That too is a falsehood. In their own day Richard Henry Lee's Federal Farmer essays recieved a far wider circulation and following than any of their federalist counterparts. That fact is noted by no less a source than Forrest McDonald, who edited the modern edition of the Federal Farmer essays. Only after the debate did they ever fall into neglect if for no other reason than that they were on the side that was opposite of ratification.
Also among the most far-sighted convention-era writings were the anti-federalist letters entitled Genuine Information by Luther Martin. Martin was one of the most brilliant delegates at the constitutional convention, though also one the most eccentric and inflamatory. The Genuine Information letters are extremely far-sighted in scope - well beyond the Federalist Papers ever went. They include one of the strongest attacks upon slavery of any founding father and theorize about a trend of growth and centralization in the national government. They also foresee, in detail greater than any other writer at the time, the civil war and how it will be played out politically. Martin predicted that a time would come when the national government would become engaged in a great war with some of the member states, during which those states would draw recourse in the sword and the revolution. In one of his letters he proposed a means of mitigating this possibility in the constitution by establishing a legal mechanism by which any conflict would be conducted, then warned that its absence would be nothing less than a bloody mess. Unfortunately his words were not heeded and a bloody mess is exactly what the country got in 1861.
Hamilton's preferred ideas regarding an empirical central government are and were no secret. Your revisionist attempts to make it seem otherwise cannot erase history. After realising that no such plan would ever, ever succeed at the convention, he supported the proposed federal form of government. Suffice it to say that James Madison addressed the issue of his initial support quite nicely when, remembering Hamilton in 1831, he said the following:
"If his theory of government deviated from the republican standard he had the candor to avow it, and the greater merit of cooperating faithfully in maturing and supporting a system which was not his choice."
It is no secret why the State legislatures were NOT allowed to ratify the Constitution. They would have been had the idea been that the new federal Union was merely a creature of the states.
Abel Upshur put it best:
'The Federal Government is the creature of the States. It is not a party to the Constitution, but the result of it - the creation of that agreement which was made by the States as parties. It is a mere agent, entrusted with limited powers for certain specific objects; which powers and objects are enumerated in the Constitution." - Abel Upshur, 'The Federal Government, Its True Nature and Character' 1868
Of course, the constitutional supremacy of the federal government in conflicts with the states amply proves states were not even equals with the federal government much less superior.
Only in regards to those few and limited powers specifically granted to the Constitution. In ALL other things, the States were to be supreme.
"The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the Federal Government, are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State Governments are numerous and indefinite." - James Madison, Federalist Essay # 45
But the plan of the convention aims only at a partial union or consolidation, the State governments would clearly retain all rights of sovereignty which they before had, and which were not, by that act, exclusively delegated to the United States." (emphasis his)- Alexander Hamilton, Federalist Essay # 32
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. - Constitution of the United States, 10th Amendment
Yes, that is what I have been saying the authority was "from the People themselves." Glad you admit it.
The "people themselves" that Madison refers to were the people of each STATE, representing each STATE, and acting as STATES. The "People" did not ratify the Constitution, STATES did. As he clearly stated:
"That it will be a federal and not a national act...is obvious from this single consideration, that it is to result neither from the decision of a majority of the people of the union, nor from that of a majority of the states. It must result from the unanimous assent of the several states that are parties to it...were the people regarded in this transaction as forming one nation, the will of the majority of the whole people of the United States would bind the minority, in the same manner as the majority in each state must bind the minority... Neither of these rules has been adopted. Each state, in ratifying the constitution, is considered as a sovereign body, independent of all others, and only to be bound by its own voluntary act. In this relation, then, the new Constitution will, if established, be a federal, not a national constitution." James Madison, Federalist Essay # 39
However, Hamilton explained what was constitutional and what not in his essay discussing the constitutionality of the National Bank. After that there is little to be said and Marshall properly used it as the basis for major rulings which drove Jefferson nuts.
After the Constitutional union was established, the supra-nationalists with Hamilton at the head, began their dirty work of undoing the intended framework established at the conventions. The reason that Hamilton and some others had supported the Federal Constitution soon became obvious: They knew they could use deceitful legalism to pervert its language and achieve their original nationalist/consolidationist goals. As Jefferson wisely observed in 1820:
"The judiciary of the United States is the subtle corps of sappers and miners constantly working under ground to undermine the foundations of our confederated fabric. They are construing our constitution from a co-ordination of a general and special government to a general and supreme one alone. This will lay all things at their feet..." - Thomas Jefferson, letter to Thomas Ritchie, December 25, 1820
That is exactly what has happened, and what is happening still. The Constitutional government established by the Founding Fathers, and the one which the States agreed to, was erased by judicial action long, long ago.