The Declaration of Independence is one of the two most famous
documents of the United States of America. The other one is the
Constitution, but the Declaration came first. It was adopted on
July 4, 1776, by representatives of the 13 original colonies from
New Hampshire to Georgia. That was the beginning of the nation.
The place of meeting, the Pennsylvania State House, in Philadelphia,
became known as Independence Hall, and Americans celebrate their
country's birthday every July 4. Men on horseback carried printed
copies of the Declaration up and down the coast from Portsmouth
and Boston to Charleston and Savannah. In Philadelphia it was
soon written on parchment and signed by 56 delegates. Anyone who
looks at it in its glass case in the National Archives, in Washington,
D.C., will find some of the faded signatures hard to read. But
the president of the Second Continental Congress, John Hancock,
of Massachusetts, wrote his name large so that nobody could miss
it. And these men, during the rest of their lives, were proud
that their names were there.
This was the most important paper that any of them had ever signed.
It announced to the world that the 13 former British colonies
in North America were now free from the rule of King George III.
They were now independent states, but they were also united and
determined to defend their freedom at any cost. Some of the signers
were rich men who were risking their fortunes, and all of them
were risking their lives. Ever since that time, Americans have
rightly called them patriots and have regarded their Declaration
as something sacred--like the flag, almost like the Bible. During
World War II the old piece of parchment was kept safe in a vault
beneath the ground at Fort Knox, Kentucky, along with the Constitution
and the country's supply of gold. Since then the Declaration has
been carefully preserved and guarded, but anybody who wants to
see it can do so. Thousands of Americans look at it every year,
and it draws many visitors from other lands. The main reason for
this is that it is more than an assertion of American independence.
It is also a declaration of the right of all men in all countries
to be free from tyranny of any sort. Abraham Lincoln said this
in a speech in Independence Hall on his way to be inaugurated
as president, and it is still true today.
Why It Was Adopted
When the delegates in Philadelphia said they were willing to
die for freedom, they were talking of something they knew about.
They and their fathers had had much more freedom than the French
and Spanish colonists in the New World. They had legislatures
of their own that met in Williamsburg or Boston or Annapolis or
some other capital. They were used to managing their own affairs.
Their taxes had been light. They did not like some of the provisions
of the Navigation Acts, which required them to do most of their
business with England. But the British Government let them get
around some of these.
The American colonists counted on England to protect them against
their enemies. Their main enemies were the French until the end
of the French and Indian War, about a dozen years before the Declaration
of Independence. As a result of that war, the French were driven
from Canada and the rest of the North American continent. The
colonists were then freed from a great danger and were much less
dependent on the British. By the time of the Declaration of Independence,
the leaders decided that they could get along better without the
British. The main reason was that after the French and Indian
War the government in England asked things of the colonists that
it had not asked before and tried to take away rights they had
long enjoyed.
The British were thinking mostly of their own problems. They
had spent a great deal of money in the war with the French, and
after it they had to manage a much larger empire. They tried to
get money from the American colonies by taxing them. The most
famous case was that of the Stamp Act. But the colonies had no
representatives in Parliament, which passed this law. So they
said: "No taxation without representation." The British gave up
the Stamp Act, but said that Parliament had the right to pass
any law for the Americans that it wanted to. They tried to enforce
the trade laws better in order to get more of the income they
needed. The British, because of promises to the Indians, tried
to keep the Americans from moving westward as fast as they liked.
The colonists thought there were more British soldiers in America
than were needed. These "redcoats" were a tough lot, and stones
were sometimes thrown at them. Once when this happened, they fired
into the crowd and killed a few people. This was what the colonists
called the Boston Massacre. So the quarrel went on year after
year. The colonists refused to buy British goods when their arguments
did no good, and at times they were violent. They said they were
loyal English people, but they were determined to defend their
rights.
The main events that led to actual fighting took place in Massachusetts.
One of these was the Boston Tea Party. Toward the end of 1773,
a group of colonists dressed themselves like Indians and threw
into Boston Harbor three shiploads of tea belonging to a British
company. They were determined that nobody should buy the tea and
pay the tax on it. Somebody might have been tempted to do so,
because the British Government tried to help the company by lowering
the tax so that the selling price would be cheap. Many Americans
did not like the destruction of British property by a mob, but
the British Government punished Massachusetts so severely that
people in all the other colonies feared the loss of their own
freedom. Parliament passed the Intolerable Acts. They said that
no ships should sail into or out of Boston Harbor. They changed
the form of government of the colony in order to increase the
powers of the king and the royal governor. They tried to prevent
town meetings. They were trying to take from the colony of Massachusetts
the right to manage its local affairs. The First Continental Congress
met because of this crisis. The other colonies promised to support
Massachusetts, and the farmers of New England took up their rifles
against the redcoats. The American Revolution began with the firing
at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775. This is the reason
for the celebration of Patriot's Day in Maine and Massachusetts.
Blood was shed at Bunker Hill a little later, and these events
led to the Declaration of Independence.
