1776 Declaration · Founding Made Plain

1In Congress, July 4, 1776

2The unanimous Declaration

3 of the thirteen

4 united States of America,

5When in the Course of human events,

6 it becomes necessary for one people

7 to dissolve the political bands

8 which have connected them with another,

9 and to assume among the powers of the earth,

10 the separate

11 and

12 equal station

13 to which

14 the Laws of Nature

15 and

16 of Nature's God

17 entitle them,

18a decent respect to the opinions of mankind

19 requires that they should declare

20 the causes which impel them

21 to the separation.

22We hold these truths to be self-evident,

23that all men are created equal,

24that they are endowed by their Creator

25 with certain unalienable Rights,

26that among these are

27 Life,

28 Liberty

29 and

30 the pursuit of Happiness.--

31That to secure these rights,

32 Governments are instituted among Men,

33 deriving their just powers

34 from the consent of the governed, --

35That whenever any Form of Government

36 becomes destructive of these ends,

37 it is the Right of the People

38 to alter or to abolish it,

39 and

40 to institute new Government,

41 laying its foundation on such principles

42 and organizing its powers in such form,

43 as to them shall seem most likely

44 to effect their Safety and Happiness.

45Prudence, indeed, will dictate

46that Governments long established

47 should not be changed

48 for light and transient causes;

49and accordingly all experience hath shewn,

50that mankind are more disposed

51 to suffer, while evils are sufferable,

52 than to right themselves

53 by abolishing the forms

54 to which they are accustomed.

55But when a long train

56 of abuses and usurpations,

57 pursuing invariably the same Object

58 evinces a design to reduce them

59 under absolute Despotism,

60 it is their right,

61 it is their duty,

62 to throw off such Government,

63 and

64 to provide new Guards

65 for their future security.--

66Such has been

67 the patient sufferance of these Colonies;

68 and

69 such is now the necessity

70 which constrains them to alter

71 their former Systems of Government.

72The history of the

73 present King of Great Britain

74 is a history

75 of repeated injuries and usurpations,

76 all having in direct object

77 the establishment of an absolute Tyranny

78 over these States.

79To prove this,

80 let Facts be submitted

81 to a candid world.

82[Grievance 1]

83He has refused

84 his Assent to Laws,

85 the most wholesome and necessary

86 for the public good.

87[Grievance 2]

88He has forbidden his Governors

89 to pass Laws

90 of immediate and pressing importance,

91 unless suspended in their operation

92 till his Assent should be obtained;

93 and when so suspended,

94 he has utterly neglected

95 to attend to them.

96[Grievance 3]

97He has refused

98 to pass other Laws

99 for the accommodation

100 of large districts of people,

101 unless those people would relinquish

102 the right of Representation

103 in the Legislature,

104 a right inestimable to them

105 and formidable to tyrants only.

106[Grievance 4]

107He has called together

108 legislative bodies

109 at places unusual, uncomfortable,

110 and distant from the depository

111 of their public Records,

112 for the sole purpose

113 of fatiguing them

114 into compliance

115 with his measures.

116[Grievance 5]

117He has dissolved

118 Representative Houses repeatedly,

119 for opposing with manly firmness

120 his invasions on the rights

121 of the people.

122[Grievance 6]

123He has refused for a long time,

124 after such dissolutions,

125 to cause others to be elected;

126 whereby the Legislative powers,

127 incapable of Annihilation,

128 have returned to the People at large

129 for their exercise;

130 the State remaining in the mean time

131 exposed to all the dangers

132 of invasion from without,

133 and convulsions within.

134[Grievance 7]

135He has endeavoured to prevent

136 the population of these States;

137 for that purpose

138 obstructing the Laws

139 for Naturalization of Foreigners;

140 refusing to pass others

141 to encourage their migrations hither,

142 and raising the conditions

143 of new Appropriations of Lands.

144[Grievance 8]

145He has obstructed

146 the Administration of Justice,

147 by refusing his Assent to Laws

148 for establishing Judiciary powers.

149[Grievance 9]

150He has made Judges dependent

151 on his Will alone,

152 for the tenure of their offices,

153 and the amount and payment of their salaries.

154[Grievance 10]

155He has erected

156 a multitude of New Offices,

157 and sent hither swarms of Officers

158 to harrass our people,

159 and eat out their substance.

160[Grievance 11]

161He has kept among us,

162 in times of peace,

163 Standing Armies

164 without the Consent of our legislatures.

165[Grievance 12]

166He has affected

167 to render the Military

168 independent of and superior to

169 the Civil power.

170[Grievance 13]

171He has combined with others

172 to subject us to a jurisdiction

173 foreign to our constitution,

174 and unacknowledged by our laws;

175 giving his Assent to their Acts

176 of pretended Legislation:

177[Grievance 14]

178For Quartering large bodies

179 of armed troops among us:

180[Grievance 15]

181For protecting them,

182 by a mock Trial,

183 from punishment

184 for any Murders

185 which they should commit

186 on the Inhabitants of these States:

187[Grievance 16]

188For cutting off our Trade

189 with all parts of the world:

190[Grievance 17]

191For imposing Taxes on us

192 without our Consent:

193[Grievance 18]

194For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits

195 of Trial by Jury:

196[Grievance 19]

197For transporting us beyond Seas

198 to be tried for pretended offences:

199[Grievance 20]

200For abolishing the free System of English Laws

201 in a neighbouring Province,

202 establishing therein an Arbitrary government,

203 and enlarging its Boundaries

204 so as to render it at once

205 an example and fit instrument

206 for introducing the same absolute rule

207 into these Colonies:

208[Grievance 21]

209For taking away our Charters,

210 abolishing our most valuable Laws,

211 and altering fundamentally

212 the Forms of our Governments:

213[Grievance 22]

214For suspending our own Legislatures,

215 and declaring themselves

216 invested with power to legislate for us

217 in all cases whatsoever.

