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 Tyrants 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 the 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 the 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 harrass 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 Rules 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 compleat 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 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.
|