Before the United States Constitution, there was the Articles of Confederation. This came with many weaknesses and was why it eventually got scrapped, which caused the Constitution to be made instead.
The Articles of Confederation was very weak and gave little to no power to the government. With the Articles, the government could not regulate trade, tax citizens, or create and enforce laws properly. Occurrences like this raised a lot of problems and many people started doubting the Articles of Confederation.
Anti-Federalists were in favor of having a small and localized government, while Federalists wanted a strong government. Many Anti-Federalists associated having a strong government with what happened with Great Britain, they did not want the abuse of power to happen that would render American citizens powerless. Federalists felt as if having a strong government was needed to have a strong country and wanted to change the Articles of Confederation.
The first ten amendments in the United States Constitution are called the Bill of Rights. Many Anti-Federalists views are put into the Bill of Rights, as they came into agreement with the Federalists with creating a new constitution as long as certain things were addressed properly. With the Bill of Rights, things like the right to bear arms, certain power to the states and people, freedom of speech, religion, and press, are there in order to protect American citizens. The government also got split up into certain parts to prevent one part from gaining too much power and abusing power onto citizens.
