Declaration of Independence

Explanation and Analysis of the Document

On July 4, 1776, Jefferson's amended draft of a document declaring independence from Great Britain was presented to the Continental Congress for a vote. This Declaration of Independence was a powerful statement of principle and high purpose. It was also a call to revolution. While the majority of the document consists of an exhaustive list of grievances against the British king, the driving creed can be found in the brief but powerful opening. An utterly amazing revolutionary document, it will ever be read and honored by lovers of liberty around the world. To the contrary, in his diary entry dated July 4, 1776, King George III of England wrote, “Nothing of importance this day” (Spalding, p. 215). As every American knows, the Fourth of July marks the anniversary of the founding of the United States of America. It was a monumental day and a monumental event; it was the beginning of a new nation.

One can hardly help but be moved by the inspiring words of the Declaration of Independence. The appeal to reason, the bold language and even bolder message, the call to arms, and the proclamation of universal rights all leave the reader reeling with democratic fervor. The language is concise, clear, to the point, and dripping with powerful prose and even more powerful imagery. From the preamble to the last resounding phrases, the men of the United States of America's founding era wrote a declaration for the ages.

Introduction and Preamble

Although the primary aim of the Declaration of Independence is to declare the independence of the United States, its related aims include the delivery of a compelling argument for the legitimacy of America's right to independence, to thus set the United States on an honorable foundation. In a letter to Henry Lee written on May 8, 1825, nearly fifty years after his drafting the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson remarked that the purpose of the document was “not to find out new principles, or new arguments, never before thought of …but to place before mankind the common sense of the subject, in terms so plain and firm as to command their assent, and to justify ourselves in the independent stand we are compelled to take” (Letter to Henry Lee).

The introduction of the Declaration of Independence begins, “When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another.” In the immediate opening, the focus is placed not on “the causes that impel them to the separation” but on “the Course of human events”—and moreover, not on the United States but on the broader “one people.” Within the preamble, the focus will likewise be on universal principles, not on particular events.

In conveying that the document shall address the standard by which any “one people” in “the Course of human events” may wish to declare independence, the introduction to the Declaration of Independence establishes the structure of the argumentation to follow. If the objective standard of the right to independence is accepted, and if the American states are found to have met this standard due to suffered injustices, the Declaration of Independence shall be found to present a compelling argument for the sovereignty of the United States of America.

Much of the phrasing and argumentation of the Declaration of Independence is rooted in Enlightenment ideology. Two particular elements of thought from the Age of Reason are crucial to understanding this document. First, according to Enlightenment thinkers, certain natural laws or fundamental principles are understood to exist. Furthermore, man is able to know natural laws by unaided human reason. As Jefferson claims, natural laws are “self-evident.” Human beings cannot alter or change the laws of nature but rather are participants in natural design; as the Declaration of Independence claims, the laws of nature are not determined by human beings but are created by “Nature's God.” Most significant is Jefferson's claim that natural laws have the following ethical implications for human beings: “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.”

Second, many Enlightenment thinkers, including the framers, subscribed to a certain genealogy of political life. According to this theory, prior to the invention of government, there existed a prepolitical state. In this state, termed the “state of nature,” natural rights were not equally protected in the strife of all against all. Government was then created by the consent of member peoples for the protection of natural rights. As such, the authority of any government rests in the hands of its political leaders only by virtue of the consent of the people. Thus, authority should ultimately be understood to rest in the hands of the ruled.

Enlightenment thinkers held that because the laws of nature are both irrevocable and universal, they can be appealed to as a consistent standard by which to judge the laws of governments, sometimes termed “positive law.” When positive law infringes upon man's natural rights, citizens have a right to rebel against the injurious forces of government. Within the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson refers to rebellion as not just a right but also a fundamental duty. Respect for natural law compels action to protect its principles and to avoid chaos and instability. At the same time, however, Jefferson promotes caution. He writes, “Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes.” Some sufferings are to be tolerated for the greater good of social order; however, as Jefferson and the other Founding Fathers observed, the British Crown had violated the natural rights of the American colonists with a “train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object.” As the Declaration of Independence concludes, the once-unifying force of British rule had operated against the interests of its colonial subjects, severing the colonists from their rights as human beings and violating the principles of its own authority.

In expressing that the American people wished to establish a sovereign government, the Declaration of Independence communicates the founding principles of the new nation. The United States of America would be structured in reaction to the unfavorable aspects of British law. Unlike Great Britain, the United States would protect the natural rights of human beings by “laying its foundation on such principles”—the laws of nature—“and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”

Indictment

The portion of the Declaration of Independence containing the colonist's many grievances against King George III provides evidence in support of the preamble's claim that the United States has a legitimate right to independence, as compelled by significant injury. Here, the universal focus of the preamble is abandoned in favor of a sharper focus on the practical facts that obliged the United States to declare separation. The indictment occupies a considerable portion of the written text of the document, supporting the claim of repeated injuries and usurpations.

