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 endeavored 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 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
neighboring 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 complete
the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with
circumstances of Cruelty and 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
endeavored 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.
JOHN HANCOCK, President
Attest.
CHARLES
THOMSON,
Secretary.
