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 shewn, 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 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 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 endeavoured 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 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:
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 Insurrections amongst us, and has
endeavoured 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 Connexions 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
Connexion 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 Honour.