At the time of the drafting of the Declaration of Independence, American complaints against the British Crown were well known. Among the colonists, some were compelled to raise these complaints following lived experiences of political oppression. Others then came to know of these complaints from widespread sources of report, including insurrectionary political pamphlets. In fact, the historical contexts of some of the events alluded to in the Declaration's list of grievances remain less known to modern students of history.

One such grievance states that the king refused to grant the colonies greater representation in Parliament despite the increasing population in the colonies. In 1767, under George III, eighteen Massachusetts laws for the establishment of new townships went ignored by the British Crown. Given the means of the era, expanding the colonies without developing new towns would have been difficult. Modes of transportation were limited, such that political representatives could not feasibly maintain contact with constituents in farther locations. Thus, new towns were needed in order to provide all citizens with access to political representation.

Another grievance addresses efforts made by the King to hinder immigration to the colonies, making reference to the royal Proclamation of 1763. This was a proclamation issued by King George III following Great Britain's acquisition of French territory in North America. The proclamation forbade colonists of the thirteen colonies from settling or buying land west of the Appalachians and gave the Crown a monopoly on land bought from Native Americans. The proclamation angered the colonists, since these were lands that they had helped fight for in the French and Indian War. Furthermore, many colonists had already settled in this area.

Another grievance refers to the brand of “mock Trial” received by British officials stationed in the colonies in accord with the Administration of Justice Act of 1774. The Administration of Justice Act granted a change of venue to another British colony or to Great Britain in trials of officials charged with crimes stemming from their enforcement of the law or suppression of riots. The purpose of this act was to ensure that the trials in question would be more conducive to the Crown than they would have been if held in the colonies, owing to the prejudices of local juries.

Although “cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world” appears as a general complaint, it specifically refers to the Boston Port Act of 1774. The Boston Port Act was a response to the Boston Tea Party; it outlawed the use of the port of Boston for “landing and discharging, loading or shipping, of goods, wares, and merchandise” until such time as restitution was made to the king's treasury and to the East India Company for damages suffered.

Another grievance admonishes the king “for abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring 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.” This grievance is a reference to the Quebec Act of 1774, which expanded British territory to include modern-day Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Wisconsin, and parts of Minnesota. The colonists denounced the act for establishing procedures of governance in this territory. The act also guarantees the free practice of the Roman Catholic faith in these lands, such that it was also denounced for giving preference to Catholicism.

One further grievance charges the King with the grave crimes of “taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments.” This complaint refers to the Massachusetts Government Act of 1774. In the wake of the Boston Tea Party, Parliament launched a legislative offensive against Massachusetts to punish its errant behavior. British officials realized that part of their inability to control the colony was rooted in the highly independent nature of local government there. The Massachusetts Government Act effectively abrogated the colony's charter and provided for an unprecedented amount of royal control. Severe limits were placed on the powers of town meetings, the essential ingredient of American self-government. Under the Massachusetts Government Act, most elective offices in the colony were to be filled with royal appointees, not with popularly elected officials.

Denunciation and Conclusion

The denunciation of the British Crown appears in the Declaration of Independence only after the conditions justifying the Revolution have been shown, in the indictment against the king. The denunciation conveys the Founding Fathers' disappointment that their attempts at rectifying injustices had thus far been unsuccessful. The list of grievances contained in the document would not be the British Crown's first clue to the colonists' discontent. As the denunciation claims,

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.

The last paragraph of the document includes the assertion that “these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States.” For the purpose of making this declaration clear, the conclusion provides a short enumeration of the rights of 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.” In becoming a sovereign nation, the United States would not only enjoy these rights but would also equally respect those of other nations.

Finally, the conclusion of the Declaration of Independence contains the first clear answer to the question, under whose authority was the document written? Here, it is claimed that the “Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress” are the spokespersons behind this announcement to the British Crown. This claim of authority together with the fifty-six appending signatures indeed sends a powerful message. On behalf of an emerging American politic, powerful through its unanimity, the inspiring words of the Declaration of Independence pronounce guiding and universal principles as well as the historic event of American independence.

Additional Commentary by Michael J. O’Neal, Ph.D.

When the Seven Years’ War between Britain and France ended in 1763, Britain was in deep debt. To alleviate this debt, Parliament passed legislation designed to increase tax revenues from Britain’s American colonies. Among these measures were the Stamp Act of 1765 and the Townshend Revenue Act of 1767. Many colonists objected to these measures, arguing that because the colonies were not represented in Parliament, that body had no authority to tax them. They expressed their dissatisfaction through the well-known phrase “no taxation without representation.” By the early 1770s numerous colonists, Jefferson among them, were beginning to believe that Parliament had no authority of any type over the colonies, each of which had its own legislature.

Matters came to a head in December of 1773 with the Boston Tea Party. To restore order in the unruly colony of Massachusetts, Parliament imposed what came to be called the Intolerable Acts. In response to these laws, the colonists in 1774 held the First Continental Congress, which resulted in two measures. One was to petition the king of England, George III, asking him to repeal the acts. The other was to organize a boycott of British goods. Hope remained high among many Americans who were still loyal to the British Crown that some accommodation could be reached.

