During the Constitution ratification debates between the Federalists (who supported ratification) and the Anti-Federalists (who opposed it), one of the most strident areas of disagreement was the extent to which the proposed position of president of the United States was actually an ersatz king. Leading Anti-Federalists thought the new president would be a thinly veiled monarch. In response, leading Federalists -- including those who would eventually hold radically different views of presidential powers -- joined forces to assuage Anti-Federalist concerns.

Multiple essays of The Federalist Papers, the Federalists' eponymous effort to publicly promote the ratification of the Constitution, were dedicated to explaining the nature of the office of the presidency. In Federalist No. 69, Alexander Hamilton -- who would in subsequent years take a much stronger view of Article II presidential power than his contemporary and Federalist Papers coauthor James Madison -- dedicated an entire essay to arguing that the president is not nearly as powerful as the British king. In making his case, Hamilton noted that the president "can confer no privileges whatever," whereas the king "can make denizens of aliens" and "noblemen of commoners."