Before the United States Constitution, there was the Articles of Confederation. The Articles of Confederation was known for being very weak and giving little power to the national government. With the Articles, the government could not tax the states, regulate trade, draft soldiers, or even create and enforce laws properly.
People in favor of the Articles of Confederation were called Anti-Federalists. They preferred when the power was in the hands of the state governments, not the national government. Many of them did not want a repeat of what happened with Great Britain and did not want to be taken advantage of again.
People who wanted something stronger and were not in favor of the Articles of Confederation were called Federalists. They wanted the national government to have more power, as they felt that having a weak national government was overall harming the country.
The original purpose of the Constitutional Convention of 1787 was just to amend the Articles of Confederation. This did not exactly happen though, as during this meeting the Articles actually ended up getting scrapped and the United States Constitution was created instead, which gave power to the national government.
