Final answer:
The Anti-Federalists demanded the addition of a Bill of Rights to protect individual liberties from a strong central government, leading to the inclusion of the first ten amendments in the Constitution.
Step-by-step explanation:
The Anti-Federalists pushed for the addition of a Bill of Rights to the United States Constitution because they feared a strong central government would trample on individual liberties. They argued that specific protections were necessary to safeguard the rights of citizens from the potential tyranny of centralized power. This concern arose after the 1787 Constitutional Convention proposed a new constitution that strengthened the federal government but did not include a bill of rights to protect individual freedoms.
Several states demanded that a bill of rights be included as a condition for ratifying the Constitution, with some states outright rejecting the Constitution without these protections. The Anti-Federalists feared that without a written guarantee of rights, the new government would be adept at expanding its powers at the expense of personal freedoms. Therefore, their insistence on a bill of rights was a strategy to ensure that specific liberties, such as freedom of speech, religion, and assembly, would be enshrined in the Constitution and protected from government infringement.
The result was the first ten amendments to the Constitution, known as the Bill of Rights, which was adopted after the new government was formed. By meeting this demand, the Federalists secured the ratification of the Constitution, and these amendments have become a crucial part of American identity and law, delineating the protections that citizens have from governmental overreach.