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More About the
Declaration of Independence
THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE
In Congress, July 4, 1776,
THE UNANIMOUS DECLARATION OF
THE THIRTEEN UNITED STATES OF AMERICA |
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary
for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them
with another, and to assume among the Powers of the earth, the separate
and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle
them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should
declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal,
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,
that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That
to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving
their just powers from the consent of the governed.
That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends,
it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute
new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing
its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their
Safety and Happiness.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should
not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience
hath shown, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are
sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which
they are accustomed.
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the
same Object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism,
it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and
to provide new Guards for their future security.
Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now
the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government.
The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated
injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment
of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be
submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for
the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing
importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should
be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend
to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts
of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation
in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and
formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable,
and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole
purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly
firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others
to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation,
have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining
in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without,
and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that
purpose obstructing the Laws of Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing
to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions
of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent
to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their
offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers
to harass our People, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent
of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to
the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to
our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to
their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders
which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these states:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province,
establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries
so as to render it at once an example and fit
instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering
fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested
with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection
and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed
the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to
complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with
circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the
most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas
to bear Arms against their Country,
to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves
by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured
to bring on the inhabitants of our
frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare,
is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in
the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only
by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every
act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have
warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend
an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances
of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native
justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our
common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt
our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice
of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the
necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the
rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in
General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world
for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority
of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That
these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent
States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown,
and that all political connection between them and the State of Great
Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent
States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances,
establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which
Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration,
with a firm reliance on the Protection of Divine Providence, we mutually
pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
John Hancock, President
Attested, Charles Thomson, Secretary
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton
Massachusetts-Bay:
Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton
Maryland:
Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison,
Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton
New York:
William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris
Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George
Clymer,
James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean
North Carolina:
William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur
Middleton
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkins,
John Hart, Abraham Clark
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Have you ever wondered what happened to the 56 men who signed
the Declaration of Independence?
Five signers were captured by the British as traitors, and tortured
before they died. Twelve had their homes ransacked and burned. Two
lost their sons serving in the Revolutionary Army, another had two
sons captured.
Nine of the 56 fought and died from wounds or hardships of the
Revolutionary War. They signed, and they pledged their lives, their
fortunes, and their sacred honor. What kind of men were they?
Twenty-four were lawyers and jurists. Eleven were merchants, nine
were farmers and large plantation owners, men of means, well-educated.
But they signed the Declaration of Independence knowing full well
that the penalty would be death if they were captured.
Carter Braxton of Virginia, a wealthy planter and trader, saw his
ships swept from the seas by the British Navy. He sold his home
and properties to pay his debts, and died in rags. Thomas McKean
was so hounded by the British that he was forced to move his family
almost constantly. He served in the Congress without pay, and his
family was kept in hiding. His possessions were taken from him,
and poverty was his reward.
Vandals or soldiers looted the properties of Dillery, Hall, Clymer,
Walton, Gwinnett, Heyward, Ruttledge, and Middleton.
At the battle of Yorktown, Thomas Nelson, Jr., noted that the British
General Cornwallis had taken over the Nelson home for his headquarters.
He quietly urged General George Washington to open fire. The home
was destroyed, and Nelson died bankrupt. Francis Lewis had his home
and properties destroyed.
The enemy jailed his wife, and she died within a few months.
John Hart was driven from his wife's bedside as she was dying. Their
13 children fled for their lives. His fields and his gristmill were
laid to waste. For more than a year he lived in forests and caves,
returning home to find his wife dead and his children vanished.
A few weeks later he died from exhaustion and a broken heart. Norris
and Livingston suffered similar fates.
Such were the stories and sacrifices of the American Revolution.
These were not wild-eyed, rabble-rousing ruffians. They were soft-spoken
men of means and education. They had security, but they valued liberty
more. Standing tall, straight, and unwavering, they pledged: "For
the support of this declaration, with firm reliance on the protection
of the divine providence, we mutually pledge to each other, our
lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor."
They gave you and me a free and independent America. The history
books never told us a lot of what happened in the Revolutionary
War. Our forefathers didn't just fight the British. They were British
subjects at that time, and they fought their own government! Some
of us take these liberties so much for granted...and we shouldn't.
So, let's take a few moments while enjoying our 4th of July holiday
and silently appreciate these patriots and thank the God who moved
them. It's not much to ask for the price they paid. |
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