Ratification debatespoliticians and the American people's distrust of strong central government. Their most potent argument against the Constitution was that it lacked a bill of rights. The lively newspaper and pamphlet war over the Constitution was a key element of the ratification controversy. Federalists and Antifederalists published hundreds of essays praising or denouncing the document. They often signed these essays with pseudonyms drawn from classical sources such as Plutarch's Lives or from the seventeenth-century English struggles against the tyranny of the Stuart kings. Notable Antifederalist pamphlets included the Letters of Brutus, attributed to Robert Yates; Luther Martin'sGenuine Information; Mercy Otis Warren's Observations on the New Constitution ... by a Colombian Patriot; and the Letters from the Federal Farmer to the Republican, whose authorship is still disputed. Every state but Rhode Island elected a ratifying convention in 1787-1788, and only North Carolina's adjourned (August 2, 1788, by a vote of 185-84) without voting on the Constitution. (Rhode Island submitted the Constitution to its town meetings; on March 24, 1788, in a vote boycotted by most Federalists, the voters rejected it, 2,708-237.) The first five ratifications took place in quick succession: Delaware, December 7, 1787 (unanimous); Pennsylvania, December 12, 1787 (46-23); New Jersey, December 18,1787 (unanimous); Georgia, January 2, 1788 (unanimous); and Connecticut, January 9, 1788 (128-40). In Massachusetts, however, the Constitution ran into serious, organized opposition. Only after two leading Antifederalists, Adams and Hancock negotiated a far-reaching compromise did the convention vote for ratification on February 6, 1788 (187-168). Antifederalists had demanded that the Constitution be amended before they would Ratification debatesconsider it or that amendments be a condition of ratification; Feder...
