HEN, in the courfe of human events, it becomes necef

Wary

'fary for one people to diffolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to affume among the powers of the earth the feparate 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 feparation.

We hold thefe truths to be felf-evident; that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among thefe are life, liberty, and. the pursuit of happiness; that to fecure thefe rights governments. are inftituted among men, deriving their juft powers from the confent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes deftructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to inftitute new government, laying its foundation on fuch principles, and organizing its powers in fuch form, as to them fhall feem moft likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long eftablished should not be changed for light and tranfient caufes; and accordingly all experience hath fhewn, that mankind are more difpofed to fuffer while evils are fufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abufes and ufurpations, pursuing inva

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riably

riably the fame object, evinces a defign to reduce them under abfolute defpotifm, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off fuch government, and to provide new guards for their future fecurity. Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and fuch is now the neceffity which constrains them to alter their former fyftems of government. The hiftory of the prefent king of Great-Britain is a hiftory of repeated injuries and ufurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an abfolute tyranny over thefe ftates. To prove this, let facts be fubmitted to a candid world.

He has refufed his aflent to laws the most wholesome and neceffary for the public good.

He has forbidden his governors to pafs laws of immediate and preffing importance, unless fufpended in their operation till his affent fhould be obtained; and when fo fufpended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pafs other laws for the accommodation of large diftricts of people, unless those people would relinquith the right of reprefentation in the legislature, a right ineftimable to them, and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and diftant from the depofitory of their public records, for the fole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has diffolved reprefentative houfes repeatedly, for oppofung with manly firmnefs his invafions on the rights of the people.

He has refused, for a long time after fuch diffolutions, to caufe others to be elected; whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercife; the ftate remaining in the mean time expofed to all the danger of invafion from without, and convulfions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these states; for that purpofe obftructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners; refufing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither; and railing the conditions of new appropriations of lands. He has obftructed the adminiftration of juftice, by refusing his affent to laws for eftablishing judiciary powers.

He has made judges dependent on his will alone for the tenure of their offices and the amount and payment of their falaries.

He has erected a multitude of new offices, and fent hither swarms of officers to harrafs our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies, without the confent of our legiflatures.

He has affected to render the military independent of, and fuperior to, the civil power.

He has combined with others to fubject us to a jurifdiction foreign to our conftitution, and un-acknowledged by our laws; giving his affent to their acts of pretended legiflation:

3

For

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us :

!

For protecting them, by a mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they fhould commit on the inhabitants of these ftates:

For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world:

For impofing taxes on us without our confent :

For depriving us, in many cafes, of the benefits of trial by jury: For tranfporting us beyond feas to be tried for pretended of

fences:

For abolishing the free fyftem 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 inftrument for introducing the fame abfolute rule into thefe colonies:

For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable. laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments :' For fufpending our own legiflatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legiflate for us in all cafes whatsoever. He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection, and waging war against us.

He has plundered our feas, ravaged our coafts, burnt our towns, and deftroyed the lives of our people.

He is, at this time, tranfporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, defolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumftances of cruelty and perfidy fcarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation.

He has conftrained our fellow-citizens, taken captive on the high feas, 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 domeftic infurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the mercilefs Indian favages, whofe known rule of warfare is an undiftinguished deftruction of all ages, fexes, and conditions.

In every stage of thefe oppreffions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been anfwered only by repeated injury. A prince whofe 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 to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts made by their legiflature to extend an unwarrantable jurifdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumftances of our emigration and fettlement here. We have appealed to their native juftice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them, by the ties of our common kindred, to difavow thefe ufurpations, which would inevitably. interrupt our connections and correfpondénce. They, too, have

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been

been deaf to the voice of juftice and confanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiefce in the neceffity which denounces our feparation, 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 Congrefs affembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, folemnly publish and declare, That thefe United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, FREE and INDEPENDENT STATES; that they are abfolved from all allegiance to the British crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of GreatBritain is, and ought to be, totally diffolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract allianees, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent ftates may of right do, And for the fupport 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 facred honour,

JOHN

NEW-HAMPSHIRE,

MASSACHUSETTS-Bay,

RHODE ISLAND, &c.

CONNECTICUT,

NEW-YORK,

NEW-JERSEY

HANCOCK.

Jofiah Bartlett,
William Whipple,
Matthew Thornton,
Samuel Adams,
John Adams,

Robert Treat Paine,
Elbridge Gerry.
S Stephen Hopkins,
William Ellery.
Roger Sherman, ‹
Samuel Huntington,
William Williams,
Oliver Walcott. }

William Floyd,
Philip Living fton,
Francis Lewis,

Lewis Morris.
Richard Stockton,
John Witherspoon,
Francis Hopkinfon,
John Hart,
Abraham Clark,

PENNSYLVANIA,