The Declaration of
Independence
Format, Background, and Results
The Declaration of Independence
• Overall, the
Declaration of
Independence was,
and is, the single
greatest United States
document.
• Declared to the world
America’s freedome
from Great Britain’s
oppressive rule!
– 1776
•
June 7 -- Congress, meeting in
Philadelphia, receives Richard Henry
Lee's resolution urging Congress to
declare independence.
•
June 11 -- Thomas Jefferson, John
Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Roger
Sherman, and Robert R. Livingston
appointed to a committee to draft a
declaration of independence.
American army retreats to Lake
Champlain from Canada.
•
June 12 - 27 -- Jefferson, at the
request of the committee, drafts a
declaration, of which only a fragment
exists. Jefferson's clean, or "fair" copy,
the "original Rough draught," is
reviewed by the committee. Both
documents are in the manuscript
collections of the Library of Congress.
•
June 28 -- A fair copy of the committee
draft of the Declaration of
Independence is read in Congress.
Chronology of
Events
• July 19 -- Congress orders the
Declaration of Independence engrossed
(officially inscribed) and signed by
members.
• August 2 -- Delegates begin to sign
engrossed copy of the Declaration of
Independence. A large British
reinforcement arrives at New York after
being repelled at Charleston, S.C.
• 1777
• January 18 -- Congress, now sitting in
Baltimore, Maryland, orders that signed
copies of the Declaration of Independence
printed by Mary Katherine Goddard of
Baltimore be sent to the states.
Chronology of
Events (cont.)
The meeting of the Continental Congress
(cont.)
On May 10, the Continental Congress adopted a
resolution that urged the states to form their own
independent governments to replace the defunct
royal governments. Despite this action, opinion
remained divided over the wisdom of having the
congress itself make a statement of independence
1. THE INTRODUCTION
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.
1. The Introduction. This he opening paragraph; a single sentence
beginning with "We the People..." It is sometime erroneously referred to
as the Preamble, probably because the opening paragraph of the US
Constitution is referred to as the Preamble to the Constitution.
2. The Preamble
We hold these truths to be • 2. The Preamble. The
second paragraph, which
self-evident, that all
begins with "We hold
men are created equal,
theses truths to be selfthat they are endowed
evident. The Preamble sets
by their Creator with
the logic al argument that
certain unalienable
people have rights, given
Rights, that among
not by men, but by their
creator.
these are Life, Liberty
and the pursuit of
Happiness.
2. The Preamble
…That to secure these rights,
Governments are instituted The Preamble.
among Men, deriving their
This section states that people
just powers from the
form governments to secure
consent of the governed, —
those rights and when a
That whenever any Form of
government becomes
Government becomes
destructive of those rights,
destructive of these ends, it
the people have a right and
is the Right of the People to
a duty to throw off that
alter or to abolish it, and to
government.
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.
The Declaration of Independence
2. Preamble (continued)
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 Declaration of Independence:
2. The Preamble (cont.)
• This section warns against frivolous uprisings
or takeovers merely for power. It says that
responsible people do not and will not
attempt these kinds of uprisings.
BUT…
3. The Indictment of King George
• 3. The Indictment of
King George III. The
list of wrongs the
King has done to
show the ways in
which the King has
abused the rights of
the colonists.
4. The Denunciation of the British
people.
A statement announcing not only the
separation of colonial government
from British government, but
colonial people from British people
and those loyal to Britain in the
American colonies.
5. The Conclusion
The Declaration of Independence
from the King and his British
peoples is the only logical
conclusion to be taken from the
above.
The Thirteen Colonies of
America
• Have you ever wondered what happened to those
men who signed the Declaration of Independence?
– Five signers were captured by the British as traitors,
and tortured before they died.
– Twelve had their homes ransacked and burned. Two
lost their sons in the Revolutionary Army, another
had two sons captured.
– Nine of the 56 fought and died from wounds or the
hardships of the Revolutionary War.