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.
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 shown, 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
Accommodations 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 Tyranny 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, 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 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 Offences:
FOR abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighboring 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 complete the Works of Death,
Desolation, and Tyranny, already begun with Circumstances
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 Insurrection amongst 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, 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 British
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.
GEORGIA, Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, Geo. Walton.
NORTH-CAROLINA, Wm. Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn.
SOUTH-CAROLINA, Edward Rutledge, Thos Heyward, junr.
Thomas Lynch, junr. Arthur Middleton.
MARYLAND, Samuel Chase, Wm. Paca, Thos. Stone, Charles
Carroll, of Carrollton.
VIRGINIA, George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Ths.
Jefferson, Benja. Harrison, Thos. Nelson, jr. Francis
Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton.
PENNSYLVANIA, Robt. Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benja.
Franklin, John Morton, Geo. Clymer, Jas. Smith, Geo.
Taylor, James Wilson, Geo. Ross.
DELAWARE, Caesar Rodney, Geo. Read.
NEW-YORK, Wm. Floyd, Phil. Livingston, Frank Lewis, Lewis
Morris.
NEW-JERSEY, Richd. Stockton, Jno. Witherspoon, Fras.
Hopkinson, John Hart, Abra. Clark.
NEW-HAMPSHIRE, Josiah Bartlett, Wm. Whipple, Matthew
Thornton.
MASSACHUSETTS-BAY, Saml. Adams, John Adams, Robt. Treat
Paine, Elbridge Gerry.
RHODE-ISLAND AND PROVIDENCE, &c. Step. Hopkins,
William Ellery.
CONNECTICUT, Roger Sherman, Saml. Huntington, Wm.
Williams, Oliver Wolcott.
IN CONGRESS, JANUARY 18, 1777.
ORDERED,
THAT an authenticated Copy of the DECLARATION OF
INDEPENDENCY, with the Names of the MEMBERS of CONGRESS,
subscribing the same, be sent to each of the UNITED
STATES, and that they be desired to have the same put on
RECORD.
By Order of CONGRESS,
JOHN HANCOCK, President.
BALTIMORE, in MARYLAND: Printed by MARY KATHARINE
GODDARD. |
