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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 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 benefit 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 compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny,
already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & 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. |
