1966
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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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