218[Grievance 23]

219He has abdicated Government here,

220 by declaring us out of his Protection

221 and waging War against us.

222[Grievance 24]

223He has plundered our seas,

224 ravaged our Coasts,

225 burnt our towns,

226 and destroyed the lives of our people.

227[Grievance 25]

228He is at this time transporting large Armies

229 of foreign Mercenaries

230 to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny,

231 already begun

232 with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy

233 scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages,

234 and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

235[Grievance 26]

236He has constrained our fellow Citizens

237 taken Captive on the high Seas

238 to bear Arms against their Country,

239 to become the executioners

240 of their friends and Brethren,

241 or to fall themselves by their Hands.

242[Grievance 27]

243He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us,

244 and has endeavoured to bring

245 on the inhabitants of our frontiers,

246 the merciless Indian Savages,

247 whose known rule of warfare,

248 is an undistinguished destruction

249 of all ages, sexes and conditions.

250In every stage of these Oppressions

251 We have Petitioned for Redress

252 in the most humble terms:

253 Our repeated Petitions have been answered

254 only by repeated injury.

255 A Prince, whose character is thus marked

256 by every act which may define a Tyrant,

257 is unfit to be the ruler

258 of a free people.

259Nor have We been wanting

260 in attentions to our Brittish brethren.

261 We have warned them from time to time

262 of attempts by their legislature

263 to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us.

264 We have reminded them of the circumstances

265 of our emigration and settlement here.

266 We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity,

267 and we have conjured them

268 by the ties of our common kindred

269 to disavow these usurpations, which,

270 would inevitably interrupt

271 our connections and correspondence.

272 They too have been deaf to the voice

273 of justice and of consanguinity.

274 We must, therefore,

275 acquiesce in the necessity,

276 which denounces our Separation,

277 and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind,

278 Enemies in War,

279 in Peace Friends.

280We, therefore, the Representatives

281 of the united States of America,

282 in General Congress, Assembled,

283 appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world

284 for the rectitude of our intentions, do,

285 in the Name, and by Authority

286 of the good People of these Colonies,

287solemnly publish and declare,

288 That these United Colonies

289 are, and of Right ought to be

290 Free and Independent States;

291 that they are Absolved

292 from all Allegiance to the British Crown,

293 and that all political connection

294 between them and the State of Great Britain,

295 is and ought to be totally dissolved;

296 and that as Free and Independent States,

297 they have full Power

298 to levy War,

299 conclude Peace,

300 contract Alliances,

301 establish Commerce,

302 and to do all other Acts and Things

303 which Independent States may of right do.

304And for the support of this Declaration,

305 with a firm reliance

306 on the protection

307 of divine Providence,

308 we mutually

309 pledge

310 to each other

311 our Lives,

312 our Fortunes

313 and our sacred Honor.

314The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:

315Column 1

316Georgia:

317 Button Gwinnett

318 Lyman Hall

319 George Walton

320Column 2

321North Carolina:

322 William Hooper

323 Joseph Hewes

324 John Penn

325South Carolina:

326 Edward Rutledge

327 Thomas Heyward, Jr.

328 Thomas Lynch, Jr.

329 Arthur Middleton

330Column 3

331Massachusetts:

332John Hancock

333Maryland:

334Samuel Chase

335William Paca

336Thomas Stone

337Charles Carroll of Carrollton

338Virginia:

339George Wythe

340Richard Henry Lee

341Thomas Jefferson

342Benjamin Harrison

343Thomas Nelson, Jr.

344Francis Lightfoot Lee

345Carter Braxton

346Column 4

347Pennsylvania:

348 Robert Morris

349 Benjamin Rush

350 Benjamin Franklin

351 John Morton

352 George Clymer

353 James Smith

354 George Taylor

355 James Wilson

356 George Ross

357Delaware:

358 Caesar Rodney

359 George Read

360 Thomas McKean

361Column 5

362New York:

363 William Floyd

364 Philip Livingston

365 Francis Lewis

366 Lewis Morris

367New Jersey:

368 Richard Stockton

369 John Witherspoon

370 Francis Hopkinson

371 John Hart

372 Abraham Clark

373Column 6

374New Hampshire:

375 Josiah Bartlett

376 William Whipple

377Massachusetts:

378 Samuel Adams

379 John Adams

380 Robert Treat Paine

381 Elbridge Gerry

382Rhode Island:

383 Stephen Hopkins

384 William Ellery

385Connecticut:

386 Roger Sherman

387 Samuel Huntington

388 William Williams

389 Oliver Wolcott

390New Hampshire:

391 Matthew Thornton