
Speaker 2:So again, to echo Herbert Storing and my professor Mary Dry, the Bill of Rights does one huge piece of work to amend American constitutionalism at the beginning, and then it's up to us to continue, 240 years later, to continue with the debate between the federalist and anti-federalist views. What did the-Federalists get wrong? What are some good points and responses made by the Federalists? How do we strike the right balance between having enough government in the center to deal with foreign affairs and to deal with organizing our commerce and organizing relations among the states, and what government is too much in the center and how much government and activity should we have at the state level and at the local level? So we're greatly indebted to the Anti-Federalists for being such thoughtful advocates of this idea of Republican self-government and the need for civic virtue and for reasonable disagreement, civil disagreement and argument, and for reasonable disagreement civil disagreement and argument.
Speaker 1:Dr Kreis, thank you for helping us bring the anti-federalists to life. I feel like they don't get their due enough, but this was very, very helpful. Thank you again.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
