I'm studying for the American Government clep exam, and the question was "The United States Constitution was opposed by which group?" The answer should be the anti-federalists, but the "correct" answer was the royalists. My question is, after America gained their freedom and then ratified a new constitution after the articles of confederacy, were there still loyalists in positions of power? And if so, were there enough of them to make up any type of voting bloc that had to be courted?
This has to be an error. Does it actually say "royalists" and not "loyalists"? Neither answer makes sense. By 1787 the loyalists were completely spent as a political force. There were hardly any left. 100,000 had fled the new nation. Those who stuck around kept their heads down. The main opposition to the ratification of the Constitution came, as you say, from the folks we call the Anti-Federalists, and their arguments had nothing to do with loyalty to the crown. If anything, the Antifeds were more hostile to monarchical tendencies than the Federalists. In his study of Anti-Federalism, The Other Founders, Saul Cornell is completely silent on the issue of latent loyalism. There was simply no alternative to republicanism in the public sphere.