The Declaration of Independence in July of 1776, the Thirteen American Colonies Had Already Been at War with England for More Than a Year
The Declaration of Independence In July of 1776, the thirteen American colonies had already been at war with England for more than a year. It might seem strange that Americans would feel a need to spend time writing a formal Declaration of Independence, but that is exactly what they did. They felt obligated, they wrote at the very beginning of the Declaration, “by a decent respect to the opinions of mankind” to explain why they no longer considered themselves subjects of the British kingdom. This suggests how members of the Continental Congress such as Thomas Jefferson, who drafted the Declaration, viewed the relationship between a government and its citizens. They believed in a “social compact” among citizens, and between citizens and government. Simply by virtue of existing, they believed, every person has an equal right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” In order to make these rights secure, they wrote, “Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” Thomas Jefferson was the main author of the Declaration of Independence. A government, in other words, is established by citizens. The only reason people agree to this is so that government will protect their fundamental rights. King George III, wrote the Founders, had been breaking that agreement for a long time. Instead of protecting the people, his government had engaged in a “long train of abuses” of their rights. They believed no government should be changed “for light and transient causes.” They believed, however, that once the government becomes an enemy of rights, rather than their protector, citizens have a right to “alter or abolish” that government.
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