Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson Volume I Part 2

That till this, they would not receive our vessels into their ports, nor acknowledge the adjudications of our courts of admiralty to be legitimate, in cases of capture of British vessels:

That though France and Spain may be jealous of our rising power, they must think it will be much more formidable with the addition of Great Britain; and will therefore see it their interest to prevent a coalition; but should they refuse, we shall be but where we are; whereas without trying, we shall never know whether they will aid us or not:

That the present campaign may be unsuccessful, and therefore we had better propose an alliance while our affairs wear a hopeful aspect:

That to wait the event of this campaign will certainly work delay, because, during this summer, France may a.s.sist us effectually, by cutting off those supplies of provisions from England and Ireland, on which the enemy's armies here are to depend; or by setting in motion the great power they have collected in the West Indies, and calling our enemy to the defence of the possessions they have there:

That it would be idle to lose time in settling the terms of alliance, till we had first determined we would enter into alliance:

That it is necessary to lose no time in opening a trade for our people, who will want clothes, and will want money too, for the payment of taxes:

And that the only misfortune is, that we did not enter into alliance with France six months sooner, as, besides opening her ports for the vent of our last year's produce, she might have marched an army into Germany, and prevented the petty princes there, from selling their unhappy subjects to subdue us.

It appearing in the course of these debates, that the colonies of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and South Carolina were not yet matured for falling from the parent stem, but that they were fast advancing to that state, it was thought most prudent to wait awhile for them, and to postpone the final decision to July 1st: but, that this might occasion as little delay as possible, a committee was appointed to prepare a Declaration of Independence. The committee were John Adams, Dr. Franklin, Roger Sherman, Robert R. Livingston, and myself. Committees were also appointed, at the same time, to prepare a plan of confederation for the colonies, and to state the terms proper to be proposed for foreign alliance. The committee for drawing the Declaration of Independence, desired me to do it. It was accordingly done, and being approved by them, I reported it to the House on Friday, the 28th of June, when it was read and ordered to lie on the table. On Monday, the 1st of July, the House resolved itself into a committee of the whole, and resumed the consideration of the original motion made by the delegates of Virginia, which, being again debated through the day, was carried in the affirmative by the votes of New Hamps.h.i.+re, Connecticut, Ma.s.sachusetts, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia. South Carolina and Pennsylvania voted against it. Delaware had but two members present, and they were divided. The delegates from New York declared they were for it themselves, and were a.s.sured their const.i.tuents were for it; but that their instructions having been drawn near a twelvemonth before, when reconciliation was still the general object, they were enjoined by them to do nothing which should impede that object. They therefore thought themselves not justifiable in voting on either side, and asked leave to withdraw from the question; which was given them. The committee rose and reported their resolution to the House. Mr. Edward Rutledge, of South Carolina, then requested the determination might be put off to the next day, as he believed his colleagues, though they disapproved of the resolution, would then join in it for the sake of unanimity. The ultimate question, whether the House would agree to the resolution of the committee, was accordingly postponed to the next day, when it was again moved, and South Carolina concurred in voting for it. In the mean time, a third member had come post from the Delaware counties, and turned the vote of that colony in favor of the resolution. Members of a different sentiment attending that morning from Pennsylvania also, her vote was changed, so that the whole twelve colonies, who were authorized to vote at all, gave their voices for it; and, within a few days, [July 9.] the convention of New York approved of it, and thus supplied the void occasioned by the withdrawing of her delegates from the vote.

Congress proceeded the same day to consider the Declaration of Independence, which had been reported and laid on the table the Friday preceding, and on Monday referred to a committee of the whole. The pusillanimous idea that we had friends in England worth keeping terms with, still haunted the minds of many. For this reason, those pa.s.sages which conveyed censures on the people of England were struck out, lest they should give them offence. The clause too, reprobating the enslaving the inhabitants of Africa, was struck out in complaisance to South Carolina and Georgia, who had never attempted to restrain the importation of slaves, and who, on the contrary, still wished to continue it. Our northern brethren also, I believe, felt a little tender under those censures; for though their people had very few slaves themselves, yet they had been pretty considerable carriers of them to others. The debates having taken up the greater parts of the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th days of July, were, on the evening of the last, closed; the Declaration was reported by the committee, agreed to by the House, and signed by every member present, except Mr. d.i.c.kinson. As the sentiments of men are known, not only by what they receive, but what they reject also, I will state the form of the Declaration as originally reported.