Those hopes were dashed when the king rejected the colonists’ plea and the Revolutionary War began in April 1775 with the battles of Lexington and Concord. The Second Continental Congress convened in May 1775. Even then, most of the delegates to the Congress were unwilling to declare independence from Britain and continued to hope that the king would intervene. When the king refused and issued the Proclamation for Suppressing Rebellion and Sedition, the movement for American independence gained ground. It gathered more steam after Thomas Paine advocated independence and the formation of a republican government in his enormously popular pamphlet Common Sense.

On June 7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee, representing Virginia, submitted a resolution of independence. Some delegations opposed the resolution. Others had not yet been authorized by their colonies to support independence. Lee’s resolution was tabled while the Congress formed a committee to draft a document that would be published to explain why the resolution of independence was approved, if in fact it later was. Accordingly, on June 11, Jefferson joined John Adams, Robert Livingston, Benjamin Franklin, and Roger Sherman on the “Committee of Five” assigned the task of drafting a declaration of independence. The committee in turn relied on Jefferson to write a draft of the declaration. Jefferson based the document on three primary sources: the preamble to the Virginia constitution, the Virginia Declaration of Rights, written by George Mason in May 1776, and the English Declaration of Rights, written in 1689 to end the reign of King James II. Ironically, the task was regarded as a routine assignment, not one that would produce a foundational document that would inspire Americans for generations.

After some discussion and revision the committee submitted the declaration to Congress on June 28. Debate continued until July 2, when Congress, with twelve affirmative votes and one abstention, voted to approve Lee’s resolution. After two additional days of discussion and debate over the wording of Jefferson’s declaration, Congress approved it for publication on July 4. In an interesting footnote, John Adams predicted that July 2, not July 4, would become a great holiday in the United States.

In the opening sentence Jefferson acknowledges that if the American colonies were going to break with Britain, the grounds for doing so must be reasonable and the colonists should explain them to the world. In this sentence Jefferson invokes the “Laws of Nature.” In doing so he was bringing into the discussion the concept of natural rights, which represents a philosophical tradition from the eighteenth-century Enlightenment as articulated by such British philosophers as Thomas Hobbes and John Locke. The next paragraph begins with the most widely known words from the Declaration: “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.” The word unalienable meant that these rights that could not be alienated, or taken away. They were not granted by the state or a king, nor could the state or a king deny to citizens the full enjoyment of these rights. People possessed rights by virtue of being human.

Given these natural rights, Jefferson goes on to say that a government, because it is “instituted among Men,” could have legitimacy only from the “consent of the governed.” Accordingly, if a government deprived its citizens of “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness,” citizens were justified in abolishing their government and forming a new one. Jefferson acknowledges that governments should not be abolished for “light and transient causes” and then goes on to say that the “abuses and usurpations” of the British government showed a clear desire to reduce the colonies under “absolute Despotism.” Thus, colonists had not only the right but also the duty to “provide new Guards for their future security.”

The bulk of the Declaration of Independence consists of a lengthy list of ways in which King George had violated the rights of the colonists. Many pertain to administrative and legislative matters: that he had “refused his Assent to Laws,” that he had “forbidden his governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance,” that he had opposed laws “for the accommodation of large districts of people,” that he had imposed taxes without the colonies’ consent, that he had “dissolved Representative Houses,” that he had obstructed trade, and that in general he had harassed the colonies with burdensome and “fatiguing” requirements. It is noteworthy that the document never refers directly to Parliament. The colonists regarded the British Empire as a compact of territories under the authority of the king; because colonies were not represented in Parliament, that body had no authority over them. Thus Jefferson refers to Parliament as a “jurisdiction foreign to our constitution.”

Additionally, says Jefferson, the king had prevented efforts to populate the colonies by passing obstructive laws for migration and naturalization and, in matters of administration of justice, had submitted the courts and judges to his will alone, abolished colonial charters, transported criminals for trial, and deprived citizens of trial by jury. He had created “swarms” of administrators whose only purpose seemed to be to “harass our people, and eat out their substance.” He had kept standing armies in the colonies without the consent of the legislatures, elevated the military over the civil authorities, required the colonies to “quarter” armed troops (that is, to provide food and housing for them), seized colonists on the seas and forced them to serve in the British military, and transported mercenary soldiers into the colonies for the purpose of fighting the war.

After listing these “usurpations,” Jefferson notes that repeatedly the colonists had petitioned the king for “Redress” and had met with “repeated injury.” This observation was included because still, even after the outbreak of hostilities, many Americans remained loyal to the British Crown. Jefferson adds that the colonists had tried to appeal to “our Brittish [sic] brethren” and their “native justice and magnanimity” but that the British had been “deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity”—that is, of ties of blood. Accordingly, while the British would be friends in peace, they were “Enemies in War.” In the final paragraph, Jefferson incorporates the language of the resolution of independence adopted on July 2, 1776, in proclaiming that the colonies were now free and independent of Great Britain. It is generally believed that the delegates to the Second Continental Congress signed the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. Even Jefferson himself later perpetuated this incorrect belief. The wording of the Declaration was approved on that date, but most of those who signed the Declaration did not do so until August 2, 1776, and some signed even later.