What had happened was that the British Government had become
stricter with the colonies at just the time they were growing
stronger and more independent in spirit. The Americans were like
a young man who had grown up and was determined to manage his
own affairs. The British Government was like a father who wanted
his grown son to stay at home, to obey him, and to help contribute
to the expenses of the family. In earlier years the father had
granted his son much freedom, but he was now trying to take this
away. The son did not always behave well, but he was determined
to be a man. The result was a family quarrel that ended with his
leaving the family.
How It Was Adopted
The men who announced to the world that the states were now free
and independent were members of the Second Continental Congress.
This was a good deal like what we call a convention. There was
no law saying there had to be a Congress, as the Constitution
now states. When the delegates met, they were still subjects of
the king. They did not ask him if they might meet, and if they
had asked him, he would have said no. After the Americans fired
their rifles at Lexington and Concord and Bunker Hill, King George
III said they were rebels, and he sent troops to force them to
submit. Some of these soldiers were not even British, but were
Germans (Hessians) whom the King had hired from their German ruler.
The Continental Congress was as firm as the King. It elected
George Washington, of Virginia, to command the Continental Army
and defend Massachusetts. Until this time the Americans had been
blaming Parliament, not the King. They had refused to obey some
laws that Parliament had passed and has said that it had no right
to pass them. They had legislatures of their own. But they hesitated
to break with the King and give up the flag under which they had
lived all their lives. One thing that helped them decide to do
it was a fiery pamphlet by Thomas Paine called Common Sense.
Paine said that there was no sense in having a king, and that
it was absurd for a big continent to be ruled by a small island.
People in the different colonies, especially in New England and
Virginia, were urging the delegates to declare independence. They
reached the decision to do so on July 2, by adopting a resolution
presented by Richard Henry Lee, of Virginia. This resolution comes
at the end of the paper they adopted on July 4. Several weeks
before this, they had elected a committee to draw up a paper.
As the first sentence of this says, "a decent respect to the opinions
of mankind" required that they should declare the causes of the
painful separation from their home country.
What It Means
The Declaration was addressed to the whole world in language
of dignity and beauty. Luckily the task of writing it fell to
Thomas Jefferson, the delegate who was best fitted to perform
it. He thought this the most important thing he ever did, though
he later became president of the United States. The members of
the committee who were most helpful to him were John Adams, who
was older than he was and became president sooner, and Benjamin
Franklin, who was older still and was regarded as the most famous
man in the Congress. Franklin was one of the best writers of the
time, but somebody said that he would have put a joke in the Declaration
if he had written it. Some changes were made by Congress when
the paper was presented, chiefly by leaving things out. We can
still see the Declaration as Jefferson wrote it with his own quill
pen. He did this in his lodgings on the second floor of a plain
brick house, and he used a folding writing box that he set upon
the table. It had been made for him by a carpenter after his own
design. He gave it to one of his granddaughters and her husband
as a wedding present shortly before he died, and it is still preserved.
The first great public paper of the American republic falls into
two main parts. One of these, which is only a paragraph, tells
of the rights that belong to everybody. The second, which is longer,
tells of things the British had actually done against the rights
of Americans. These were charges against the King. George III
was not personally responsible for all of these actions, but Jefferson
did not want to mention Parliament. He and others had already
denied its authority over them. There was a reason for every one
of the charges, but nobody now thinks that George III was a tyrant
like Stalin or Hitler. He was a foolish king who asked too much
of his American subjects and then tried to force them to obey
him. They thought him a tyrant because they were so used to being
free and governing themselves. The charges against him are of
interest to students of history, but most people have forgotten
them.
The first paragraph will always be interesting to most Americans
because it sums up what they believe and have tried to live up
to. It also appeals to people everywhere because it talks about
all men, not just Americans. Many of the ideas in it came from
English writers, such as John Locke. Jefferson did not claim that
he was original. He said that he was stating what all the patriots
believed.
In the Declaration he stated that all men are born equal. This
does not mean that they are born equal in wealth. It does not
mean that at birth they all have the same strength of body or
mind. What it means is that they are equal in rights, whether
they are rich or poor, strong or weak. It means that people have
the same rights if they are Americans or Europeans, or are from
Asia or Africa. They have them because they are all human beings.
They have a right to live, to be free, and to be happy. Everyone,
no matter who he is, should be treated as a human being. In many
times and places people have not been treated that way. Americans
themselves have not always lived up to their beliefs. But, as
Abraham Lincoln said, the Declaration tells Americans what they
ought to do, and they must keep on trying to do it.
This part of the Declaration also says that governments have
been set up to protect the lives and liberties and happiness of
people. They exist for no other reason. It is not right to have
a government the people do not like. They have the right to change
it. Hardly any of the governments of Jefferson's time were based
on the "consent of the governed," and many of those of the 20th
century are not. Many of the countries have dictators who are
more cruel and powerful than any of the rulers of Jefferson's
day. In what is called the free world, however, governments are
based on the consent of the governed, and the people can change
them when they do not like them. That is one of the things we
mean by democracy. The Declaration tells us that tyrants should
always be resisted. After all these years it reminds us that every
person has the right to be free and to be treated like a human
being.
Dumas Malone
Author, The Story of the Declaration of Independence; Jefferson
the Virginian
Copyright © 2002 Grolier Incorporated. All Rights Reserved.