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THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE

Action of Second Continental 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 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.