Bill of Rights, U.S.

The first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution are commonly referred to as the Bill of Rights. These 10 articles resulted from the clash between those who supported replacing the Articles of Confederation with the Constitution, drafted by the convention in Philadelphia, and those who opposed the new document. Opponents of the Constitution— dubbed Anti-Federalists by its proponents—argued that the Constitution created a consolidated or national government. As evidence for that charge, they cited the lack of a Bill of Rights, which, in Thomas Jefferson's words, was “what the people are entitled to against every government on earth, general or particular, and what no just government should refuse, or rest on inference.” Anti-Federalists were not so much interested in obtaining a Bill of Rights as ...