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 shewn, 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
[George III] 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 for 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 compleat the works of death,
desolation and tyranny, already
begun with circumstances of Cruelty
and 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
attentions 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 the 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.
The signers of the Declaration
represented the new states as
follows:
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple,
Matthew Thornton
Massachusetts:
John Hancock, Samual Adams, John
Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge
Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington,
William Williams, Oliver Wolcott
New York:
William Floyd, Philip Livingston,
Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon,
Francis Hopkinson, John Hart,
Abraham Clark
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
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
North Carolina:
William Hooper, Joseph Hewes,
John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward,
Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur
Middleton
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall,
George Walton
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