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The Declaration of Independence \\ 
of the \\
Thirteen Colonies.
}
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On July 2, 1776, in Philadelphia, the Continental Congress adopted the
resolution, introduced by Richard Henry Lee and John Adams,
which actually declared independence from Great Britain.
It declared, in part,
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.

The Declaration, which explained 
{\em why}
the Colonies (now States) declared
their independence,
was adopted by the Continental Congress July 4, 1776.

The leading draftsman was Thomas Jefferson, assisted by
John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Robert R. Livingston, and Roger Sherman.

\newpage

\section*{In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776  \\
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of
 America.}

{\Large 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     \\
\one    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   \\
\one    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,         \\
\one    [Thomas Jefferson had originally written inalienable]                       \\
\one    that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.           \\
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men,              \\
\one    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                                                   \\
\one    to alter or to abolish it,                                                  \\
\one    and to institute new Government,                                            \\
\two        laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers      \\
\three            in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their     \\
\three            Safety and Happiness.                                               \\
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not     \\
\one    be changed for light and transient causes;                                  \\
and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed       \\
\one    to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by          \\
\two        abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed.                      \\
But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same   \\
\one    object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism,            \\
it is their right, it is their duty,                                            \\
\one    to throw off such Government,                                               \\
\one    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   \\
\one    Systems of Government.                                                  \\
The history of the present King of Great Britain [George III] is a history of\\
\one    repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the       \\
\one    establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States.                  \\
\one    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  \\
\one    public good.                                                             

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing        
importance,                                                                  \\
\one    unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained,  \\
\one    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,                                                                      \\
\one    unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the  \\
\two        Legislature,                                                         \\
\two        a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.          

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable,  \\
\one    and distant from the depository of their public Records,                 \\
\one    for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly,                           \\
\one    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  \\
\one    be elected;                                            \\
\one    whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned \\
\two        to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the \\
\two        meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and     \\
\two        convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States;                  \\
\one    for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners;    \\
\one    refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither,              \\
\one    and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.                 

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice,                               \\
\one    by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.          

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for                            \\
\one    the tenure of their offices,                                               \\
\one    and the amount and payment of their salaries.                              

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of           \\
\one    Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.                

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies, without the consent  \\
\one    of our legislatures.                                                       

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the      \\
\one    Civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our     \\
\one    constitution and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their    \\
\one    Acts of pretended Legislation:                                             \\
\one    For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:                      \\
\one    For protecting them by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders        \\
        which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:           \\
\one    For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:                     \\
\one    For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:                              \\
\one    For depriving us in many cases of the benefits of Trial by Jury:           \\
\one    For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:        \\
\one    For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring           \\
\two        Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and            \\
\two        enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example         \\
\two        and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into         \\
\two        these Colonies:                                                        \\
\one    For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and        \\
\two        altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:                   \\
\one    For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested     \\
\two        with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.                

He has abdicated Government here by declaring us out of his Protection and     \\
\one    waging War against us.                                                    
                                                                               
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed  \\
\one    the lives of our people.                                                  
                                                                               
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to         \\
\one    complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun         \\
\one    with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most  \\
\one    barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.       

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas          \\
\one    to bear Arms against their Country,                                        \\
\one    to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren,                  \\
\one    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          \\
\one    merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare is an                \\
\one    undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.             

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the      \\
\one    most humble terms.                                                         \\
Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury.             \\
\one    A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a   \\
\two        Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.                     

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren.                \\
\one    We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature     \\
\two        to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us.                       \\
\one    We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement
here.\\                                               
\one    We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity,                  \\
\one    and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow     \\
\two        these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections    \\
\two        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            \\
\one    Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, \\
\one    in Peace Friends.                                                          

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States                        \\
\one    of America, in General Congress, Assembled,                                \\
\one appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions,\\
\one do, in the Name, and by the authority of the good People of these Colonies,  \\  
\one solemnly publish and declare.                                                   \\
That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and               \\
\one    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   \\
\one    is and ought to be totally dissolved;                                       \\
and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to                \\
\one    levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce,           \\
\one    and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of         \\
\two        right do.
And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the            \\
\one    protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other           \\
\one    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,      \\
\two    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,   \\
\two    Abraham Clark                                                               \\
Pennsylvania: Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton,     \\
\two    George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross        \\
Delaware: Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean                             \\
Maryland: Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone,                             \\
\two    Charles Carroll of Carrollton                                               \\
Virginia: George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, \\
\two    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.,        \\
\two    Arthur Middleton                                                            \\
Georgia: Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton                            

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