2595
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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 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 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 Brittish 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.                    |
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