-EXPCITE-
    THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE - 1776

-HEAD-
    THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE - 1776 (1)

-STATUTE-
                         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.
             (1) The delegates of the United Colonies of New Hampshire;
          Massachusetts Bay; Rhode Island and Providence Plantations;
          Connecticut; New York; New Jersey; Pennsylvania; New Castle,
          Kent, and Sussex, in Delaware; Maryland; Virginia; North
          Carolina, and South Carolina, In Congress assembled at
          Philadelphia, Resolved on the 10th of May, 1776, to recommend
          to the respective assemblies and conventions of the United
          Colonies, where no government sufficient to the exigencies of
          their affairs had been established, to adopt such a
          government as should, in the opinion of the representatives
          of the people, best conduce to the happiness and safety of
          their constituents in particular, and of America in general.
          A preamble to this resolution, agreed to on the 15th of May,
          stated the intention to be totally to suppress the exercise
          of every kind of authority under the British crown.  On the
          7th of June, certain resolutions respecting independency were
          moved and seconded.  On the 10th of June it was resolved,
          that a committee should be appointed to prepare a declaration
          to the following effect: ''That the 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.'' On
          the preceding day it was determined that the committee for
          preparing the declaration should consist of five, and they
          were chosen accordingly, in the following order: Mr.
          Jefferson, Mr. J. Adams, Mr. Franklin, Mr. Sherman, Mr. R. R.
          Livingston. On the 11th of June a resolution was passed to
          appoint a committee to prepare and digest the form of a
          confederation to be entered into between the colonies, and
          another committee to prepare a plan of treaties to be
          proposed to foreign powers.  On the 12th of June, it was
          resolved, that a committee of Congress should be appointed by
          the name of a board of war and ordnance, to consist of five
          members.  On the 25th of June, a declaration of the deputies
          of Pennsylvania, met in provincial conference, expressing
          their willingness to concur in a vote declaring the United
          Colonies free and independent States, was laid before
          Congress and read.  On the 28th of June, the committee
          appointed to prepare a declaration of independence brought in
          a draught, which was read, and ordered to lie on the table.
          On the 1st of July, a resolution of the convention of
          Maryland, passed the 28th of June, authorizing the deputies
          of that colony to concur in declaring the United Colonies
          free and independent States, was laid before Congress and
          read.  On the same day Congress resolved itself into a
          committee of the whole, to take into consideration the
          resolution respecting independency.  On the 2d of July, a
          resolution declaring the colonies free and independent
          States, was adopted.  A declaration to that effect was, on
          the same and the following days, taken into further
          consideration.  Finally, on the 4th of July, the Declaration
          of Independence was agreed to, engrossed on paper, signed by
          John Hancock as president, and directed to be sent to the
          several assemblies, conventions, and committees, or councils
          of safety, and to the several commanding officers of the
          continental troops, and to be proclaimed in each of the
          United States, and at the head of the Army. It was also
          ordered to be entered upon the Journals of Congress, and on
          the 2d of August, a copy engrossed on parchment was signed by
          all but one of the fifty-six signers whose names are appended
          to it.  That one was Matthew Thornton, of New Hampshire, who
          on taking his seat in November asked and obtained the
          privilege of signing it.  Several who signed it on the 2d of
          August were absent when it was adopted on the 4th of July,
          but, approving of it, they thus signified their approbation.
            Note. - The proof of this document, as published above, was
          read by Mr. Ferdinand Jefferson, the Keeper of the Rolls at
          the Department of State, at Washington, who compared it with
          the fac-simile of the original in his custody.  He says: ''In
          the fac-simile, as in the original, the whole instrument runs
          on without a break, but dashes are mostly inserted.  I have,
          in this copy, followed the arrangement of paragraphs adopted
          in the publication of the Declaration in the newspaper of
          John Dunlap, and as printed by him for the Congress, which
          printed copy is inserted in the original Journal of the old
          Congress. The same paragraphs are also made by the author, in
          the original draught preserved in the Department of State.''
      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 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 distance 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
    offenses:
      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 & 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 Brittish 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.
                               NEW HAMPSHIRE
    Josiah Bartlett,                  Matthew Thornton.
    Wm. Whipple,
                             MASSACHUSETTS BAY
    Saml. Adams,                      Robt. Treat Paine,
    John Adams,                       Elbridge Gerry.
                                RHODE ISLAND
    Step. Hopkins,                    William Ellery.
                                CONNECTICUT
    Roger Sherman,                    Wm. Williams,
    Sam'el Huntington,                Oliver Wolcott.
                                  NEW YORK
    Wm. Floyd,                        Frans. Lewis,
    Phil. Livingston,                 Lewis Morris.
                                 NEW JERSEY
    Richd. Stockton,                  John Hart,
    Jno. Witherspoon,                 Abra. Clark.
    Fras. Hopkinson,
                                PENNSYLVANIA
    Robt. Morris,                     Jas. Smith,
    Benjamin Rush,                    Geo. Taylor,
    Benja. Franklin,                  James Wilson,
    John Morton,                      Geo. Ross.
    Geo. Clymer,
                                  DELAWARE
    Caesar Rodney,                    Tho. M'Kean.
    Geo. Read,
                                  MARYLAND
    Samuel Chase,                     Charles Carroll of
    Wm. Paca,                         Carrollton.
    Thos. Stone,
                                  VIRGINIA
    George Wythe,                     Thos. Nelson, jr.,
    Richard Henry Lee,                Francis Lightfoot
    Th. Jefferson,                    Lee,
    Benja. Harrison,                  Carter Braxton.
                               NORTH CAROLINA
    Wm. Hooper,                       John Penn.
    Joseph Hewes,
                               SOUTH CAROLINA
    Thos. Heyward,                    Thomas Lynch, Junr.,
     Junr.,
    Edward Rutledge,                  Arthur Middleton.
                                  GEORGIA
    Button Gwinnett,                  Geo. Walton.
    Lyman Hall,
      Note. - Mr. Ferdinand Jefferson, Keeper of the Rolls in the
    Department of State, at Washington, says: ''The names of the
    signers are spelt above as in the fac-simile of the original, but
    the punctuation of them is not always the same; neither do the
    names of the States appear in the fac-simile of the original.  The
    names of the signers of each State are grouped together in the
    fac-simile of the original, except the name of Matthew Thornton,
    which follows that of Oliver Wolcott.''
-END-