Verified answer

They believed everything had been covered in the Constitution and pretty much it did. But someone felt like it didn't just like adding hate crimes that do not protect anyone but prosecute people. Someone was mad they didn't get what they wanted.

During the Ratification debates, several things in the Constitution concerned many delegates in the state's Conventions, not the least of which was the opening of the Preamble, "We the people".

Considering all of their concerns, many states put forth amendments. Most ratified the Charter with the promise of the forthcoming amendments. Two states refused to ratify the Constitution until those amendments were sent to the States for approval.

The basis of the concern was essentially that all those "self-evident" rights the Framers of the Constitution took for granted may at some point in the future may not be so "self-evident" to "we the people" and an improper and unconstitutional government would someday try and rule by a majority of "we the people" instead of the Constitution and use the will of a majority of "we the people" to eliminate those self evident rights and replace them with rights evident only to a majority.

A majority that would try to dominate the lives of every citizen of every state was their greatest concern.

Patrick Henry summed up the concerns here:

"I have the highest veneration of those Gentleman, (delegates to Philadelphia) -- but, Sir, give me leave to demand, what right had they to say, We, the People? My political curiosity, exclusive of my anxious solicitude for the public welfare, leads me to ask who authorized them to speak the language of, We, the People, instead of We, the States? States are the characteristics, and the soul of the confederation. If the States be not the agents of this compact, it must be one of great consolidated National Government of the people of all the States." – Patrick Henry, 1788 Virginia debates, stated on June 4, 1788

Many of the Amendments in the Bill of Rights were meant to reduce the concerns by establishing individual rights of a person and the individual states as more important than "collective" rights of a consolidated "we the people".

A number of States believed that without a Bill of Rights the Government would become oppressive and over reach their powers enumerated in the Constitution.

Some States believed that the Constitution was written so clearly that the Government would never over reach their powers enumerated in the Constitution.

There were enough States which believed a Bill of Rights was necessary, that without the promise of a Bill of Rights to be taken up by the first meeting of Congress the Constitution would have failed to be ratified.

As it ends up, the States which believed a Bill of Rights was necessary were right, and if they knew then what we know now, the Bill of Rights would have had a hundred Amendments, covering a thousand pages of detail (and even then, it probably would not stop the Government's over reaching).

The Articles of Confederation did not have any kind of Bill of Rights. When they were creating the Constitution, certain states would only ratify it if a Bill of Rights was included.

Same reason public option won't be in the Health Care Reform Bill. Politically infeasible.

they are after-thoughts; hence they are called amendments.

Dunno why not, but it was added to convinve Massachusetts to ratify the constitution.