eXplorations>The
Revolution> Declaring
Independence>Rough Draft of the Declaration
A
Declaration of the Representatives of the UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
in General Congress assembled.
When
in the course of human events it becomes necessary for a people
to advance from that subordination in which they have hitherto
remained, & to assume among the powers of the earth the equal
& independant station to which the laws of nature & 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 change.
We
hold these truths to be sacred & undeniable; that all men
are created equal & independant, that from that equal creation
they derive rights inherent & inalienable, among which are
the preservation of life, & liberty, & the pursuit of
happiness; that to secure these ends, governments are instituted
among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the
governed; that whenever any form of government shall become destructive
of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish
it, & to institute new government, laying it's foundation
on such principles & organising it's powers in such form,
as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety &
happiness. prudence indeed will dictate that governments long
established should not be changed for light & 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 & usurpations, begun at a distinguished
period, & pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design
to subject them to arbitrary power, it is their right, it is their
duty, to throw off such government & to provide new guards
for their future security. such has been the patient sufferance
of these colonies; & such is now the necessity which constrains
them to expunge their former systems of government. the history
of his present majesty, is a history of unremitting injuries and
usurpations, among which no one fact stands single or solitary
to contradict the uniform tenor of the rest, all of which have
in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over
these states. to prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid
world, for the truth of which we pledge a faith yet unsullied
by falsehood.
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 & pressing
importance, unless suspended in their operation till his assent
should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has neglected utterly
to attend to them.
he
has refused to pass other laws for the accomodation of large districts
of people unless those people would relinquish the right of representation,
a right inestimable to them, formidable to tyrants alone:
he
has dissolved Representative houses repeatedly & continually,
for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of
the people:
he
has refused for a long space of time 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, & convulsions within:
he
has endeavored 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;
& raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands:
he
has suffered the administration of justice totally to cease in
some of these colonies, refusing his assent to laws for establishing
judiciary powers:
he
has made our judges dependant on his will alone, for the tenure
of their offices, and amount of their salaries:
he
has erected a multitude of new offices by a self-assumed power,
& sent hither swarms of officers to harrass our people &
eat out their substance:
he
has kept among us in times of peace standing armies & ships
of war:
he
has affected to render the military, independant of & superior
to the civil power:
he
has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign
to our constitutions and unacknoleged by our laws; giving his
assent to their pretended acts of legislation, for quartering
large bodies of armed troops among us;
for
protecting them by a mock-trial from punishment for any murders
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 of the benefits of trial by jury;
for
transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offences:
for taking away our charters, & altering fundamentally the
forms of our governments;
for
suspending our own legislatures & declaring themselves invested
with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever:
he
has abdicated government here, withdrawing his governors, &
declaring us out of his allegiance & protection:
he
has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns &
destroyed the lives of our people:
he
is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries
to compleat the works of death, desolation & tyranny, already
begun with circumstances of cruelty & perfidy unworthy the
head of a civilized nation:
he
has endeavored 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, & conditions of existence:
he
has incited treasonable insurrections in our fellow-subjects,
with the allurements of forfeiture & confiscation of our property:
he
has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating it's
most sacred rights of life & liberty in the persons of a distant
people who never offended him, captivating & carrying them
into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur miserable death
in their transportation thither. this piratical warfare, the opprobrium
of infidel powers, is the warfare of the CHRISTIAN king of Great
Britain. determined to keep open a market where MEN should be
bought & sold, he has prostituted his negative for suppressing
every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this execrable
commerce: and that this assemblage of horrors might want no fact
of distinguished die, he is now exciting those very people to
rise in arms among us, and to purchase that liberty of which he
has deprived them, & murdering the people upon whom he also
obtruded them; thus paying off former crimes committed against
the liberties of one people, with crimes which he urges them to
commit against the lives of another.
in
every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress
in the most humble terms; our repeated petitions have been answered
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 people who mean to be free. future ages will scarce believe
that the hardiness of one man, adventured within the short compass
of 12 years only, on so many acts of tyranny without a mask, over
a people fostered & fixed in principles of liberty.
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 a jurisdiction over these our states. we have reminded
them of the circumstances of our emigration & settlement here,
no one of which could warrant so strange a pretension: that these
were effected at the expence of our own blood & treasure,
unassisted by the wealth or the strength of Great Britain: that
in constituting indeed our several forms of government, we had
adopted one common king, thereby laying a foundation for perpetual
league & amity with them: but that submission to their parliament
was no part of our constitution, nor ever in idea, if history
may be credited: and we appealed to their native justice &
magnanimity, as well as to the ties of our common kindred to disavow
these usurpations which were likely to interrupt our correspondence
& connection. they too have been deaf to the voice of justice
& of consanguinity, & when occasions have been given them,
by the regular course of their laws, of removing from their councils
the disturbers of our harmony, they have by their free election
re-established them in power. at this very time too they are permitting
their chief magistrate to send over not only soldiers of our common
blood, but Scotch & foreign mercenaries to invade & deluge
us in blood. these facts have given the last stab to agonizing
affection, and manly spirit bids us to renounce for ever these
unfeeling brethren. we must endeavor to forget our former love
for them, and to hold them as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies
in war, in peace friends. we might have been a free & great
people together; but a communication of grandeur & of freedom
it seems is below their dignity. be it so, since they will have
it: the road to glory & happiness is open to us too; we will
climb it in a separate state, and acquiesce in the necessity which
pronounces our everlasting Adieu!
We
therefore the representatives of the United States of America
in General Congress assembled do, in the name & by authority
of the good people of these states, reject and renounce all allegiance
& subjection to the kings of Great Britain & all others
who may hereafter claim by, through, or under them; we utterly
dissolve & break off all political connection which may have
heretofore subsisted between us & the people or parliament
of Great Britain; and finally we do assert and declare these a
colonies to be free and independant states, and that as free &
independant states they shall hereafter have power to levy war,
conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, &
to do all other acts and things which independent states may of
right do. And for the support of this declaration we mutually
pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, & our sacred
honour.
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