The parts struck out by Congress shall be distinguished by a black line drawn under them; * and those inserted by them shall be placed in the margin, or in a concurrent column.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Draft of Declaration of Independence, page016]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Draft of Declaration of Independence, page017]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Draft of Declaration of Independence, page018]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Draft of Declaration of Independence, page019]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Draft of Declaration of Independence, page020]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Draft of Declaration of Independence, page021]

* In this publication, the parts struck out are printed in Italics and inclosed in brackets--and those inserted are inclosed in parenthesis.

A DECLARATION BY THE REPRESENTATIVES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, IN _GENERAL_ CONGRESS a.s.sEMBLED.

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 a.s.sume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's G.o.d ent.i.tle 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 [_inherent and_] (certain) inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights, governments are inst.i.tuted 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 abolish it, and to inst.i.tute 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 shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolis.h.i.+ng the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations [_begun at a distinguished period and_] 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 [_expunge_]

(alter) their former systems of government. The history of the present king of Great Britain is a history of [_unremitting_] (repeated) injuries and usurpations, [_among which appears no solitary act to contradict the uniform tenor of the rest, but all have_] (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 [_for the truth of which we pledge a faith yet unsullied by falsehood._]

He has refused his a.s.sent to laws the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his governors to pa.s.s laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his a.s.sent should be obtained; and, when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pa.s.s 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 [_and continually_]

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 endeavored to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners, refusing to pa.s.s others to encourage their migrations. .h.i.ther, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands.

He has [_suffered_] (obstructed) the administration of justice [_totally to cease in some of these states_] (by) refusing his a.s.sent to laws for establis.h.i.+ng judiciary powers.

He has made [_our_] judges dependant on his will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a mult.i.tude of new offices, [_by a self-a.s.sumed power_]

and sent hither swarms of new officers to hara.s.s our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us in times of peace standing armies [_and s.h.i.+ps of war_] 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 const.i.tutions and unacknowledged by our laws, giving his a.s.sent 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 abolis.h.i.+ng the free system of English laws in a neighboring province, establis.h.i.+ng 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 [_states_] (colonies); for taking away our charters, abolis.h.i.+ng 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 [_withdrawing his governors, and declaring us out of his allegiance and protection._] (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 complete the works of death, desolation, and tyranny already begun with circ.u.mstances 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 amoungst us and 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, s.e.xes, and conditions [_of existence._]

[_He has incited treasonable insurrections of our fellow citizens, with the allurements of forfeiture and confiscation of our property.

He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred rights of life and, liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him, captivating and 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 and sold, he has prost.i.tuted his negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this execrable commerce. And that this a.s.semblage 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, by murdering the people on 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 pet.i.tioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated pet.i.tions have been answered only by repeated injuries.

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 [_who mean to be free. Future ages will scarcely believe that the hardiness of one man adventured, within the short compa.s.s of twelve years only, to lay a foundation so broad and so undisguised for tyranny over a people fostered and fixed in principles of freedom._]

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_] (an unwarrantable) jurisdiction over [_these our states_] (us). We have reminded them of the circ.u.mstances of our emigration and settlement here, [_no one of which could warrant so strange a pretension: that these were effected at the expense of our own blood and treasure, una.s.sisted by the wealth or the strength of Great Britain: that in const.i.tuting indeed our several forms of government, we had adopted one common king, thereby laying a foundation for perpetual league and amity with them: but that submission to their parliament was no part of our const.i.tution, nor ever in idea, if history may be credited: and,_] we [ ] (have) appealed to their native justice and magnanimity [_as well as to_] (and we have conjured them by) the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations which [_were likely to_] (would inevitably) interrupt our connection and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity, [_and 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 and foreign mercenaries to invade and destroy us. 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 hold them as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends. We might have been a free and a great people together; but a communication of grandeur and of freedom, it seems, is below their dignity. Be it so, since they will have it. The road to happiness and to glory is open to us too. We will tread it apart from them, and_] (We must therefore) acquiesce in the necessity which denounces our [eternal] 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 a.s.sembled, do in the name, and by the authority of the good people of these states reject and renounce all allegiance and subjection to the kings of Great Britain and all others who may hereafter claim by, through, or under them; we utterly dissolve all political connection which may heretofore have subsisted between us and, the people or parliament of Great Britain: and finally we do a.s.sert and declare these colonies to be free and independent states, 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, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor._]

(We therefore the representatives of the United States of America in General Congress a.s.sembled, appealing to the supreme judge of the world for the rect.i.tude 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.)